With her commitment to using local, organically-grown products in the restaurant, owner Anna Maria DeFreitas has hooked up with island-bred Ryan Browne. A builder by trade, Ryan has opportunity to view parts and parcels that most of us rarely, if ever, see. But he views them with a keen eye – not for their beauty, but for the bounty they yield.
Ryan is a forager, someone who goes out and searches for provisions – whether they are for food, medicine, soaps, cosmetics, tools or shelter. In other words, he puts to use the natural resources. Where you and I might look out our backyard and see weeds, Ryan sees remarkably abundant gifts of nature. “The dandelion is the poster child for edible weeds” he remarks. But it’s not just the foraging that he’s good at. He’s delved into the history of the island, learning what both the Native Americans and the Europeans did with the plants that grew here. Fortunately there’s an incredible amount of information available to him: what they used it for, how they prepared it. There’s so much that goes into each plant; not just whether it’s edible or not, but also what its other uses are; can you take it; should you take it. For example, wildflowers are edible, but can be terribly disruptive to the eco-system if you take them.
Ryan Picks Meullin
Another challenge is to understand the cycles of the year. The windows of availability for most edibles are short, and they’re rarely the same each year. This year, things are coming in early, and with the recent rains, he’s finding mushrooms growing when there usually aren’t. The types people like to eat – morels, chanterelles, oysters – usually grow wild in the fall but are showing up now, and certainly will make their appearance on the Coho menu. One type in particular, the Shaggy Mane, is tough to cultivate, but nature rewards diligent foragers; it starts to go bad as soon as its picked, so Ryan tends to bring a skillet and fry ‘em up on the spot.
Glasswort is another interesting edible that you may see on the Coho menu if you’re lucky enough to be there the day Ryan shows up. Though not an aquatic plant, it’s a perennial that tolerates lots of salt water and grows in inter-tidal areas; most people just walk over it, but for Ryan, it’s a good side for dinner, tasting something like a seasoned heart of lettuce. That’s also when a great chef shines – creativity “on the spot.”
Ryan Picks Salmonberries
Ryan was always interested in foraging while in school here on San Juan Island, but delved deeper into it while in college in Santa Barbara, CA and through a travel/study program in Napa CA. He came back home with an even great commitment to utilizing the natural resources of the island, and hopes to get people excited about what’s growing in our own back yards. Of course, anyone spending a year in Napa has got to learn something about wine-making, and Ryan is no exception. His greatest hobby now is wine-making, but it’s definitely his own style. He makes “wild wines” – salmonberry, yellow plum, blackberry wines – dry, not sweet. Hmmmm, maybe I’ll get lucky and nab a taste of his Dandelion wine.
For information on Washington’s native plants, see http://www.wnps.org/education/native_plant_info.html. To read about happenings at the inns, go to http://www.harrisonhousesuites.com/blog/ and http://www.tuckerhouse.com/blog/ and for what’s going on around the island, go to http://www.experiencesanjuanisland.com/blog/.
