BLOGS

How our food choices teach us about the world around us

by Chef Robin Kort

Buying food at the grocery store has never been less fun.  Having to worry about high prices, avoid packaging, checking all the unreadable print on labels for weird ingredients in ‘natural’ products and trying to buy local (Is this apple from the USA or China and how do I feel about their politics)?  It’s enough to make you run through the aisles screaming (that would be satisfying).   We all choose what we eat, how we gather it and, as an extension, what kind of relationships we build with our family, the land we live on and the creatures that live in it.  Decisions on what we eat for dinner are one of the most enjoyable, time consuming, and important aspects of our life and they have a great impact on the world around us.  So, what are our options and how can we make the best decisions for the world around us?  I want to take you on a foraging journey, one where we get to know the creatures around us and they teach us a bit about how to be happy on this ridiculous planet.

What about learning to gather some food locally, pick a delicious wild mushroom or shuck an oyster?  Too weird or scary even? If you’ve ever picked a blackberry from the vine, you are a forager, you can do it and it can be super fun. These berries and seafood that you can harvest aren’t only delicious and sometimes expensive ingredients, they each have their own unique stories that we continue to be a part of.  If you are curious, I’ll tell you my own story of two wild things that helped me make better choices and understand this tiny slice of the world that I call home.

Born on the coast, I’m a foraging chef which gets me out into nature to look for tasty treats throughout the seasons; into forests burned by fire for spring morel mushrooms, out on a cold rainy day to harvest horse clams, or into my own backyard to pick invasive weeds like young dandelion shoots for healthy microgreens (What are these gorgeous little tasty leaves on my plate?!).  Weaving hyper local ingredients into my cooking has been a life long passion, I made my first ‘dandelion blossom and grass salad’ for my mom in Stanley Park when I was little.

We all start with that natural curiosity for the world around us.  “Can I eat this’ is a primal question that’s as natural as breathing which is the question I was subconsciously asking while creating that wild salad on a warm summer day.  My mom pretending to nibble on it and making yummy sounds revealed to me the joy of harvesting and creating food for others.

That basic curiosity and a desire to eat unique delicious things from the wild led me on a journey to learn more and more about the world around me and the wonderful creatures that are waiting for us to notice them.  To pay attention and perhaps build a better relationship with them.  I’ve found that your own curiosity is your best foraging guide and it can introduce you to dozens of new planty partners to add to your suppers, (maybe a little minty, lemony or wild tasting leafy green is what you’re craving?)

I invite you, next time you are walking down the street stop and look around, bend down, peer at the plantsthat are peaking out of the concrete or take a slow saunter at the beach at low tide and notice the undulating colourful seaweeds.  What are their names and what creatures are they protecting?  Who brought them here or were they hear all along?  It can be meditation-like pondering the life around you and it invites you to get to know your neighbours; the plants, animals and sea life that surround us whether you eat them or not doesn’t matter, the most beautiful part of a foraging journey is the connections that you make and the stories that you learn about wild things and the peacefulness it engenders, and perhaps the inspiration to protect or give back to the world that we take so much from.

I spend a lot of time on Galiano Island in BC, on a specific rocky bluff with a small beach facing the sun.  Because I am a curious creature and I’m always looking for food, I go down to the rocks at low tide and gaze into the clear, deep sea where it meets the sandstone bluffs.  That’s where I first met my underwater neighbour, Spike and his hundreds of brothers and sisters.  His long purple-red spines sticking out in all directions, he struck me as the punk rocker of the sea.  I had met various ‘Spikes’ in a restaurant setting as uni roe and knew they were tasty.  I just had to brave the cold water with my mask, snorkel and some long tongs to snatch a few, shuck them and pop the fresh uni roe into my mouth.  The Parmesan of the sea, so delicious!  People are very good at relating to organisms through a food lens, our taste buds and our stomach are strong motivators, but on a foraging journey that starts with food, to be a good forager you have to learn about all aspects of Spike and his friends.  More questions started to percolate for me.  I could see tons of them clinging to the cliffs. Why were there 100’s of them?  That’s weird right? What do they like to eat? What else eats them?  How do I fit into the puzzle?

I met my second new friend on those rocky bluffs alongside Spike, an elegant charmer with long gorgeous amber locks flowing in the deep ocean current, we’ll call her Flow.   I learned that she was a bullwhip kelp and can grow one foot a day through the summer.  Bullwhip is cravable seaweed, the long blades smoked over a fire are salty and rich in a natural MSG, packing a massive umami punch, a good new friend indeed. Many species of seaweed thrive on the coasts of BC with a rainbow of different flavours, colours and textures.  As a chef, my culinary curiosity knows no bounds, so I had to learn more about Flow.  Who else relies on her?  I hadn’t seen her in early spring, why only in summer?  I had seen her before while kayaking on the Sunshine coast, I floated passed her with her sisters, their blades forming long protective masses.  Why are there so few on this particular cliff? Is there enough for me to sustainably eat? I waited and watched.

To understand the story of Spike and Flow, we have to travel back to the 18^th century on the coast of BC where the sea otter population was wiped out because of the fur trade. A male sea otter can eat up to 50 sea urchins a day! With the sea otter gone from the coast, Spike, the sea urchin, started happily multiplying unchecked.  What does Spike love to eat?  Seaweed like Flow!  As Spike’s family grew, they devoured more and more of the seaweed forests along those rocky ocean coastlines creating mass ‘urchin barrens’ under the sea.  These kelp forests are essential protective nurseries for baby fish, so my ancestor’s initial role in Spikes story is one of a destabilizing influence, we tipped the scales.  I could easily see how I could choose to play a part in this story today by foraging in areas of over abundant urchin, plus I get to make some uni butter, not a hard choice.  All these revelations were important as I developed a deep love of this little slice of the coast.

The more I come to this beach to harvest and watch the urchins and seaweeds grow, die and change the landscape around them, the more curious I become. How can I join the story and make connections to these wild new friends and be a good neighbour to them by making sure that there are many local harvests to come for all creatures?  They remind me that I am a part of the land and sea that I live on and my decisions on what I eat can have great impact.

People are very good eaters (too good), it’s like a superpower.  I choose to use my powers to try and better the beautiful world around me, strive to balance harms done if possible and leave a delicate footprint. I have gained so much more than dinner by walking out of the grocery store and into the wilderness to look for food.  Another way I try to give back, is to pass on my stories to others to encourage them to get outside and make some new friends.  If you choose to develop a stronger relationship to the land around you, to harvest locally, buy less and experience the joy of eating fresh Dungeness crab after you’ve caught it or garnishing your cocktails with the fireweed blossoms you’ve picked this spring, you won’t regret having learning their names.

Notes: Bullwhip kelp (Nereocystis lutkeana), is a protected species of kelp, it’s illegal to pull it up from the seabed if it’s attached.  You need a tidal water fishing license to harvest any seafood in B.C.

If you want to hear more stories about my culinary adventures from wild mushrooms to spring flowers, check out my coastal forager’s cookbook. 

Acknowledgement:

I want to thank all my teachers that have taught me so much about the land and food that grows around me.  Especially, the Coast Salish peoples who were instrumental in illustrating respectfully how to develop a right relationship with the coastal foods that I love.