Simple ingredients that pack easily and combine well make for an ideal picnic.

As much as I love to cook, some of my favorite meals are simple assemblages, preferably packed as a picnic for a day of hiking or paddling. Nothing tastes better than a few simple ingredients carefully chosen to complement the season and the destination.

Beginning by the coast where Willow Creek drains to the Russian River, Ene and I hiked inland along the marshes that flank the stream, making our way up to where willow, cattail and cottonwood give way to oak and bay. We found an abandoned barn and spread our larder of goat cheese, smoked salmon, walnut baguette, radishes and cress, finished off with steaming hot tea and dried apricots. We sat in the sun listening to the creek gather itself, Ene cut some willow’s catkin and we made our return, energized by the tea and our delicious picnic at Willow Creek.

Cattails and willow grow in abundance in marshes flanking Willow Creek.

An abandoned barn is the perfect hiking destination for a picnic.

My Swedish military backpack has plenty of room for picnic gear and spare clothes.

Tagged: california coast, picnic, sonoma coast, willow creek, wowhaus

Stored in a cool place, these freshly picked pears will ripen in a few days.

“There are only ten minutes in the life of a pear when it is perfect to eat.”

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

We’ve been harvesting our pears in phases over the past week; the fruit seems to ripen unevenly on our trees, depending upon the amount of sun exposure. I begin to check them for ripeness when I notice one or two fall to the ground, usually in early September. If the fruit detaches easily when tilted sideways, it’s ripe enough to pick. We’ve learned that it’s best not to let the pears ripen fully on the tree- the fruit becomes coarse and bruises easily. Stored in a cool spot or refrigerated, the pears release ethylene and form sugars more slowly, yielding better texture and flavor. It’s still a challenge to know how best to put them to use with such a tiny window of perfect ripeness, especially when we’ve had a bumper crop like this year.

Waverly Root recommended eating ripe pears with a spoon!

Tagged: california flora, deep craft, pear, slow food, waverly root

Freshly harvested kelp drying on the garden fence

For a while after the recent tsunami in Japan, Californians were aflutter about iodine, the primary antidote to radiation exposure. In researching sources of the element I discovered that the Japanese consume about five times more than most of the rest of the world, largely because seaweed and fresh fish figure so prominently in their daily diet. Interestingly, there is a strong correlation between the Japanese consumption of iodine with both their decreased rates of cancer and increased lifespan. I also learned that the production of the chemical element, iodine, was a cottage industry in Ireland and other coastal regions in the nineteenth century, where kelp was prevalent and abundant throughout the year.

Because our local beaches yield heaps of kelp, I’ve experimented over the past few years with using it as a material for making things, with varying degrees of success. I’m now more interested in kelp as a food source, and have been foraging the flat strands and drying them in the sun for cooking. Eventually, I’d like to make a batch of pure iodine as an experiment, perhaps as a way of staining/preserving wood. Historically, iodine has be extracted from kelp by reducing it to ash, boiling and filtering the ashes, and extracting the pure element by mixing it with hydrogen peroxide.

Tagged: appropriate technology, deep craft, iodine, kelp, tsunami

the 30′ long table returns home, after weathering 5 years at the Sonoma County Museum

When we first moved our home and main studio to West Sonoma County five years ago, Ene and I were commissioned to participate in an exhibition called Hybrid Fields at the Sonoma County Museum, curated by our friend Patricia Watts. We had been milling several storm fallen Douglas Fir trees on our property at the time and proposed installing a 30′ long harvest table constructed of rough timbers for the exhibition, to be sited on a lawn adjacent to the museum. We called the project Tree Trust True and organized a public feast featuring local foods that all grow on trees for the exhibition’s opening. The event lasted just one afternoon and evening, but the table remained at the museum for the next five years, becoming a popular spot for lunches and impromptu gatherings, weathering like a giant piece of driftwood.

The table is constructed of stacked and pinned timbers, topped off with 6″ thick slabs

We recently decided to bring the table back home, return it to the site where the tree originally grew. With the help of our capable friends Hus, Rob and Angel, we disassembled the table, loaded the parts onto a 16′ flatbed truck and reassembled it back at the wowhaus compound, where it will serve as the primary site for an ongoing series of secret dinners we’ve been planning, featuring guest chefs and handcrafted tableware. The first of these is tentatively planned for October First, with chef Leif Hedendal at the helm.

Angel, Rob, Hus and Scott unload the truck

Angel, Hus, Scott and Rob assemble the table, pinning the timbers with long screws

Installation complete, the crew takes a break to savor Ene’s homemade Pozole

ENE’S POZOLE
• Saute one chopped onion, 1/2 tsp cumin and salt and pepper to taste, in olive
oil. Add to the water in the pot, as described below:
• Place a whole chicken in a pot and add enough water to fill the pot double the
height of the chicken + 8 sprigs of fresh oregano; simmer for at least 2 hours,
preferably longer, at least until the meat falls away from the bone.  Add water
as needed along with 4 cups of canned hominy. Simmer until flavors blend.
• Clean the meat from the bones; add more fresh oregano and cumin to taste, if
desired.
• Squeeze in fresh lime to taste or serve as a garnish

Serve with the following as garnish:
• Chopped Avocado
• Fresh lime slices
• Sliced jalapeno peppers
•  Salsa
• Chips or toasted tortillas can be eaten on the side, but we like to add them to the soup as well….

Enjoy!

Tagged: contemporary art, deep craft, furniture design, innovation, leif hedendal, pozole recipe, scott Constable, slow food, sonoma county museum, wowhaus

Black chanterelle (Craterellus cornucopioides)

The Late Season (text and photo by Josef Szuecs)

As I mentioned in an earlier post, mushrooms generally fruit in species dependent windows of time.  The exact timing of these windows vary from year to year, affected by a number of factors.  In the SF Bay area, we can start looking for a few wonderful late season mushrooms in December and January.  Namely, Black chanterelles (Craterellus cornucopioides), Hedgehogs (Hydnum repandum  and H. umbilicatum), and the Yellow-foot chanterelle (Cantharellus tubaeformis or Craterellus infundibuliformis).

Individually, these are relatively small specimens.  Caps are typically under 2 inches in diameter. (Except for H. repandum, which can get pretty big.)   Though small in size, they like company.  When you find a patch, they can number in the hundreds.  The three types also like the same habitat, Tan Oak woodlands, so you’ll find them growing in close proximity.

I’ve noticed that the black chanterelles like very wet locations, more so than the hedgehogs.  Look for drainages and small basins where water tends to flow and collect.  Another admirable feature of this group of mushrooms: no insect infestation.  For some reason, the little maggots that fiercely attack porcinis and other species have no interest in these.

The black chanterelles are hard to spot.  They are dark brown to black in hue, and look ‘leafy.’  Just like the bed of decaying leaves where they are

found.  You really have to find the appropriate habitat and then look hard. The trick is looking for holes.  The open trumpet shape, when viewed from above, looks like a round pitch black hole.  The flavor of black chanterelles is earthy and fruity.  Absolutely delicious.  They dry very well. Oh, make sure you tear or cut each one apart lengthwise.  The mushroom is a trumpet shaped tube.  Bits of debris, small slugs, pill bugs and other undesirables may be hiding in there.

Hedgehogs are easy to spot.  Light tan/yellow and almost always atop the duff.  Just make sure that your specimens have ‘teeth’ instead of gills.  The spore bearing surface of a hedgehog is made up of small spines that hang from the underside of the cap.  There are a few small Lactarius that I’ll find growing near them, and these should be avoided.  The flavor of hedgehogs is mildly nutty.  When cooking them, make sure you brown them nicely to bring out this nuttiness.   When I collect a bounty of them, I simply pan sauté them in olive oil, pack in jars, top with more olive oil and freeze.

Finally, the Yellow-foots.  A fine mushroom, although mildly flavored.  I use them to stretch a pan of hedgehogs.  They actually dry well. Yellow-foots are also trumpet shaped tubes, so watch out for stowaways.

Here’s a great side dish made with hedgehogs.  Clean and cut a pound, more or less, of fresh hedgehogs, into a very rough chop.  Mince a shallot. Toss the shallot into a pan with some olive oil.  Cook until translucent.  Add the mushrooms.  And salt to taste.

In a minute or so, the hedgehogs will release an impressive amount of moisture into the pan.  Simmer until evaporated, and then sauté until the mushrooms are well browned.  Add 1 ½ cups of Arborio rice. Saute for a minute or two.  Add 2 ½ cups chicken stock, (preferably homemade).  Cover, drop heat to simmer, and cook for 20 minutes.

Serve with, well, almost anything.

Tagged: california flora, deep craft, josef szuecs, slow food, sonoma coast, wild mushroom

Looking up at the persimmon tree’s wild constellation of fruit still languidly dangling, you’d hardly know we already picked over two bushels for drying. Ene recently discovered the Japanese art of Hoshigaki, a technique of drying fruit by a combination of open-air hanging and hand massaging. The fruit is picked before it fully ripens, with a section of branch left attached, then it is peeled and hung for several weeks, gently squeezed daily after a skin develops; the massaging brings out the sugars. Our studio is rimmed with drying persimmon, adding to the season’s festive atmosphere.

peeled persimmon are hung to dry, still attached to the branch

our Hachiya Persimmon tree is still loaded with fruit

Tagged: california flora, deep craft, DIY, gardening, hoshigaki, persimmon, phenology, slow food, traditional craft

This week my friend Josej Szuecs has graciously penned the second installment of his Mushroom Report:

Midseason Mushrooms (text and photo by Josef Szeucs)

The question is often posed to me: “When do the mushrooms start coming up?” In the western US, I start foraging two or three weeks after the first significant rainfall.  This is rain that penetrates the top leaf layer of the forest floor and moistens the underlying duff.  Usually this happens in late October or early November.  If the rain comes, I can expect of find numerous early season species.  Porcinis, golden chanterelles, oyster mushrooms, and cauliflower mushrooms (Sparassis crispa) are the prime examples. If the rain comes later, like mid-December, I can expect a poor year for those species.

I’ve found that many fungus want to fruit within a certain window of time.  The season can be broken down into three parts:  early, middle and late.  These are rough, and there is much overlap, but still a useful demarcation.If the weather conditions don’t line up with the fruiting window: better luck next year.

Once the porcini hunting has started to wind down, about a month after the onset of fruiting, I start to focus on my favorite mid-season fungus:  the matsutake, *Tricholoma magnivelare.  *Matsutake translates to ‘pine mushroom’, although in our area it grows under oaks.  The true matsutake of Asia grows under pines, and is actually a different, although closely related, species.  A truly beautiful mushroom that has an unusual aroma that is difficult to describe.  It is highly sought after by the Japanese.  On the other hand, it is not held in high regard by many collectors of Italian, and other European, descent. Simply put, it does cook up well using western methods. It’s all about highlighting that unique aroma.

Before I get further into cooking, I need to warn the reader about this mushroom.  It is medium to large sized, is white (with some brown patches on the cap), and shares a couple of characteristics with the Amanitas.  This last part is the warning.  Matsutakes resemble white Amanitas.  One of the white Amanitas has the common name ‘Destroying Angel.’  It is deadly poisonous.

A few years ago, I took a chef out on a foray during matsutake season.  I spotted a patch of them on the forest floor and stood back so my friend would ‘find’ them.  She yelped, “Matsutake”, and quickly picked them and put them in her basket.  As we readied to move on, I asked what she had picked. She looked at me, a bit puzzled, and answered, “Matsutake.”  I replied, “Yes, but you also picked something else.”  I lifted one of the white egg-like buttons from her basket and cut it in half. “No, this is an Amanita.”  I emphatically impressed upon her the danger of being careless when collecting this mushroom.  And then re-iterated my rule of matsutake collecting: “You have to smell every one of them.  If it doesn’t smell strongly of matsutake, toss it.” Needless to say, if you are interested in collecting this mushroom, have an expert identify your finds.

OK, back to cooking.  As I mentioned before, the aroma is the main charm of this mushroom, so keep it simple. Thinly sliced Matsutake briefly simmered in homemade dashi stock is the classic.  Throw in some mild miso paste – a great idea.  Toss in a couple of shrimp and a few slices of scallion, even better.  To really nail it, a squeeze of yuzu lemon to finish is ideal.  Yuzu is hard to find, Meyer lemon is a good substitute.  Any lemon or lime works.

My favorite recipe couldn’t be simpler.  Get a bottle of high quality, dry, mildly flavored sake.  Heat it up in a small stainless steel pot.  Just before it boils, toss in some thinly sliced matsutake.  Turn off the heat and let steep for a couple of minutes.  Serve in small sake cups.  Make sure to put a slice of the mushroom in each cup.

To read Joe’s first installment of the seasonal Mushroom Report, click here.

Thanks Joe!

Tagged: california flora, deep craft, foraging, josef szuecs, mushroom, phenology, sonoma coast

The raccoons have commenced their furtive nighttime raids on the persimmon tree, whose fruits are prematurely ripe by a few weeks. We’re still trying to figure out how best to use the hundreds of Hachiya persimmon produced by our single tree each winter, and have been picking and ripening the fruit before the raccoons strip the tree bare. The past few years we waited until the persimmon were dropping, soft and syrupy on the branches, and we’d slice them in half, freeze the halves and serve them as a deliciously slushy dessert with fresh lime between Christmas and the New Year. Still, we ate only a small percentage of the fruit, the rest fattened the raccoons, grosbeak and orioles. This year I plan to experiment with boiling down the ripened persimmon to make a sweet, colorful syrup, but remain open to any other suggestions.

making wreaths

Ene and Aili have been making wreaths this year with friends from our various holly trees, whose berries have also ripened early. It’s wonderful to see such value added to our annual prunings; the trees benefit while Ene sends beautiful homemade wreaths as gifts to family for Christmas. Making wreaths is a great model for the kind of nonchalant agriculture we seem well suited to practice, and we hope to continually develop the property by encouraging beneficial loops and a gift economy.

Ene’s Mexican marigold (Tagetes lucida) brighten up chilly gray mornings

The foreboding, coastal fog has returned after an exquisitely crisp spell

To follow the thread as I track seasonal cycles please click here and scroll down.

Tagged: aesthetics, california coast, california flora, craft philosophy, deep craft, DIY, gift economy, Hachiya persimmon, phenology, slow food, sustainability

Most people know Ene, my wife and wowhaus partner, as one of the sunniest people they’ve met, and rightfully so. Our wowhaus compound has been blessed by her love of planting, harvesting and saving seeds, as she eagerly scouts out patches of sun throughout the year, populating them with seasonal flowers and vegetable gardens, battling hungry deer and gopher with joyous aplumb.

With the soil softened and moist from early rains and short days, Ene is truly in her element as she purposefully marches about the property, picking the last of the apples, dragging hoses and planting fruit trees, mulched with woodshop shavings. Her winter garden is predictably unruly, its inner logic a kind of living, visual manifestation of Ene’s happy hands and exuberant spirit. We eat well from Ene’s Winter Garden, where collard greens, dyno kale and lettuces thrive, and I love nothing more than to discover what’s ready to cook, driven by hunger to forage at dusk for the family dinner.

Ene’s Autumn Greens

Saute bacon in a cast iron skillet. Remove bacon to drain on a cloth or paper towel. Drain the bacon fat from the pan, leaving some. Add olive oil and saute sliced onions until slightly softened. Add chopped kale, collards or other green, tossing with the onions over medium high heat. When the greens are tender, de-glaze the pan with apple cider vinegar and toss in chopped apples and the bacon, crumbled into pieces. Reduce heat and allow to simmer until flavors blend, adding water if the mixture is dry. Season with salt and pepper and serve over pasta or as a side dish with roasted chicken or fish.

Tagged: aesthetics, california flora, deep craft, gardening, slow food, sonoma coast, wowhaus

artist/musician/chef Josef Szuecs of The-Way-To-Go-Joes

My friend and neighbor Josef Szuecs is one of the most multi-talented people I’ve ever met. Owner of Renga Arts in Occidental, CA, guitarist/founder of the locally popular, self-described ‘porch jazz’ combo, The-Way-To-Go-Joes, Joe is also an accomplished chef, and his food often features seasonal fare he hunts, grows, fishes and forages. Joe is always generous in sharing his knowledge, and recently introduced Ene and me to the craft of cider-making. As a Halloween treat, Joe has penned the primer that follows on foraging and cooking wild mushrooms, an autumnal delight in our region that is often shrouded in mystery:

Joe’s morning harvest of foraged porcini mushrooms

Joe’s Mushroom Report (text by Josef Szuecs):

Most fungi cannot be cultivated. They depend on a complex relationship with the environment. For instance, many form a symbiotic relationship with a very specific species of tree. Therefore, the success of a foray depends heavily on the collector’s knowledge of these dependencies. Of course, one of the first questions to consider: When will the mushrooms appear? As you might expect, it depends on the particular fungus. But let’s limit this to an all-around favorite, the porcini. Formally known as Boletus edulis. Also known as steinpilz and cep. The porcini (por-chee-nee) is one of the first mushrooms to pop up  in the fall. Every fall, I anxiously anticipate the rain. Timing is everything. Too late and the fruiting is sparse. Late October to early November is ideal. Volume of rain is also important. The ground must get thoroughly saturated. Given that, I start checking out my spots after two weeks. Spots? Yes, porcini, and many other mushrooms, are the fruit of subterranean plants.  A seasoned collector generally has a network of very specific locations to look. Much like checking a tree to see if its fruit are ripe. A knowledge of specific spots is not really necessary to have a successful foray. But it really helps to know the habitat that the porcini prefers. In our area, the SF Bay, it’s the coastal Bishop Pine forest. Three to four weeks after the first rains, the fruiting is well underway. After six weeks, it’s over. More rain won’t lead to more porcini. It’s a window of opportunity. More rain will lead to other mushrooms, though. What I refer to as the mid-season fruiting. But we’ll discuss that when it comes.

The flavor of a fresh porcini is typically described as mildly nutty, reminiscent of hazelnuts. It also has a subtle sweetness. When dried, the porcini develops an intense flavor, highly prized for soups and sauces. When I get back from the woods, my first task is to separate my finds into ‘eaters’ and ‘driers.’ Eaters are firm and void of little holes, or tunnels, in their stems. Driers are older specimens that may have significant tunneling. These tunnels are wormholes. Tiny flies are very quick to lay eggs on most fungi. These wee beasties are harmless, although unappetizing. Certainly nothing I would serve to guests. If the thought of worms, dry or not,  in your food is, well, unappetizing, just discard these specimens. Just remember, all commercial foods have guidelines that limit the amount of this type of contamination in products. Limit, not eliminate.

Joe’s Simple Porcini Recipe

OK, a recipe. For me, simplest is best. Each wild fungus has its signature flavor, texture, and aroma. When I prepare them, I try to bring out these characteristics, not mask them behind more assertive flavors. For instance, I would never cook a porcini in a tomato sauce. This recipe is as simple as it gets.

Clean and cut firm and worm-free porcinis into 1/8’ slices. Heat mild (not extra-virgin) olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Fry the slices, turning frequently, until golden brown. Place the fried slices on a plate, sprinkle with a quality sea salt. Serve with a nice fresh loaf of rustic white bread.

Prepared this way, the sugars in the mushroom caramelize, and the nuttiness is amplified. I cannot overstate how good this tastes. For vegetarians, this is as close to the sublime flavor of bacon that you can get.

If you are fortunate to bring home a few pounds on porcini, you may prepare the whole batch this way. Pack them into small mason jars, top with the mild olive oil, and freeze. You will be able to enjoy them all year long. One warning, the sugars in porcini are quick to burn and become bitter. Don’t turn the heat up too high. Also, change the cooking oil every two or three batches.

Finally, a morning foray in the woods collecting these culinary gems is one of those perfect life experiences. One made even better when shared with a good friend.

Tagged: california coast, craft, deep craft, foraging, josef szuecs, occidental, porcini, slow food, way to go joes, wild mushroom