Early spring is not a time of plenty. Various wild mushrooms, nettles, dandelion greens appear in the marketplace. The first local produce items to look for will be asparagus, spinach & radishes around the first week of April.

Spring sturgeon, only available from Native Americans this year, has ended while the halibut and salmon seasons are just getting underway and wild steelhead are beginning to arrive. Even the True Cod that has been so wonderful is beginning to fade. So I continue to work with ahi tuna, which is fabulous, as well crab and scallops and I stay on the lookout for the jewels that pop up periodically.

Thanks to a referral by some regular customers I was introduced to Popsie Fish Company. This family has been set-net fishing in the Egegik District of Bristol Bay since 1987. Set-net fishing is accomplished from the beach and is known to be less rough on the salmon than drift nets, where most of the fish are caught. This family uses all the best practices. They bleed and ice the fish immediately on catching. They process their own fish and sell it throughout the year, with almost the entire extended family helping out. This is a great family story that we decided to combine with our own. I will soon be adding Popsie wild sockeye as a regular item on our dinner menu.

 

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