Holly Heyser. Photo courtesy of Holly A. Heyser

There are hunters, and then there are hunters. There's a big difference between the people who sit around with guns, shooting at whatever moves in the distance, and those who carefully consider the philosophy of what they're doing, completing their bloody business with integrity. In the latter camp is Holly Heyser, known to many as NorCal Cazadora. (The term cazadora means "huntress" in Spanish, in case you were wondering.)

Since hunting and eating are so closely linked -- at least for some -- I thought I'd interview Holly to get her viewpoints on hunting, wild food, and what it means to be a girl in the field with a gun. She's got some valuable viewpoints here. I think you'll relate to a lot of what she has to say.

Doves. Photo courtesy of Holly A. Heyser

How did you get your start in hunting? What prompted you to try it to begin with?

Ten years ago, I never would have guessed that I’d become a hunter. I always assumed that I’d eventually raise animals for food, because that’s what my family did when I was a kid, and I knew that doing so produced better meat, and better lives for the animals. But I thought hunting was a bit creepy. I mean, killing animals for fun? Besides, guns scared me.

Then my boyfriend, Hank Shaw, started hunting, and from the very start, he invited me to join him. I was baffled. I mean, I was fine with him hunting because he was hunting for food, not for kicks, but I didn’t understand the logic of spending hours and hours in the field to get a couple ducks or rabbits when we could raise them in the back yard much more easily.

I remember asking him once, after he’d discovered he’d pulled rabbits he’d shot out of poison oak and was paying the price (he was from the East Coast and had never seen poison oak), “Wouldn’t it be easier to raise them in the backyard?” He said, “It’s not the same.” I didn’t get it.

What finally motivated me to join him was ducks. Wild ducks taste amazing, and you can’t get anything like them in any store, or even from your backyard. I decided that if I could eat them, I could damn well take responsibility for hunting them too. So I dove in.

What are your priorities when it comes to finding your own food?

I didn’t set out to design my hunting this way, but this is how it has worked out: What I love to eat the most, I love to hunt the most. I won’t hunt anything that I won’t eat.

But the force that motivates me to go out, and to endure sometimes harsh conditions, and the very real possibility of failure, is a bit more mysterious, and not driven directly by food. I love hunting. It is absolutely joyful. With rare exceptions -- like having a migraine, or shooting really, really badly -- I am blissful when I’m in the field.

Creepy, eh? How can I find killing to be joyful? The answer is, I don’t. Killing is unpleasant, at best, and can be really horrible if you do a bad job of it and the animal doesn’t die quickly. Yes, I’m excited when I have been successful, because a lot of planning and practice goes into that success. But I almost always put myself in the animal’s shoes as it dies, and it’s nauseating.

I have spent a lot of time trying to figure out why I love it so much, given the painful reality of inflicting death, and I have two explanations. One is that there is something fulfilling about doing what it is we’re supposed to do. Civilization has turned us into a species of dependents; very few of us know how to feed ourselves in a natural environment. Amazingly, we accept this as normal, when it’s actually insane. While civilization has given us lots of comforts and conveniences, it has also inflicted on us -- and the planet -- a lot of disease, physical and mental. Returning to how we’re designed to live is a brief reprieve from that insanity, even if we can’t truly escape civilization.

Reason No. 2 is the biological origin of the mental state I’ve described above: Love for hunting is a result of natural selection. In the past, those who loved hunting were more likely to bring home lots of meat, which led to healthier families, and a higher survival rate of offspring than for those who didn’t love hunting. Therefore, nature selected for those who love hunting. Ten thousand years of a more sedentary agricultural lifestyle can’t trump a million years of our genetic history.

Plucking Wild Turkey. Photo courtesy of Holly A. Heyser

What's your favorite creature to hunt, and why?

Ducks, ducks, ducks, ducks, ducks. They taste the best. We hunt primarily in the Sacramento Valley, where the ducks get fat all winter on the rice that remains in harvested fields, and fat is flavor. My favorite way to cook them is taking a dressed whole bird, salting it, browning it in duck fat, roasting it until the meat in the breast reaches 135 degrees, tenting it in foil for five minutes, then digging in. It’s eyes-rolling-back-in-your-head good.

They’re also fun to hunt because they’re challenging. They have a thousand ways to thwart me, which makes me laugh at myself. Ruddy ducks are some of the best at that. For duck hunting, I hide in clumps of cattails and lure ducks in range with decoys and duck calls. We’ll see ruddies barreling in from a quarter mile away, and they’re so fast that they’re almost impossible to shoot. They’ll fly low over the water, then lift just a little bit to zoom over us, often close enough for us to grab them. I’ve watched ruddies fly just a foot over my hunting partner’s head, or even between my hunting partner and me. I’m pretty sure they have a sense of humor.

Kung Pao Pheasant. Photo courtesy of Holly A. Heyser

Do you think your diet has improved since you started eating wild game/fowl?

Absolutely! I eat a more varied diet than I used to, not sticking to the chicken-pork-beef diet of most meat eaters. We eat rabbit, hare, dove, pigeon, snipe, squirrel, turkey, duck, goose, pig, deer, bear, elk and antelope. All of those animals taste different from one another, and even within each species, there are flavor differences rooted in each animal’s particular diet. Beyond that, I eat more parts of animals, including livers, hearts and gizzards, which can bring different nutrients to the table. (Literally!)

Also, I’m not ingesting all the hormones and antibiotics that go into the meats most meat-eaters consume. I can’t say the meat we eat is totally organic, because animals we hunt definitely feast at least in part in agricultural fields where pesticides and herbicides may have been used. But I suspect the meat we eat is far less polluted than what’s available in most stores.

And here’s a fun fact: My exercise regimen has gone out the window in the past five years (related to other factors in my life, not hunting), and I’ve abandoned the hideous low-fat diet I used to follow. I eat as much fat as I want, particularly duck fat, which we render during duck season and use to flavor foods year-round. But my cholesterol tests are nothing short of amazing -- the numbers are always in the “unusually good” range.

Blue Camas Bulbs. Photo courtesy of Holly A. Heyser

Why do you chronicle your experiences on your blog, NorCal Cazadora?

I started the blog on a lark --– I was looking for a platform for teaching my students a little HTML (I’m a journalism lecturer at Sacramento State), and I found Blogger so easy to use that I thought, “Hey, I can do this!”

At first I thought no one would read it. I mean, what hunter would look to a total newbie for advice or information? But I quickly found out that seasoned hunters really enjoyed reliving the experiences of a beginner through me. And people who were interested in taking up hunting – particularly women -- enjoyed having a role model who made them feel like they could do it too.

The basic story-telling on my blog very quickly evolved into a great ongoing conversation with my readers about why we hunt, and what ethical rules we should follow. I didn’t grow up hunting, so I’ve had to find my own way. It’s my readers who have helped me do that, and I am so grateful for this extended community I’ve found.

Wild Boar Liver Creme Caramel. Photo courtesy of Holly A. Heyser

What advice would you give to women who want to try hunting, but are unsure, intimidated, or any number of other feelings that might keep them from picking up a gun?

Let’s take these one at a time:

Fear of guns? I get that. But a gun is a tool, like a kitchen knife. You can cause tremendous harm with it if you’re careless, but there are rules that keep us safe with them, when we follow those rules. A huge part of learning to hunt is learning gun safety, so you can’t start hunting without learning those rules. A key one is always knowing where the muzzle of your gun is pointed, and making sure it’s not pointed at a human. I’ve had new hunters accidentally hit the trigger of their guns twice in the past few years, and the fact that their muzzle was pointed in a safe direction meant that the mishap, while disconcerting, was not harmful.

Intimidated? A lot of women worry about looking stupid shooting or hunting around more experienced people, particularly around men. For them, there are lots of programs where they can learn to shoot, take their hunter education course and even go on their first hunt in women-only groups. California Waterfowl does a ton of programs like that. I work with Cal Waterfowl on one held each September in which women do hunter ed, shooting instruction and a first hunt in one weekend -- a process that took me six weeks when I first started. It’s worth noting that Cal Waterfowl also has programs to help adult men, who can be equally intimidated, possibly even more so, because as men, they’re expected to be comfortable around firearms.

Unsure? This is the most important one. Can I kill? Can I gut an animal? Many women I meet say, “Oh, I couldn’t do that,” and I tell them they’d be very surprised about what they can do. That said, hunting isn’t for everyone. I strongly recommend that women (or men, for that matter) go along on a hunt before deciding to commit to hunting. They’re either going to hate it or they’re going to feel that electricity that I felt when I went along on a hunt -- the feeling that told me I must do this. If it’s not for you, that’s fine. You don’t have to apologize for it. There are other ways to acquire meat that’s been raised outside of the factory farms that many of us find so repugnant. And frankly, going vegetarian is an option too, if you really find the killing that upsetting.

One obstacle you don’t mention is money. Hunting isn’t cheap. Licenses, stamps and tags are expensive. Guns are expensive. Ammunition is expensive. Guides are expensive (you don’t have to hunt with them, but you’ll learn faster if you start with them). Gas is expensive, and unless you live in a place where you can step outside your back door and hunt, you’re going to have to drive to your hunting spots.

I won’t lie: The meat we eat in our house costs more than the meat we would buy at the store. It’s worth it to us because the meat is so good, and the experience adds so much to our lives. The upside is that we can take pride in the fact that the taxes and fees we pay on equipment, the hunting license fees and the public land use fees go directly into supporting habitat, not just for the animals we hunt, but for all the animals in those ecosystems. It isn’t a stretch in any way to say that the tremendous rebound we’ve seen in many wild animal populations is due to the contributions of hunters, not something achieved in spite of us. Urban and suburban land development takes habitat away; hunters give land back.

Related Video:

QUEST: Hog Wild
Video on Jul 14, 2009 by Chris Bauer from QUEST Northern California

Daniel Klein in Tartine Bakery kitchen in San Francisco.
All Photos: Wendy Goodfriend

Regular Bay Area Bites readers will be familiar with the edible explorations of BAB contributor Daniel Klein. The omnivorous chef and his vegetarian girlfriend/cameragal Mirra Fine are the dynamic duo behind The Perennial Plate, a web-based, weekly documentary real food romp devoted to socially responsible, sustainable and adventurous eating.

As you may recall, season one of the good grub chronicles introduced video viewers to a year of food finds in Minnesota, a state that Klein and Fine used to call home. Klein wants people to see where their meat comes from, so he documents rabbit, pig, and turkey killings, along with deer hunting, squirrel slaughtering and bison butchering, often set to a haunting soundtrack. For the more squeamish among us, there's also cranberry harvesting, morel mushroom gathering, and wild food foraging, typically accompanied by more uptempo tunes.

Mirra Fine filming Perennial Plate's dinner prep in Tartine Bakery kitchen.

In season two, which began in early May, the culinary couple took their show on the road for a six-month journey across America in search of stories (and the people behind them) that speak to the heart of food and farming practices in the nation. To date their eating expeditions have led them to harvesting produce in urban farms in New Orleans, hunting feral pigs in Texas, and catching frogs in Arkansas.

Funding for these mini food films has come from Klein's fans via Kickstarter and the National Cooperative Grocers Association. Some 15,000 people see the weekly videos, with Californian viewers coming in second behind Minnesotans as top watchers. The savvy shooter distributes his web work via The Huffington Post, Grist, Serious Eats and Take Part.

Daniel Klein and Samin Nostrat cook dinner at Tartine Bakery in San Francisco.

In the Bay Area this week, Klein teamed up with Tartine Afterhours chef Samin Nosrat to cook a memorable family-style meal for 40 last night at Tartine Bakery in San Francisco. The guest list, gleaned from Nosrat's considerable good food advocate contact list, included Chez Panisse Foundation folk, Eat Real Festival organizers, and a CUESA staffer. On the menu: Simple yet satisfying salads featuring new potatoes, roasted beets, and shaved summer squash. Followed by bronze-cut rigatoni served with Riverdog Farm pork for the meat eaters and cherry tomatoes generously doused in oregano from Oakland's Pluck and Feather Farm for the veg heads.

Chad Robertson's famed rustic bread at Tartine Bakery.

Oh, and some "little snacks" to nibble on initially, mostly seasonal veggies sparingly and elegantly presented with a posse of boiled eggs topped with herbs that wowed the gourmet cooking crowd. Did I mention that Chad Robertson's famed rustic bread was in abundance (and went home with diners)? Don't get me started on the Sunny Slope Orchard's apricots al cartoccio (think parchment paper) with whipped cream and lavender shortbread that provided the sweet end note to the meal.

Lavender Shortbread at Perennial Plate dinner at Tartine Bakery.

Klein and Nosrat swung through the temporary dining room, gracious, grateful and generous hosts both. Fine filmed the event, which featured music by Sonya Cotton and Gabe Dominguez. The 28-year-old chef, who has trained and worked in many top Michelin starred restaurants around the world (The Fat Duck, St. John, Mugaritz, Bouchon, Applewood, and Craft) and made films about Africa and oil politics, took some time at the end of the evening to chat about year two of his real food tour.

Guests feast at The Perennial Plate's dinner at Tartine Bakery in San Francisco.

Can you give us some of your initial impressions of the food scene in the Bay Area?

Obviously, local food here is huge, it's easy and everywhere. There are even some people who are tired of the whole idea. But I could do another 52 week series right here.

How about some highlights from your visit so far?

On the farms: Riverdog is huge but they've been able to get big without sacrificing their values or quality. Sunny Slopes is small and I ate a plum there that was probably the most delicious plum I've ever tasted. Those apricots speak for themselves. And then there's the local urban farming phenomenon personified by Esperanza Pallana of Pluck and Feather.

On the food front: We had a very good meal at Gather. It's refreshing when a high-quality chef does really interesting things with vegetables.

As for people: Samin is the most generous, relaxed, fun-filled, well-connected person to work with -- she organized this whole event -- and she's a great chef as well. And then there's the incredible generosity of the woman in Glen Park, a random stranger, who heard we needed a place to stay and put us up for three nights.

Has anything surprised you in your travels?

People's generosity and willingness to share their stories. We've met people who work really hard and maybe don't have much but they still take the time to show us their world and teach us new things about food. People have fed us, given us a bed, and while we've certainly been in situations where some subjects are off limits, nobody has murdered us.

What's the message you want viewers to take away from your films?

We want to educate and entertain and project a positive image of food around the country, without making it seem like things are perfect out there, because they're not. We're not trying to tell people what to do. We're trying to make people think about their food and become more engaged with what they eat.

What's next?

Foraging with Hank Shaw before we head to Ashland for a coop cookout on July 3rd. Once the road trip is over we'll have time to think about related projects like a cookbook or a long-form film based on our travels. But right now we're only a third of the way into it, so we're busy hitting the road, editing en route, and meeting and eating with a diverse range of food and farming people around the country. The adventure continues.

Stay tuned for The Perennial Plate's Bay Area installment coming soon in this space.

Check out The Perennial Plate's website and blog.

Chad Robertson's famed rustic bread Perennial Plate souvenir.

Florida: what do you think of? Your grandma in Boca? Bikinis in South Beach? The wild chickens of Key West? I didn't know what I was missing until I fell in love with a native Floridean who was determined to show me what she loved about her home state. Sure, we walked along the white Atlantic-side sands of Cocoa Beach and Delray Beach, and picked up shells from the Gulf of Mexico on the panhandle side. But mostly, we went inland, to explore the swampy, cypress-y, egret-y beauties of Central Florida, from the St. Marks Wildlife Refuge to Wakulla Springs (not to mention the Weeki Wachee mermaids, of course, but that's another story).

I'd read The Orchid Thief, by Susan Orlean, but I didn't realize how spot-on her reporting was until I watched a couple of sandhill cranes cavorting in a ditch alongside the highway. Lush nature was everywhere, creeping in between suburban developments and strip malls. Huge bushes of hibiscus and poinsetta. Stubby sabal palms. Anahingas perched on telephone wires, drying their wings. Alligators sunning themselves like piles of old tires.

I still hold an appreciation in my heart for the hidden treasures of this quirky, complicated state down at the bottom of the country, which meant I was instantly intrigued upon hearing about Hayley Downs' film Swamp Cabbage: A Dark and Sweaty Survival Guide, made with Bay Area artist Julie Kahn. Downs is a self-described "half-cracker," born and bred in central Florida, taught to hunt and fish alongside her dad in a place where hearts of palm don't come in a can and wild boar and venison are what's for dinner. "Spooky, dark, weird, unpredictable, beautiful," she calls it.

So what better way to raise completion money for such a film than to get help from the Bay Area's own huntin', fishin', and foragin' culture? This Saturday, you can support the film while grazing on unique eats you won't find elsewhere, at the 2nd benefit party hosted by Kahn and chef Ali Ghiorse of Savory Thymes, to be held in a private garden tumbling down a hillside in one of the posher bits of Marin. Part of the fun is in the discovery of different stations are set up throughout the garden for your nibbling pleasure.

Think Fatted Calf's beef jerky is the ne plus ultra of chewy dried meat? Well, the Jerk-Off Jerky Tasting might change your mind, offering everything from Maria Finn's salmon (the defending champion of last year's jerk-off) to Keith and Damon's Headlands caribou and Gator Bob's smoked alligator, all dried to a savory tooth-pulling chew. Prefer pickles? You can prattle about pickling with Sandor Katz, the father of the wild-fermentation movement, presiding over at the Pickle Party Smack-Down.

The menu, like anything based on wild foods, tends to shift until the food's actually on the table. (Last year, for example, wild boar was promised, except that the Sonoma hunting expedition to source it came up empty-handed; grilled lamb took its place.) But so far, meats promised include Devil's Gulch rabbit; Mendocino wild boar proscuitto; wild-caught raccoon stew; and Rocky Mountain elk chili; and Ryan Farr's puffy, crackly chicharrones. No shortage of vegetables, either, from wild mushroom soup and wild nettle pasta to Tierra Vegetables' purple Rio Zape beans and corn bread made (appropriately enough) from Bloody Butcher corn. And on the desserts table, I'll be offering up my own foraged-fruit turnovers. (Which reminds me: if any readers have extra backyard or farm fruit to offer, I'll be happy to come around and turn it into a donation to the arts.)

Of course, the real fun comes from the unexpected. Last year, after sunset, word went round the campfire that honest-to-Pete Tennessee moonshine was on offer in one of the darker corners of the garden. A perfectly respectable-looking couple, a doctor and his wife, had smuggled, inside their luggage, the product of a friend's backyard still. Now they were pouring tots of white lightning for any curious takers. It was surprisingly smooth, potent but definitely more Woodford Reserve than Copperhead Road. What will happen this time? Come and find out!

Wild Game & Foraged Feast, Sat., May 21st, 6-9pm. Tickets $75 and up.

Today, after the last of the snow in our backyard melted, it snowed again. It has been a long winter -- as it usually is in Minnesota (although I’ve only experienced two). This extended period of long-underwear, wool socks, and root vegetable stews is the reason why more people don’t live here. But as the snow melts and the temperature rises above 32 degrees, there is real joy. It’s not just a nice day for us… it’s excitement, anticipation and even a relaxation (of whatever muscles are used in shivering). And for me, most of all, it’s the search for wild foods that gets me out walking in the woods.

Over the course of the last year making episodes about food in Minnesota, of all the topics, foraging has been the most prominent. I suppose it is so with any subject, but the more you learn, the more wonderful and intriguing it becomes. A walk in the woods is not just beautiful, it is a shopping trip and a treasure hunt. So this time of year is the most exciting of all.

At this point in April when we (Minnesotans) have a few wild edibles popping out of the ground, you (Californians) have been eating them for months. But that doesn't make them any less special. So, this last Saturday we had a pizza party in celebration of Spring. It was quite ironic as the temperature dropped into the 30's that evening. Regardless, that morning we went foraging for the first of spring's offerings. A ritual that I wish was part of every cooking job: first go harvest, then go cook.

We found garlic mustard, nettles, ramps, daylilies and dandelion greens. The nettles were small and purple in color. They aren't woodsy or bitter at this point, more like spinach. We used these as a base for our pesto. The ramps were still a little young, so we didn't over pick them. If you haven't had a ramp yet, they are garlicky and delicious. I usually use the leaves for pesto while pickling the stems. The daylilies are shooting up all along the edge of my house, if you get them when they are young, they add a nice crunch with a very slight onion flavor. And dandelion greens -- they are bitter of course, but add a taste that connects you to the earth.

Recipe: Ramp Pesto

Ingredients:
• 1 part ramp leaves
• 3 parts nettles
• 1 part garlic mustard
• 1 part dandelion greens
• 1/2 part Extra Virgin Olive oil (more if needed)
• Salt

Instructions:
Blanch the nettles in hot water followed by an ice bath. Wring out the water. Puree all the ingredients together. You can add nuts or Parmesan if you want, but we we're going for more of a sauce type consistency. This could be used in pasta or as a sauce for more full flavored fish or a lighter meat. We used it on pizza, with a few dollops of chevre and cooked it in a wood-fired oven then garnished with some micro greens. A delicious spring.

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Recipe: Pizza Dough

The pizza oven and the levain used in the dough were both created by Lisa Ringer of Two Pony Gardens. She spent the last year collecting large stones from her property to decorate the oven all the while managing her wild yeast "mother." I used her levain to create my pizza dough, no commercial yeast added.

Ingredients:
• 1 Cup levain
• 3 Cups flour
• 1/2 Cup warm water
• 2 Tablespoons EVO
• 2 teaspoons sea salt

Instructions:
Because I was making dough for 150, I mixed the dough in a mixer. But for a small batch, do it in a bowl. Add a little extra water if necessary, you want the dough to be nice and wet. Once the dough is formed (as little mixing as possible, just knead until combined), I let it rise for a couple hours in the kitchen and then overnight in the fridge. The next morning, I divided it into small balls, covered with a damp towel and let it slowly rise again until i was ready to cook the pizzas. In the heat of a wood-fired oven they don't take more than a minute.

If there is ever a nuclear war or our food system completely falls apart, I'm heading to Hank Shaw's house. Besides being an avid hunter and gardener, Hank is a highly experienced forager -- which means that he's likely to be one of the few people who continue to eat well when the world is on its last legs (assuming we haven't destroyed all plant and animal life, too). Lucky for us, he chronicles his adventures on his blog, Hunter Angler Gardener Cook, and is about to release a cookbook/wild food guide, Hunt Gather Cook.

I'm excited to interview Hank about his new book and learning to forage in the Bay Area, an area that is teeming with wild edibles. He was also generous enough to provide a recipe for Fennel and Tomato Pasta Sauce, which you will find at the end of the interview.

Happy foraging!

How do you define "foraging?" What sort of things do foragers do?

I think of foraging as the gathering of wild plants and mushrooms, and, to a lesser extent, shellfish such as clams and mussels. For me, foraging is when you go looking for things that don’t run away. Hunting and fishing involves catching more mobile fare.

Foraging can be as easy as eating the weeds around your house -- you’ll likely find dandelion, wild lettuce, chickweed, plantain, wild mustard and possibly wild onions and salsify root in vacant lots and yards around the Bay Area. Or, foraging can be as tough as digging giant geoduck clams (pronounced gooey-duck), which live three feet under the sand and are only accessible at extreme low tides a few times each year. Picking berries is easy. Picking owl limpets off storm-tossed rocks in Bodega Bay is not.


Foraging has become more popular over the past few years. Any ideas why?

People are yearning to be closer to their food, to know where it comes from and to eat with a sense of place on the plate. To eat abalone is to be Californian. To eat wild rice is to link yourself to the great Northwoods of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan. Nothing is more local, more seasonal -- and, when done responsibly, more sustainable -- than incorporating wild food into your diet.

Foraging gets you out into the world, into the fresh air and into close contact with Nature. We are all so busy that maybe the simple act of hiking with a purpose provides the spark we need to get the hell away from the computer, whether it’s to bring back huckleberries for a pie or a deer for a full winter’s worth of meals. Foraging allows us to flirt with the wild.

I can walk nearly anywhere and spot edible plants and animals. Knowing that not everyone possesses that skill is a heady, powerful rush. I know I am not alone in that feeling, and many new foragers describe something similar to me when they find a good stash of nettles, or morels, or butter clams.


What can a Bay Area person find in their area? Any ideas for tasty things the average Joe or Jane should keep an eye out for? 


"Yard weeds" are a great place to start. I wrote a primer on lawn foraging a while back that runs through the basics. Mostly these are salad greens, and right now is prime time for them all.

Blackberries are a good one. Everyone knows what they look like, and they are everywhere. Put on some gloves and get out there in July and August. We also have great huckleberry picking around here. Huckleberries are a lot like blueberries, only a little spicier, a little more tart. There are other berries around, too.

Fennel is another easy one. Fennel is native to the Mediterranean, but it was brought to California by Italian immigrants a century ago and has naturalized here. It is the same fennel you get in the store, only denser and more flavorful; it will not have big, fat bulbs, though.

Are there any dangerous foods that locals should avoid? What are your thoughts on the general dangers of foraging? 


Everything has its dangers. Mushrooms, especially. I came very close to poisoning myself recently. I thought I had a fried-chicken mushroom: It met every descriptor, except the spore print. Had I been foolish enough to not take a spore print, who knows what might have happened? That said, chanterelles and morels are pretty easy to identify. Buy a good guidebook (I recommend David Arora’s All that the Rain Promises and More), learn it, and go slow.

This is also true for plants. There are lots of good guidebooks for West Coast foraging. Pick one up and study it, and then bring it into the field with you. Never eat something you cannot absolutely identify.

You will also meet up with ticks, bees, wasps, and, occasionally, rattlesnakes. It’s an occupational hazard. Bears and lions are around in the mountains, too, but they will not generally bother you. I’ve seen both animals several times while foraging. I gotta admit I was a little unnerved by the kitty, though.

Say a person wants to learn more about foraging before setting out on their own. Where should they go for more information? Should they take lessons or go on foraging walks? Where can they find such a thing? 


I know that some people do conduct foraging walks, but I have not been on one since I was 11 years old -- and that was in New Jersey. I’d contact Iso Rabins with Forage SF for more on that one. As for me, I learned everything I know from experience, from books, and from being with knowledgeable friends. If you are into mushrooms, however, there are several excellent mycological societies around the Bay Area. Join one, go on a foray, and learn. It’s a cool experience.

Can you tell us a little bit about your book? What topics does it cover? Will a Bay Area person be able to put it to good use? How about a person in other parts of the country? 


The book is called Hunt, Gather, Cook: Finding the Forgotten Feast, and it is intended as a guide and cookbook for anyone who wants to make wild foods part of their diet -- or for someone who already does fish, forage or hunt, this book will help expand their knowledge. A lot of people just forage, but don’t hunt or fish. A lot of hunters don’t know much about foraging, and a lot of anglers don’t understand hunting. This book brings it all together, with recipes at the end of each chapter. Some of those recipes are basic, like buttermilk fried rabbit, but others push the edges of wild game cooking, like wild boar liver crème caramel.

But I think the most important, the most unique piece of this book is the hunting section. Very few books have ever been written for adults who want to start hunting but have no idea how to go about it. Most intro-to-hunting books are geared for little kids. I include extended chapters on everything from hunting rabbits to deer to waterfowl, wild boar and upland game such as pheasants. Not a week goes by when I don’t receive an email from a reader of my blog who wants more information about how to start hunting. This book is an attempt to help.

As for the Bay Area, it is an integral part of my blog, Hunter Angler Gardener Cook, and since the book is an outgrowth of the blog, it follows that anyone living in the region will get a lot out of the book. There is not one chapter that is not relevant to someone living in NorCal.

That said, I have lived (and fished, hunted and foraged) in New Jersey, New York, Virginia, Minnesota and Wisconsin, and I have visited many other states in search of wild food. Just as there is no chapter that excludes California, no chapter excludes the rest of the country as well. Sure, there may not be highbush cranberries here in NorCal, but the Midwest doesn’t have manzanita or madrone. I write about all of them.

When does the book come out, and where can we get more information? 



Hunt, Gather, Cook comes out May 26. It is already available for pre-order on the various online booksellers such as Amazon.com and Powell’s. Once the book is released, I will be setting up a series of events in the Bay Area and beyond -- cooking demos, readings, even fishing and foraging trips. You can get updated information about both the book and where I will be doing events on my blog, Honest-food.net, and by following me on Twitter under @Hank_Shaw.

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Fennel and Tomato Pasta Sauce
By Hank Shaw, Hunter Angler Gardener Cook

Tomatoes and fennel pair well together, and this recipe is wonderful with the baby fennel that is sprouting all over the Bay Area right now. The sauce gets an added anise hit with a splash of Ouzo or Pernod, just to liven things up.

It is a great vegetarian sauce to serve with pasta, ideally a long pasta like spaghetti, bucatini or even homemade tagliatelle. Once you make the sauce, it will store in the fridge for 10 days or so. You can also freeze it.
Serves 6-8

Ingredients:
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 cup wild fennel, finely chopped
1/2 onion, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, chopped
1/4 cup ouzo or other anise-flavored liqueur
1 quart tomato sauce or crushed tomatoes
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon mint or lemon verbena, chopped
Salt to taste
Pecorino cheese to garnish

Instructions:
1. Heat the olive oil over medium-high heat in a wide, deep pan or a large pot. When the oil is hot, add the fennel and onion and saute for 4-5 minutes, until the veggies are translucent. Don’t let the veggies brown — turn down the heat if you need to. Add the garlic and saute for another minute or two.

2. Pour in the ouzo and let this boil until it is reduced by half. Add the crushed tomatoes, honey and mint and mix well. Taste for salt and add some if needed. Let this simmer gently for 30 minutes.

3. Put the sauce into a blender or food processor and puree. Pour the blended sauce back into the pot and bring to a simmer. You’re ready to serve. This is a powerful sauce, so use less than you think you need at first.

(Note: Photos courtesy of the fabulous Holly Heyser)

Food, glorious, food. It's that time of year people: Bay Area Bites brings you the best in food news for 2010.

In this two-part package, we look at the national trends and topics that sizzled over the past 12 months and serve up some local flavor on the side.

Feel free to weigh in with your own edible highlights from the year that was. In no particular order:

1. Food Safety

From previous years we've learned that what we eat can make us sick (tainted peanut butter, beef gone bad, and salmonella-laced spinach ring any bells?).

This year's food alerts: A massive egg recall and lingering questions about health risks associated with Gulf seafood.

Thankfully, late in the year Congress passed the Food Safety Modernization Act to protect consumers from food products hiding harmful poisons or pathogens like E. coli and salmonella, a food policy coup that greatly strengthens the Food and Drug Administration's ability to keep unsafe food off supermarket shelves and restaurant plates by expanding the agency's recall abilities and access to records.

Local angle: Bay Area-based media consultant Naomi Starkman kept the spotlight on potentially dangerous foods for sale in reports on Civil Eats and Huffington Post, including a story about a Consumers' Report study that found packaged salad laden with fecal bacteria.

2. D.I.Y. Food

Age-old practices such as canning, jamming, foraging, fermenting, growing and gleaning are suddenly new (and cool) again. Chickens are the au courant backyard animal of choice. And classes in the Domestic Arts all the rage.

The New York Times Magazine traveled west to take pretty pictures of urban homesteaders from the Bay Area, The Washington Post chronicled the canning trend long strong here, and Vogue got down and dirty with city farmer Novella Carpenter, who donned a pink cardigan in a concession to fashion for a photo shoot with the stylish mag's scribe Hamish Bowles. (Carpenter seemed to pop up everywhere last year, including on KQED.)

Local angle: In addition to Novella Carpenter's Ghost Town Farm in Oakland, the Bay Area D.I.Y. brigade created a kind of cottage industry, hawking their homemade wares at venues like SF Underground Market (Underground Market on BAB) and East Bay Underground Market, as well as the Pop-Up General Store.

And they wrote about it too; notable D.I.Y. books this year included Rachel Saunders' tome The Blue Chair Jam Cookbook, Napa forager Connie Green's The Wild Table (featured on The California Report), and D.I.Y. Delicious by Vanessa Barrington. Online, San Francisco's Sean Timberlake launched Punk Domestics, a curated space for D.I.Y.-driven cyber self-publishers.

Classes in baking, brewing, beekeeping, bottling, animal husbandry and more were in high demand at venues like 18 Reasons, Urban Kitchen SF, the Institute of Urban Homesteading, and BioFuel Oasis, a worker-owned cooperative begun by Carpenter and friends.

3. Food Politics

In an era of identity politics and culture wars, food fights join the fray. What you eat (and what you choose not to consume) speaks volumes about your political persuasions. First Lady Michelle Obama, dubbed America's foodie-in-chief by The Atlantic, talked about ending obesity and increasing activity with her Let's Move initiative. She also championed growing food and farmers' markets -- and brought to her kitchen top chefs like Sam Kass. On the other hand, Rush Limbaugh mounted a modern-day Twinkie defense (this time citing the fact that a man lost weight on a diet consisting mostly of the infamous junk food as evidence that all nutrition science is bogus). Sarah Palin showed up at a Pennsylvania school bearing cookies and dished up s'mores at a diner in a calculated countermove to a Michelle Obama dessert comment. Professional rager Glenn Beck even weighed in. Sigh...

The task of putting the food wars in context fell to ex-Washington Post writer Jane Black, who has moved to Huntington, West Virginia with new husband editor Brent Cunningham to see what happens to the community's eating habits now that celebrity chef Jamie Oliver has skipped town.

Local angle: Taking the happy out of Happy Meals: Outgoing SF Mayor Gavin Newsom vetoed a Board of Supervisors ban on plastic toys in fast-food meals. But the supes struck back, ensuring that no child in the city will be tempted to eat junk food simply to get their hands on a cheap trinket that will likely break before you can say Big Mac.

4. School Food

For the majority of schoolchildren around the country school lunch sucks. Big time.

But change is coming. This year, Jamie Oliver brought his Food Revolution to the States, an anonymous teacher chronicled what she ate every day in her school cafeteria in her blog Fed Up With Lunch, and President Obama signed into law the much-anticipated Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010. The legislation bans some junk food, and gives a small, though historically significant, six-cent increase per child per lunch (the first such boost in the reimbursement rate in 30 years), and there may be more lunch money tucked inside the bill to boot.

Local angle: Veteran school food reformer Alice Waters claimed victory for her Edible Schoolyard model following the results of a study on Berkeley's School Lunch Initiative from University of California at Berkeley researchers.

5. Street Food

Fueled by Twitter feeds, gourmet grub on the go continued to attract a growing following around the country as food trucks hit the streets in increasingly more legitimate ways, boasting inspired names and bright colors, to wit The Best Wurst in Austin, Big Gay Ice Cream Truck in New York City, and Chairman Bao in San Francisco.

Food trucks went a step further in size, too, with the introduction of bustaurants, stripped former public transit buses reconfigured as a mobile kitchen, and, in some cases, even offering eat-in seating. In L.A. the double decker Worldfare dished up ethnic eats, while closer to home Le Truc in San Francisco served up gastro-pub fare, and Diamond Lil debuted to a small crowd and a camera crew.

Los Angeles officials announced it may regulate mobile carts, a move that could see other cities follow suit.

Local angle: With mild-mannered accountant Matt Cohen at the helm, the mobile food fest Off the Grid launched in Fort Mason and sprouted several neighborhood locations, including Golden Gate Park, McCoppin Hub, Civic Center, and UN Plaza. Officials in San Francisco passed reforms making it easier and cheaper for mobile vendors to serve street eats, while in the East Bay the city of Emeryville saw pushback from local brick-and-mortar businesses and Berkeley residents bemoaned missing out on most of the mobile food fun (for now).

Check BAB tomorrow for the rest of the best of 2010 food news.

Let's Preserve volunteers get ready to make apple sauce. Photo: Agustin Gutierrez

Foraging with friends and gleaning for good is very much back in vogue. Locally folks like Asiya Wadud of Forage Oakland and Iso Rabins of forageSF, as well as North Berkeley Harvest, PUEBLO Urban Youth Harvest in Oakland, and Anna Chan (aka The Lemon Lady) in Clayton have that covered.

And D.I.Y. canning is also au courant, with Bay Area cookbook authors like Vanessa Barrington encouraging urban homesteaders to put up provisions in their pantry.

Now comes canning for a cause. The Sonoma County group Let's Preserve a community effort to continue old-fashioned (now newly chic) food traditions, make good use of excess produce, and help those in need.

This past harvest season in Healdsburg, Santa Rosa, and Petaluma thousands of pounds of gleaned apples, tomatoes, and quince were preserved and donated to local food pantries, in an effort, says one organizer, to close the gap between waste and want. Apples and tomatoes were canned for sauce, the quince became filling for empanadas that were frozen for future use.

Merrilee Olson, who runs her own Sebastapol-based food business PRESERVEsonoma, didn't grow up hungry but her family needed help to put food on the table. Raised by a single mom, who supported three kids on a state salary in Lincoln, Nebraska, food stamps frequently helped to provide dinner. Now a professional chef who works with local farmers and artisan food and wine clients, Olson wanted to find a way to give back through food.

She teamed up with Judy Christensen from Slow Harvest in Healdsburg and Elissa Rubin-Mahon of Artisan Preserves in Forestville and last summer offered a training workshop for volunteers who want to galvanize their community to preserve surplus produce.

Last month, she led a group of volunteers who peeled, cut, cooked, and canned hundreds of pounds of apples to benefit the COTS Petaluma Kitchen.

Food pantries will accept preserved products that have been processed in a commercial kitchen under the supervision of someone who is food-safety certified, says Olson.

Nobody doubts the need is out there. NPR reported this week that the number of people on food stamps hit a new all-time high; as of September nearly 43 million people were using the program, according to data released this week. "Food insecurity is reaching frightening levels," says Olson. "We believe we can make a difference in our communities by preserving and making healthy food available where it's needed."

Last month, KQED's Forum addressed hunger in the Bay Area. In San Francisco, one of every five children is at risk of going hungry and the numbers are similar in other local counties. During this holiday season, food bank and soup kitchen operators are reporting a spike in the number of families that are seeking food.

"I'd love to see every community in the Bay Area doing its own preserving and feeding their neighbors in need," says Olson, who notes that groups as far away as Minneapolis have been inspired by the Let's Preserve model to can food for the needy. She also points to Anya Fernald's Commando Canning events, Yes We Can Food, in Oakland as a local example of community canning.

In the future, Olson would like to include other preservation methods, such as pickling, drying, and curing, to ensure that good produce -- including vegetables -- finds its way to the underserved. She'd also like to teach families in need preservation techniques so they can can for themselves.

Clearly, community canning events do good. They're also fun. "We get volunteers from 18 on up -- at our last event we had eight young adults from the Coast Guard -- and everyone had a good time sharing stories in the kitchen and around a table at a potluck afterwards," says Olson. "There's nothing like food to build community."

To learn more about how to start something similar in your area or to sign up for future community canning events, visit Let's Preserve.

Do you know of similar efforts in your area? Let us know below.

[Thanks to Jennie Kimmel and Agustin Guiterrez for sharing their photos.]

In the Napa Valley, Connie Green has been foraging for mushrooms, berries, greens and much more since the early 1970s -- and she's made quite a business out of it by selling her bounty to some of California's very best restaurants.

Host Scott Shafer sat down with Connie Green to talk about the new book she's written with chef Sarah Scott, called "The Wild Table."

Recipe: Persimmon Pudding With Brandy Hard Sauce [pdf]

The fig tree in my neighbor's yard--the one with lots of branches hanging temptingly over the sidewalk--is just starting to ripen its fall crop. According to California law, fruit growing in public space (hanging on a branch over a city sidewalk, for example) is public fruit, and free for the taking, as long as the picker leaves what's on the other side of the fence (or property line) alone. Going out to get yogurt and a newspaper on a Saturday morning, I'd arrive home with a foraged breakfast centerpiece of ripe sweet figs.

But clearly, I've barely cracked the spine on Foraging for Dummies. At least compared to Seattlite Langdon Cook, author of Fat of the Land: Adventures of a 21st Century Forager for whom a daily forage might involve digging for razor clams at dusk in December, or setting up a spotlight for late-night squid jigging in January. Spearfishing for lingcod within the city limits, hand-grabbing Dungeness crab out of the Sound, dodging homeless guys to harvest choice young dandelion greens near the I-5 on-ramp. . . if you sum it up like that, Cook sounds like a pretty wild and crazy guy.

Except that he's almost always eclipsed in his own narrative by the buddies who show him the ropes. With nicknames like Trouthead and Warpo, these dudes are guy's guys, passionate, risk-loving, obsessive hunter-gatherers who let Cook tag along as they head into their element: to the bank of the Columbia at dawn for shad, into a beat-up canoe on the Hood Canal for shrimp, tramping a burnt-out section of the Okanogan National Forest for morels.

Cook walks the walk, and dives the dive, but hard as he tries, he never quite transcends. Throughout, he remains a game but nerdy writer, less on the hunt for shrimp and sturgeon (the toothy, prehistoric-looking fish that Cook's friend Beedle describes admiringly as "one tough hombre") than for a certain manly authenticity that remains always a little out of his reach, no matter how many times he grabs for his pen to scribble down a colorful phrase.

"What can be said about this river that hasn't already been said?" he notes from the banks of the surging Columbia River, looking up at the power lines swooping overhead. "I try to put myself in a dugout canoe circa 1805, but the wires keep getting in the way."

The book is organized in a way familiar to readers of Mark Kurlansky or Michael Pollan: first an action narrative, then a loop through biology and ecology, a dash through the stinging nettles of climate change and ever-encroaching environmental destruction, a quick end run through socio-cultural history, then a wind-up of the narrative and a triumphant meal and recipe.

The reader tags along after Cook, skimming along through his magazine-ready adventures (it's no surprise to find out that he writes frequently for publications like Outside and The Stranger), learning some nifty stuff about, say, the fruiting cycles of the morel mushroom, or why hunting for Dungeness crabs during their mating season is like shooting fish in a barrel. But, just like those lurking lingcod, the truly captivating stories stay in the shadows.

What does fishing mean for the Asian grandmothers who come down night after night to fish for squid off the municipal pier where Cook shows up one evening, nervous of his status as Anglo newbie amid the bantering regulars from Cambodia and Nicaragua? Or the morel-hunting locals on the edges of a remote mountain town who saw their forest go up in smoke around them during a recent wildfire? Cook can't quite shake the knowledge that what's fun (or at least fodder for a book contract) for him is necessity for others, and neither can the reader.

Still, it's an intriguing read, and a way to take a fresh look at the edible abundance available for the (slightly stealthy) taking even in the heart of a sprawling American city.

And if you're not quite ready to free-dive for abalone yet, you can join interdisciplinary artist Julie Kahn (currently working at the Headlands Center for the Arts) for a feast of wild game and foraged foods in Marin on November 15th. It's a benefit for Swamp Cabbage, which Kahn and her fellow filmmaker Hayley Downs call a "dark and sweaty" documentary in progress tracing their personal connections to the fast-disappearing backwoods traditions of rural Florida. The multi-course menu includes chicharrones from Ryan Farr's 4505 Meats, swamp cabbage pickles, gator bites, locally hunted wild boar from Mendocino, local abalone, acorn bread, truly wild mushroom pizza, persimmon gelato foraged and made by Liana and Michael Orlandi of Mill Valley's Gelateria Ceci, and more.

I'll be baking foraged fruit turnovers for the spread, too--which means I better get up early and start stalking those succulent figs around the corner.

Last week, still heavily under the influence of jet lag, Shannon, my oldest friend in the world, whisked me down to Redwood City late Saturday night so that I might spend some time with her family, make breakfast, and later accompany my goddaughter to a community theater production of Annie Get Your Gun. Typical, wholesome Sunday fun.

When I awoke to the various sounds of three children trying to be quiet-- enjoyable to someone like me who merely borrows the children of others but does not have to live with them-- I wandered into the kitchen to find that, not only had the morning's menu been decided, but preparations had been made in advance-- enjoyable to someone like me to whom the words "let's make breakfast!" are sometimes uttered, but the planning and execution are invariably a solo effort, in which case I try to dirty as many dishes as possible.

Craig, my college roommate and the man Shannon had the good sense to marry, announced that he and my goddaughter had been foraging for acorns. Acorns. When I think of foraging, if at all, my mind goes to truffle pigs and strange old men materializing back around the kitchen door with boxes of strange looking mushrooms in their arms and cigarettes dangling from their weather-beaten lower lips. Acorns call to the mind irritatingly industrious and moralizing rodents of fable. I had always thought of foragers as edgy, marginalized, or borderline crazy. Modern foragers do not go to spas for Rolfing sessions or have cable television. I was now faced with performing a quick and rather drastic reassessment. The only two foragers I actually knew were standing in front of me with a bowl of acorns-- a 38-year-old man and an 8-3/4-year-old girl. Based upon the new information at hand, I had to decide that foraging was not necessarily a desperate reaction to hunger performed by those who are either too chicken or too lazy to go out and hunt wild animals. Nor was it necessarily a rejection of supermarket commercialism. As I looked into their proud faces, I decided that foraging was painfully cute. It was an act, in this case, of optimism and resourcefulness.

Shannon mused that she was glad to know she would now be able to feed her family in the event of the Apocalypse. We spent the next two minutes explaining what the Apocalypse was to my goddaughter. She was unimpressed.

Suddenly, foraging for acorns seem like a very, very good idea. I was saved from spending too much time figuring out how I would survive in San Francisco when the world finally goes to Hell by the fact that there were three hungry children and an equal amount of adults who needed to be fed. With acorns.

Though I am technically 1/8 Native American, genetically speaking, I received none of the famous resourcefulness of these ancestors. Neither did I inherit their characteristic lack of body hair or intolerance to alcohol, but those are topics for other blogs. Besides, my ancestors were from the Great Plains. They couldn't walk ten steps without falling over a bison. I had no idea what to do with acorns. Fortunately, Craig has an intimate understanding of both the Internet and how to read cookbooks. He did a little research and got some ideas, the best of which was pancakes. Acorn pancakes.

According to Siouxme.com, acorns were once the main food staple of nearly 3/4 of the Native Californian population. The most common oak trees found in the Bay Area are the Tan Oak, the Black Oak, the Live Oak, and the Valley Oak. (If you don't know why I'm talking about oak trees... please say you know why I'm talking about oak trees.) The Pomo Tribe preferred the acorns from the Tan Oak, feeling that they had superior flavor. The Miwoks preferred Black Oak acorns, because it took less leeching to rid them of their bitter tannic acid. The conflict between what is good and what is convenient is as old as the ages, it would seem. These original food snobs of the Bay Area pronounced the acorn of the Live Oak as "too wormy" and "too easy to get-- nothing that plentiful can be very good."

Craig performed a similar experiment and came to basically the same conclusion. I am also grateful that he took the time to leech the acorns himself, sparing me the effort. So, with thoughts of feeding his hungry brood, he handed me a bowl of acorn meal and recipe for pancakes, Shannon turned on the griddle, and I proceeded to make the pancakes.

The results were great. The meal had a flavor reminiscent of chestnuts. When combined with honey and butter? I would use an expletive here to convey how good they were, but I thought better of it.

Three cheers for acorn pancakes.

Acorn Pancakes

If foraging on your own, look down-- you want the ones which have fallen from the tree. You might consider wearing protective headgear, since Autumn is the only time to gather acorns and, since one invariably spends a good amount of time directly beneath the canopy of oak trees when one is gathering the goods, odds are decent that some might leap to their death from the branches and on to one's head. Lawsuits against oak trees can be costly and, most likely, pointless.

Speaking of headgear, look for acorns still wearing their "little hats". Those found without these hats are likely to be infested with weevils, which some might consider appealingly value-added, in terms of protein content. I doubt these would add much value to pancake batter.

Ingredients:

1 cup acorn meal *
1 cup white flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 eggs
1/4 cup of oil (vegetable or some other neutral-flavored type.)
1/2 cup honey
2 cups milk

Preparation:

1. Preheat griddle to medium heat.
2. Combine dry ingredients in whatever large bowl you like. One with a spout is most welcome.
3. Combine oil, honey, eggs, and milk until smooth in consistency.
4. Combine the wet with the dry ingredients into the large bowl.
5. Adjust by adding more milk if the batter appears too thick, more flour if too thin. The nature
of all acorn meal is not equal. The batter should be thin enough to pour, but not runny, as
one might imagine.
6. Drop an experimental dollop of batter onto griddle. Adjust heat accordingly.
7. Griddle dollar-sized pancakes until the bottoms are browned and the top side bubbles.
About three minutes. Flip and cook until cakes are barely firm to the touch.
8. Remove pancakes to a warm plate. I hold mine in a warm oven covered with a towel until
all the pancakes have been made.
9. Serve hot with butter and honey. Or whatever you feel like. I don't really care. As long as
it makes you happy and harms no one.

Makes about 36 dollar-sized pancakes. I was not anal-retentive enough in this case to count them. We were too busy eating them as they came off the griddle to get an accurate number.

* I know I have not walked you through the process of leeching acorns, but I have not walked down that road myself. Go do an internet search or something. It's not like you have anything better to do, seeing that you've managed to waste enough time reading about my pancakes.