Pheasant, Grouse, Quail
BBQ Quail Southwest Style
Quail barbecued slow and low with Arizona sauce. What is Arizona sauce, you say? All that is good about the wild foods of the Southwest: mesquite honey, tequila, and wild chiltepin chiles.
Salmon and Trout
Saffron Sauce with Fish
Every spring I create a dish that celebrates spring's colors, which for me are green and gold. Here is this year's edition, a trout dish that is as simple as it is pretty.
Pasta, Risotto, Gnocchi
Ramp Pasta with Morels
This might be the prettiest - and best-tasting - dish I've made this spring. You can really taste the ramps in the pasta, and the morels, cooked simply with ramps, butter and a little stock, compliment the pasta like sunshine on a pretty girl's eyes.
Preservation Recipes
Pickled Mustard Greens
Ever since I began studying Chinese food some years ago, I noticed how much fermented and pickled foods factor into…
Fish
Trout with Morels and Wild Onions
Trout with morels, ramps and fiddleheads is a classic combination - all are in season at the same time, and in the same place. Even in the High Sierra, we have our own rendition, with bracken fiddleheads and Sierra wild onions. I call this dish Sierra Spring.
Recipe
Venison Tartare
Beef or venison tartare is the "trust fall" of the culinary world: Raw meat and a raw egg yolk. If your ingredients are not impeccable, things can go very, very wrong. But done right, this is at once a primal and exciting little appetizer.
Recipe
Swedish Salmon with Peas and Vattlingon
Behold, one of the most vividly beautiful recipes I've made in a long time. Salmon Swedish style, with vattlingon. It screams Christmas, right? Wrong. This dish can only be made in springtime. Read more to find out why...
Salmon and Trout
Salmon Rillettes
One of the cool things about salmon is that it is rich enough to make rillettes with, especially when you use belly meat and the trim from around the bones. This is a pretty classic version, with both smoked and fresh salmon or steelhead trout.
Pasta, Risotto, Gnocchi
Nettle Ravioli
Beyond the fact that stinging nettles are a superfood, they are just so damn pretty! Blanched, they lose their sting, and take on a lurid emerald. That green makes an exciting pasta -- and a great ravioli filling. Yep, this is a double dose of nettle goodness.
Recipe
Buttermilk Fried Quail
If you like fried chicken, you'll love fried quail. This is a Southern style recipe, where you marinate the quail in buttermilk, then fry it in a cast-iron pan. Pure Southern comfort food...
Pasta, Risotto, Gnocchi
Fish Risotto
If there is one episode of Anthony Bourdain's "No Reservations" that sticks with me, it is his trip to Venice. In that episode he has risotto di go, an ethereal dish that hinges on a magical fish broth. I've remade this risotto here with striped bass. It will transport you.
Preservation Recipes
Wild Green Onion Kimchi
It's wild onion season pretty much everywhere, and there happens to be a cool kind of Korean kimchi that uses green onions. So I made a big batch last month and let it ferment. Lo and behold, it's awesome - especially as an accompaniment to fish.
