Bringin’ home a fall feast

Sunday Afternoon

With half of our beloved Seahawks injured and Peyton Manning's immense cerebral cortex highlighted on virtually every sports radio and television program all bloody week I painfully decided to forego watching the Seahawk game and instead spend yet another day outdoors. This time we were in search of chanterelle mushrooms and steamer clams with the Endsley clan. My parents, Uncle Pete Endsley, Nicole, and myself all piled in the Surburban Clampit-style and rumbled off towards Mason County to some secret-squirrel mushroom haunts and a slam dunk beach full of steamer clams.

Uncle Pete is a mushroom master and it wasn't long before all five of us were pulling white and yellow chanterelles from the earth and stuffing them into bags. Chanterelles can be found in stands of Douglas Fir and particularly around old, rotten stumps tucked away amongst the trees. These tastey mushrooms start appearing in September and can be found thru November on some years if temperatures hold steady. Uncle Pete explained that chantrelles prefer temperatures in the mid-50's and temperature swings of 12 degrees or less, which is why they grow so well in the fall and not the spring when temps can swing as much as 30 to 40 degrees in a day.

Once a batch of chanterelles is located it's best to remove them from the ground using a pull and twist method that leaves the mycelium in the ground. Doing this makes it possible to come back to the same spot every year to find the mushrooms, because only some areas that have all the "right stuff" will grow them. This is why mushroom-heads keep their productive spots on the low-down, sometimes even covering the mushrooms with brush to keep others from finding them before they mature. For those that aren't familiar with chanterelles and what they look like please be sure to ask an expert or refer to a publication on mushroom identification before hitting the woods.

After the mushrooms are picked use a sharp knife to clean off the base of the chanterelle and a small soft-bristled brush to remove pine needles, dirt, or other debris from the cap or stem. The mushrooms can be stored for up to four or five days in the fridge in a paper bag or frozen after they are cooked. The mushroom on the left below is a white chanterelle and the specimen on the right is a yellow chanterelle, both of which are delicious.     

Two bags of mushrooms later we turned on 710 ESPN Seattle in the family truckster to catch a quick score only to hear Steve Raible say, "Like the Colts need another three points!" 31-3 Colts in the second half…ug! Off to get some steamers…

Steamer clams are easy to dig and inhabit many of the low-gradient beaches in Puget Sound. After dad pointed out the small holes the clams leave in the sand it took us less than ten minutes to grab a few limits of Manila clams raking around on this particular gravelly-muddy-sandy beach. We filled some five gallon buckets halfway with sea water to purge them in overnight and were back to the truck in less than twenty minutes.

A great Sunday activity with family and a mess of chanterelle's and steamers to go with barbecued silver salmon for Monday Night Football. Gotta love October!

Monday Night

I grabbed a bottle of Cheteau St Michelle Chardonnay at Costco today and poured just enough of it in a cooking pan to cover the clams. Next I added an entire stick of Tillamook butter, a finely chopped clove of garlic, diced onion, and chives. After bringing this to a boil I cooked the clams for approximately 5 minutes before they popped open, with another five minutes on simmer to allow all the flavors to mix thoroughly. I used this Simple Salmon recipe to grill up some Alaskan silver salmon, sauteed the chanterelles in butter and garlic along with some onions, steamed a bunch of fresh carrots, and sliced up a fresh loaf of sourdough bread for soaking up the clam nectar. 

I would have taken photos of the full-meal-deal but it was just too difficult to resist diving into this meal head first. A feast fit for a king!