I realized yesterday that wild food had been at my table every day for the last week! Rabbit stew was chased by crab and fish ramen, followed by Cambodian-style clams, followed by clam chowder, followed by Chinese-style rockfish and finally wild mushroom risotto with venison chops!
There are those who see what hunter-gatherers do as uncivilized and barbaric... a sort of sadistic aggression on a natural world of peace and harmony. These are usually (though not always) the people who will happily cast the first stone towards a mushroom forager, angler, or hunter and then discuss their disgust over Chilean sea bass and European Chardonnay.
I am sure I am preaching to the choir here, but the vinyard that made that wine necessarily displaced and/or irradicated all of the wildlife that once resided in that fallow land, the carbon footfrint of importing that wine and fish is astounding, and Chilean seabass is hardly a sustainable fishery.
Wouldn't you rather go gather local, abundant, sustainable, and seasonally available wild foods to provide a unique culinary experience (and relationship with your food) that cuts out the industrial middlemen?
Hey, wine is great...no argument there, I would not pass up a Bordeaux from Bordeaux (even knowing that any agricultual product necessarily impacts wildlife) but as far as our food is concerned, let's get out and gather in an ethical and yet fantastically fun way just a little more than "normal"! OK, my rant is over.
And so it was that Diane and I made our way to the far shores by kayak!
We were mostly shooting footage for the new Youtube channel (launching as soon as we get the last couple of shots and edits in) so we didn't take too many pictures. However, two seaside nights crabbing, clamming, and cooking was one heck of a good time!
*Remember to always call the biotoxin information line before harvesting to know when and where shellfish (clams, mussels, and crab) are safe to eat (In CA that number is 800 553-4133).
After some very productive clamming, we grabbed a few bay mussels and cooked up a simple little appetizer.
Then we got the ramen going in the wok.
The blend of rock crab, clams, and rockfish fillets added some incredible flavor to the soup and warmed our bones after a day of digging in the cold mud and sand... made colder when I had to wade out pants-less into the water to help a fisherman push his boat off of a sandbar after he ran aground.
Even though I have been seaside camping since I was a young boy, so I know to position the tent far from the water's edge and on higher ground, the highest ground we could find was only a foot or so higher than the surrounding shore. By the next morning at peak high tide, the water was less than two feet from the foot of our tent!
It had crept around us and came in from behind rather than from the ocean side. Luckily, we were just an inch too high for the water to reach us. Next time we will place the tent on the iceplant to gain another inch...though either way that water was too close for comfort! If it had been open ocean rather than a secluded and calm bay there is no way we would have camped so low as we would have surely awoke to deal with a very wet and cold night! Remember when setting up camp at low tide to at least be a few meters away from seagrass and driftwood lines on the sand that indicate the extent of a peak high tide!
After firing up the hobo stove and making some cowboy coffee, we paddled back to "civilization" and left our pirate cove until next time.
The Cambodian style clams were absolutely fantastic and the chowder was incredible!
Well, we finally got a solid rain! And you know what that means fungi fanatics!
Keep the old ways alive!
