* Event Dinners
* Cooking classes
* Mushroom Forage

Join us for the next local food feast

Saturday, September 18, 2010

Averil Creek Winemakers Dinner

(Cowichan Food and Wine Festival Weekend)

Gewurztraminer

* Alsatian Caramelized onion tartlet with Hillary’s Goat Cheese
* Duck liver pate with Chinese spices

Pinot Gris

* Dungeness Crab chowder with coconut milk and farm grown kafir lime leaves

Prevost

* Chanterelle risotto with double smoked bacon, kale and corn

Pinot Noir

* Duck breast over braised duck leg with orange and vanilla bean on a savoury wild mushroom gratin

Cowichan Black

* Flourless blackberry and chocolate cake with scented geranium crème fraiche and rosehip syrup

$125 / person (plus taxes) Tickets available at the winery 1-250 709-9986

Saturday, September 25, 2010

Italian-style Fall Harvest Dinner

Grilled Pizza with guanciale (smoked pork cheek), porcini and sage besciamella

Bruscetta with roasted tomatoes. olives and basil

Eggplant, Albacore Tuna and Arugula Salad

Barley polenta with wild Mushrooms and Pancetta

Red wine braised Beef short ribs ravioli with heirloom tomatoes and local cheese

Pear custard cake “Palpiton” with a hazelnut zabaglione

$90 / person (plus taxes)

Saturday, October 9th, 2010

Fall Wild Foods Celebration Dinner

Cider-braised rabbit rillette with rose hip mustard

Game pate with porcini mushroom, apple, bacon and endive aioli

Salad of smoke-roasted chanterelles and spiced, pickled squash

Dungeness crab cake with Chinese braised wild mushrooms

Venison stew with dried fruit, root vegetables and truffled polenta

Wild berry pie with coconut crumble and Big Leaf Maple ice cream

$90 / person (plus taxes)
… More to be scheduled including Pine Mushroom and Truffle Dinners …

Saturday cooking classes:

Cooking Class: 12 noon – 5:00 pm

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Porcini Mushrooms (Boletus edulis)

Porcini Mushrooms in all their glory. Everything you ever wanted to know (but were afraid to ask).

- Sourcing, habitat, preserving
- Grilled Alsatian flatbread with fresh cheese, porcini and herbs
- Grilled, Sauteed and Preserved Porcini tasting plate
- Porcini and pork noodles, Taiwanese style (vegetarian and alternatives available)

$100/person (plus Tax)

… Private classes, forages and gift certificates available…

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Mushroom Forage: 11:00 am – 4:00 pm

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Wild Mushroom Experience

Join renown chef, author and mycologist Bill Jones as he leads you on a unique wild mushroom experience. Mushroom display, show and tell, guided forage and a delicious mushroom meal to top it all off.

- Mushroom basics
- Identification
- Habitat and Seasons
- Guided forage
- Wild Mushroom tasting and treats

$125/person (plus Tax)

Contact and reservation Info:

Bill Jones
Deerholme Farm
4830 Stelfox Road
Duncan, BC, V9L 6S9

Please email or call 250-748-7450 to book or for further information. Bill Jones

We sit on the edge of the Pacific Ocean and have always found joy in celebrating the bounty of our oceans and sea shores. The people who bring us these products are some our our favourite people. These hearty souls are the living spirit of the honest and hard-working pioneers who help build our coastal communities. They continue to work with respect and honour for our local ocean environments. We present a menu of sustainable seafood, influenced by the flavours of Asia and elevated with the best farm to table ingredients – from our own gardens and the best local producers.

Join us for the next local food feast.

Saturday, July 24, 2010

East Meets West Coast Seafood

Green Onion cakes with house-smoked Sockeye salmon

Spot Prawn rice paper rolls with smoked chili mayo

Handmade Bao (steamed buns) with sweet soy braised Octopus, pickled daikon and carrot Salad

Crispy Quailicum Bay Scallops with dashi-miso vinaigrette and Deerholme salad

Planked Sablefish marinated in Granville Island Sake lees, served with garden vegetable sticky rice

Grilled Nectarines, ginger cake and 5 spice caramel sauce

$90 / person (plus taxes)

upcoming:

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Sublime Vegetarian – Cowichan Style

Lettuce wraps with grilled Eggplant and home-made Hoisin Sauce

Mushroom and caramelized Onion salad rolls with peanut sauce

Stuffed peppers with Fairburn Buffalo Mozzarella and olive caponatta

Heirloom Tomato and Pine Mushroom soup with red wine crème fraiche

Squash Cannelloni with coconut curry sauce and crispy onions

Lemon Verbena panna cotta with fresh Blueberries and mint

$75 / person (plus taxes)

Saturday, September 25, 2010

Italian-style Fall Harvest Dinner

Grilled Pizza with guanciale (smoked pork cheek), porcini and sage besciamella

Bruscetta with roasted tomatoes. olives and basil

Eggplant, Albacore Tuna and Arugula Salad

Barley polenta with wild Mushrooms and Pancetta

Red wine braised Beef short ribs ravioli with heirloom tomatoes and local cheese

Pear custard cake “Palpiton” with a hazelnut zabaglione

$90 / person (plus taxes)

Saturday cooking classes:

July 17– East meets Westcoast Cooking

We put an Asian spin on local seasonal cooking. This is a hands-on exploration of Asian pantry ingredients, local seasonal vegetables and some of the finest Cowichan Valley ingredients. You will make and sample all of the recipes in a fun and unique afternoon of cooking and learning.

Recipes will include:

- soba noodles with kale and mushroom in a sesame sauce

- wok-seared Dungeness Crab with herbs and garlic shoots

- stir-fried chicken with egg and sweet pea rice

- coconut and fresh strawberry tarte.

$100 per person

August 14– Local Sustainable Seafood

In this delicious class we seek out some of the best seafood gems on the island: Dungeness Crab, Sablefish, Octopus and Manilla Clams. We’ll learn about the sustainable choices we can make when shopping for seafood. Tips on sourcing, handling and cooking seafood will be discussed along with a number of fresh and exciting seafood dishes that you will prepare and taste in class. Recipes include:

- planked sake marinated Sablefish with a soy and honey glaze

- Dungeness Crab Cakes with apricot salsa

- Smoked Octopus with olive and potato salad

- Manilla clams with green and black bean sauce

$100 per person

Deerholme Farm and the Cowichan Valley Featured in July 2010 Travel and Leisure Magazine

In Vancouver Island”s Cowichan Valley, there is a growing food scene that defiantly (and deliciously) local
by Peter Jon Lindberg

“… if Bill Jones is hosting one of his monthly dinners, book ahead at Deerholme Farm. Jones, a supremely talented chef, is also a passionate forager, and wild mushrooms are often the highlight of his tasting menus, served in his cozy farmhouse. Working with a single sous chef, Jones puts a French and Asian spin on farm-to-table cooking: a recent menu included Chinese-style duck with hoisin sauce made from the farms own squash and a hen and egg dumpling soup infused with fresh ginseng and wasabi from the garden.”

The article comes off like a love letter to an emerging culinary destination and raves about the uniqueness of the region and the passion of the people who ” …prefer to let the food and wine do the talking” and a valley that is the “..highlight of Vancouver Islands culinary circuit”.

Travel and Leisure Magazine is based in New York City and is one of the premiere travel and dining magazines – with a total audience of more than 3 million. (www.travelandleisure.com)

Deerholme Farm
4830 Stelfox Road
Duncan, BC, V9L 6S9
250 748-7450
www.magnorth.bc.ca

Next Dinner:

Saturday June 19th

Pasture-raised Cowichan Valley Meats

• Grilled chicken skewer with a Jamaican-spiced walnut pesto
• Beef tenderloin Carpaccio with roast garlic and blue cows-milk cheese
• Chinese-style BBQ pork salad with morel mushrooms and Asian vegetables
• Duck and barley soup with a smoked chickpea crouton
• Local Salt and Grand Fir needle crusted lamb with maple-bean casserole
• Lavender shortcake with local berries and sweet cicely custard

My next target for our local food dinners is pasture raised meats. Maybe because I’ve been focusing on seafood for much of the past few months, it seemed time to unleash the inner carnivore. Here on the farm we have a policy that we don’t eat our pets. Luckily my neighbors oblige us by raising some of the best meats around and allow us the privilege of buying and using their products.

Menu:

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Pasture-raised Cowichan Valley Meats

Grilled chicken skewer with a Jamaican walnut pesto

Beef tenderloin Carpaccio with roast garlic and blue cows milk cheese

Chinese-style BBQ pork salad with morel mushrooms and Asian vegetables

Duck and barley soup with a smoked chickpea crouton

Local salt and Grand Fir needle crusted lamb with maple-bean casserole

Lavender shortcake with local berries and cream

$90 / person

I’m very excited to be getting a new BBQ in time for this event. I’ve opted for a Traeger pellet smoker BBQ, after borrowing one from my Don Genova. Don and I put on a class last year called BBQ with the Masters, we brought over his grill and he let me use it over the next month. It was very difficult to give it back. The Traeger uses compressed pellets of sawdust to efficiently create heat and smoke for an unbelievable end result. It leaves food moist and smokey without many of the harmful by-products of traditional BBQs. It probably made the best chicken I’ve ever eaten.

My main application will be to roast a leg of lamb (or two) in the smoker BBQ. This should make a great dish for the evening. I also found a couple doing local salt here in the valley and plan to use it to coat the lamb with sea salt and Grand Fir needles. This dish will be served with a side of navy beans baked and flavoured with Big Leaf Maple Syrup (Mountain View Farm) and a smoked ham hock.

The menu will include chicken, duck, beef and pork – all my favorite food groups. Hopefully the cool spring weather will end and we can harvest some of our local strawberries. The local crop is suppose to be available just as the dinner is being held!

Bill

Last week the local spot prawn season opened and I followed it up with a marathon weekend of organizing a local prawn fest and coordinating a fund raiser (prawn themed) dinner in honor of my departed friend James Barber. You’d think that would weaken my need for spot prawns. Oh no, after 5 cooking demos and plating 7 prawn courses at the dinner – I look forward to creating a menu this Saturday at Deerholme Farm.

Saturday, May 22, 2010

5 pm – 9 pm

Asparagus and Spot Prawns

Spot Prawn and prosciutto rice paper rolls / grilled asparagus with vino cotto

Flat bread with a spot prawn morel and handmade cheese spread

Poached asparagus with truffle and prawn aioli

Chinese style hot and sour prawn soup with porcini mushrooms

Indonesian-flavoured asparagus and prawn risotto

Grapefruit custard tart with ice wine infused cream, rhubarb syrup

$90 / person (meat free version available)

It was early on in my mushroom career that I was introduced to the morel. Hiking in the foothills of the Rockies, probably searching after an elusive brown trout stream, I saw a mass of spongy spear heads rising from a mossy bank. I knelt down for a closer look and marveled at the textured surface of the fungi. My exposure to mushrooms up to this point had been an affinity for cooking the store-bought buttons with a nice chunk of steak. My then recent foray into a vegetarian diet had ended badly – at a BBQ fueled on by too many beers and a rack full of grilling pork ribs. I remember guiltily ending the day covered in sauce and pork fat. This discovery of the morels was however not fueled by culinary motives. I was at first repelled by the shape, the brain-like structure and the foreign look of these organic objects. In my stupor, I left them in the field but managed to look them up in a guidebook when I got home.

In my local gourmet store, I found a pack of dried morels and tried them in a classic French preparation. I cooked a chicken in white wine, cream, garlic and leeks and added the morels after soaking. Sitting down with my room mates we tried the dish with a little anticipation mixed with a little trepidation at the brown “objects” we were about to consume. The taste was a revelation, earthy, pungent, hints of caramel and smoke rippled around my tongue. The morel opened my eyes to the possible worlds of mushrooms and taught me a valuable lesson on the deception of appearance. It was a big step in the evolution of my relationship with food.

It took me about 20 years to find my next morel. I guess I was sidetracked by careers, education, chanterelles and porcini. Living in Vancouver kept the morels off my foraging radar. Once I started to explore my new surrounding after moving to Vancouver Island, I began to unearth tidbits about morels that peaked my curiosity. One of the largest white specimens of morel was found on Southern Vancouver Island, morels like the old orchards of the Cowichan Valley, morels like the south facing slopes early in the spring. These were all great tips but the elusive morel still eluded my grasp. One day I was walking by our old campfire area on the farm. I looked down and saw about 20 morels poking up from the ash. I was stunned to find them right under my nose. Looking around the valley, I found several other clumps of morels all appearing at the same time.

In the woods, the morel looks frustratingly like a pine cone stuck in the forest floor. Once you’ve found one you start to get the hang of it. They blend so well into the environment they can sometimes be maddeningly difficult to find. It took me many years to key into the cream-white stem of the fungi (not the camouflaged cap) before I had any real success. The time frame can also be a very narrow and movable window for the morel. I began to look at other plants for indicators of morel time and settled on two local plants, the vanilla leaf plant (Achlys tryphilla) and the flower of the trillium (Trillium ovatum) as good indicators of the timing for the morel. The cooking part was relatively easy after that epic 20 year journey!

Saturday, April 17th

Morel Dinner Menu

Tarte Flambe with morels, fresh cream cheese and air-dried beef

Country Ham Pate with morel mushrooms and new onions

Braised morels stuffed with chorizo and olives

Spring Salad with wild greens, morel and maple candied salmon relish

Canard au Vin (braised duck) with morels and pinot noir, duck potatoes

Rhubarb and candied ginger upside down cake with spiced crème fraiche

$90 / person

Classes:

April 24 – Wild foods and morel mushrooms (forage and demo)

This class is a special forage and demo class. We will take a walking tour of the farm and the Trans-Canada Trail to look at Springtime wild foods found in our region. Depending on Mother Nature (always fickle) we will explore the local habitat for morel mushrooms. The window for this mushroom is a narrow one locally so we work with the conditions we are dealt. Regardless, we will have fresh and dried morels on hand and will showcase these morsels in a number of dishes that can be easily executed at home. The class includes a sampling of wilds foods and mushrooms. Vegetarian options are available if can you let me know in advance – otherwise I’m sure a little bacon and seafood will figure in the tasting somehow.

$100/person

12:00 noon – 5:00 pm

Call Bill (250) 748-7450 for reservations and info

It’s amazing how a little thing called time changes our perspectives. Growing up in Nova Scotia, I vividly remember reading about the early explorers like John Cabot who wrote of cod so abundant you could catch them off the sides of their ships using a wicker basket and a rope. Five hundred years later we witness the collapse of the east coast cod fisheries. How did we manage to take a once startling abundant food source and mismanage it into near oblivion?

In recent years, I marveled at the abundance of west coast salmon. I’ve witnessed runs of pink salmon marshaling at the mouth of northern rivers – so many you think you could walk on their backs to cross the river. One moonlit night we watched as phosphorescent plankton, shimmered around the pinks, leaving trails of lights and colours that were simply magical. Each movement of their tails and fins sent off swirls of sparkling colour into the black water. My brain told me it was bioluminescent, probably from a dinoflagellates plankton. My heart told me it was a magnificent example of the beauty and complexity of our planet. Now even these amazing runs of salmon have a cloud of uncertainty hanging over them. How many times will we learn the same lessons history is teaching us?

Who knows how many things are connected in the vast web of the world? Who knows what really is sustainable? There are many questions out there with answers to come someday – hopefully before we totally collapse the food chain of the oceans around us. What is becoming clear is that there are choices we can make than minimize the damage we now see in our oceans and promote solutions to allow us to continue harvesting seafood from the ocean. In the interconnection of our world, we know that the actions of mankind are at the root of many of the issues. Overfishing, habitat destruction, pollution and processes that effect the chemistry (pH, nutrients, hormones, drugs, etc.) are all part of the complex effects of our impact on the oceans. Reducing our ecological footprint is a personal step we can all take.

For seafood issues, I look to people who are far smarter and better informed than me when I look for answers on seafood consumption. Locally the Oceanwise program (based at the Vancouver Aquarium) works to educate consumers and businesses on sustainable seafood choices based on the following criteria:

Ocean Wise’s recommendations are based on 4 criteria. An Ocean Wise recommended species is:

1) Abundant and resilient to fishing pressures

2) Well managed with a comprehensive management plan based on current research

3) Harvested in a method that ensures limited bycatch on non-target and endangered species

4) Harvested in ways that limit damage to marine or aquatic habitats and negative interactions with other species.

Another great local group Seachoice, brings the education right to the counter top with their excellent guide to sustainable eating called Canada’s Seafood Guide. The group was formed by five highly respected organizations: Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, The David Suzuki Foundation, Ecology Action Center, Living Oceans Society and Sierra Club British Columbia. They were formed to give Canadians a voice and information in the efforts to support sustainable fisheries and aquaculture.

You may be surprised to see aquaculture in the last sentence. Right now, about 30% of the world’s seafood comes from aquaculture. Many forms of shellfish aquaculture (oysters, mussels, clams, scallops, etc) are excellent, sustainable sources of seafood.

Inland, closed farm systems are another emerging alternative and are now commercially producing trout, tilapia, catfish, sturgeon and Arctic char. Ocean pen based aquaculture has many problems that cause me concern. I personally avoid these products whose main motivation appears to revolve around the sustainability of profit rather than the ecosystem that surrounds it.

On March 20th, we’re having a dinner at Deerholme Farm that celebrates the local heroes of Sustainable fishing, these are people and products that are leading the way to ensure we have seafood for generations to come – not just filling the next quota. Please join us for an evening of great food, good company and education.

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Ocean -wise Sustainable Local Seafood

Truffle honey cured spring salmon on artisan bread

Japanese-style BBQ pacific octopus and burdock salad

Baked Cortes Island oysters with a morel and leek gratin

Dungeness Crab with a sweet and sour sauce over black sticky rice

Seared Qualicum Scallops over pork belly and stinging nettle casserole

Local hazelnut and chocolate truffle tarte, wild plum syrup

$90 / person (meat free version available)

For tickets call 250 748-7450 or email bill@deerholme.com

Our next season of events will commence on March 20th. On the weekend of the Spring Equinox we will celebrate our bounty of local sustainable seafood. The following week we’ll launch our first cooking class with a hands-on look at Dungeness Crab. Please scroll down for details.

Spring wild food foraging will be showcased in an event on April 24th with a walking tour of the local trails and a cooking demo and tasting based on products we have foraged.

Our culinary activities have been profiled in Gourmet Magazine, Saveur Magazine, Bon Appetite and Harrowsmith. Come see why these people are talking about the food of the Cowichan Valley.

Please email or call 250-748-7450 to book or for further information. Bill Jones

Email me here:

bill@magnorth.bc.ca

* Gift certificates are available *

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2010 Dinner Events:

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Saturday, March 20, 2010

Ocean -wise Sustainable Local Seafood

Truffle honey cured spring salmon on artisan bread

Japanese-style BBQ pacific octopus and burdock salad

Baked Cortes Island oysters with a morel and leek gratin

Dungeness Crab with a sweet and sour sauce over black sticky rice

Seared Qualicum Scallops over pork belly and stinging nettle casserole

Local hazelnut and chocolate truffle tarte, wild plum syrup

$90 / person (meat free version available)

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Saturday, April 17, 2010

Morel Mushrooms

Tarte Flambe with morels, fresh cream cheese and air-dried beef

Country Ham Pate with morel mushrooms and new onions

Braised morels stuffed with chorizo and olives

Spring Salad with wild greens, morel and maple candied salmon relish

Canard au Vin (braised duck) with morels and pinot noir, duck potatoes

Rhubarb and candied ginger upside down cake with spiced crème fraiche

$90 / person

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Saturday, May 22, 2010

Asparagus and Spot Prawns

Spot Prawn and prosciutto rice paper rolls / grilled asparagus with vino cotto

Flat bread with a spot prawn and handmade cheese spread

Poached asparagus with truffle and prawn aioli

Chinese style hot and sour prawn soup

Indonesian-flavoured asparagus and prawn risotto

Grapefruit custard tart with ice wine infused cream, rhubarb syrup

$90 / person (meat free version available)

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Pasture-raised Cowichan Valley Meats

Grilled chicken skewer with a Jamaican walnut pesto

Beef tenderloin Carpaccio with roast garlic and Moonstruck blue cheese

Chinese-style BBQ pork salad with mushrooms and Asian vegetables

Duck and barley soup with a local cheese crouton

Salt and Grand Fir needle crusted lamb with maple-bean casserole

Lavender shortcake with local berries and cream

$90 / person

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Local Food Cooking Classes

Hands-on limited size classes with Bill Jones. These are opportunites to expand your culinary horizons cooking with the finest local ingredients and working along side an accomplished chef and culinary instructor. Classes include a valuable primer on the topic and recipes to follow along in class and back home. Suitable for all levels of cooking skill but a prime opportunity for those looking to develop their skills and to ignite their creativity. Bill is the author of 9 cookbooks including The Savoury Mushroom and a recognized regional expert on mushrooms and wild foods.

All Classes: Saturday 12:00 noon – 5:00 pm

Cost : $100 per person

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March 27 – Dungeness Crab

April 24 – Wild foods and morel mushrooms (forage and demo)

June 5 – Wild Salmon

Please call for availabilty (250) 748-7450

The truffle is not a true aphrodisiac; but in certain circumstances it can make women more affectionate and men more attentive. -Brillat-Savarin

Wow, what a tempting proposition – affection and attention all in one small tuber. Reality is often not as romantic. My first exposure to truffles was a completely underwhelming one. While working in France, I was given a truffle preserved in cognac and told to make a special of a salad of poached lobster with truffle mayo. It was a simple enough salad, based on fresh well handled ingredients with a fresh mayonnaise built up with the liquor from the truffle and a little of the tuber shredded in.

A non-chef friend who was visiting me came into the kitchen and we chatted as I prepared my mis-en-place. He asked what I was working with and as soon as I said truffle, he grabbed the black orb and took a lusty bite out of it. I watched in horror as he spit most of it into the garbage ” I thought it was chocolate” he meekly sputtered between scraping his tongue with his upper teeth.

My god, I thought, how am I going to hide this from the chef! Luckily I went to the fridge and saw a stock pile on the shelf, up until today it’s been our little secret.

For the first while I was disillusioned with my truffle experience, I thought they were a mix of cognac, old socks and guilt. It was my first trip to forage for truffles that really opened my eyes. I talked a co-worker into introducing me to his truffle hunting uncle, Marc. We headed off to the oak forest armed with a knapsack, laguiole knife  and a walking stick. Marc looked for several tell tale signs on the forest floor. A burning (dry patch of ground)  near the base of the oaks, He also looked for the activities of rodents and squirrels (pretty much the same thing in my mind – and my dog Cooper) and flies buzzing around these areas. All are attracted to the odor of the ripe truffles. Much to my surprise, these tips soon landed us with 3 or 4 nice orbs of black truffle. The smell was amazing with these fresh specimens.

The Classic Laguiole Knife

We worked our way back to Marc’s cabin (actually a shack made of recycled odds and ends)  and we cooked up a batch of fresh eggs, fire scorched bread (sorry but it wasn’t toast Marc), local cheese and wine dispensed from a recycled water bottle. The truffles were hacked with the laguiole (the indispensable knife of most Frenchmen) and it might have been the best and most satisfying meal I’ve experienced.

In my many experiences with truffles since that day, they generally pale in the comparison. Assaults with cheap truffle oil and stale truffles that taste like burnt rubber have slightly jaded my perspective. An encounter with properly handled truffles always restores my faith. Aromatic white truffles from Italy, black truffles from France, Tasmania and Tennessee, foraged truffles from Oregon – all have been interesting albeit expensive solutions for my truffle cravings. I’m also encourage by the pioneering work of several farmers on Vancouver Island who are in the process of establishing our own homegrown truffle industry. They are growing black Perigord Truffles generally planted in the roots of Hazelnut trees. Good luck and god speed to those black  morsels, we need all the help we can get to make women more affectionate and men more agreeable.

I’ll be hosting a truffle cooking class on the farm on December 5 and a multi-course dinner on December 12

1) Triffling with Truffles – Cooking class -

Saturday December 5, 12:00 noon – 5:00 pm

$125 / person including recipes

2) Truffle Dinner

Saturday December 12th 5:00 pm – 9:00 pm

Truffled deviled eggs with artisan smoked bacon

Truffle Veloute

Fresh egg pasta with butter, fresh truffle and artisan Parmesan cheese

Terrrine of scallops and prawns with a black truffle aioli

Fresh truffle risotto with red wine braised lamb shank

Chocolate truffle tarte with hazelnut ice cream

$125 / person including recipes

For more info see:

www.magnorth.bc.ca

- a brief review of the mushroom foraging season 2009

It’s been quite moist around Duncan these past few days, the rain falling on the hillsides has saturated our local watershed, filling up the streams and sprouting lakes where streets use to run. Several months ago I remember wistfully thinking that we needed more rain. The moss in the forests around my farm was getting scorched in the dry and hot September weather. The mushroom harvest had not really started and that made me a little nervous for my favourite pastime – fungi foraging. I guess this was a case of be careful what you ask for – you may get it.

Here we are in late November and at last count we had 21 rain days out of 23 days this month! The moss is looking very healthy now and the past mushroom season has been one of the strongest in recent memory. It all started back in July when I found my first yellow chanterelle (Cantharellus formosa) in the woods around my place. That was a very encouraging sign – and was turned into a lovely pasta dish with rosemary, garlic, olive oil and Parmesan cheese. This soon turned out to be a premature start for the season, we went into near drought conditions for the next few months until about the last week in September. This year, the early fall rain showers translated into a bumper crop of white chanterelles (cantharellus subalbidus). On several occasions we went out and collected 10-15 lbs in less than a couple of hours foraging. These were destined for chowders, tomato sauces and pickles, now slowly being doled out of our pantry. Oddly enough, in the Cowichan there was a distinct lack of yellow chanterelles, in a normal year they are one of the dominant mushrooms in the forest – not this year.

We did notice a huge fruiting of short stemmed russulas (russula brevipes), these on their own are quite unremarkable mushrooms that have one redeeming quality – they are attacked by a parasitic fungus (hypomyces) and converted in the prized lobster mushroom (hypomyces lactifuorum) . They sprouted by the literal thousands in the hills of the valley, a truly remarkable fruiting that continues late into the fall (another rare occurrence).

October brought the biggest surprise of the season, an immense bounty of boletus mushrooms including the prized Porcini (boletus edulis). We have hunted high and low for these delicacies in the past, this year we found them scattered all around the trails and paths of the region. In mid October, a visit to our farm by noted mycologist David Arora shed some light on the fickle nature of the porcini. David explained the porcini is an edge-species in the world of fungi, they like to fruit in the zones that receive a little dappled sunlight and pop up on the edges of forest along paths, streams, meadows and road ways. We also found that the presence of the fly agaric (amanita muscaria) are an indicator of the correct conditions for porcini. The mushrooms are also closely associated with the roots of certain trees (in our area the Douglas Fir) – all of these tips combined with perfect growing conditions to put us in porcini heaven.

Finally in mid October, the nights cooled, the moon waned and the matsutake or pine mushrooms (Tricholoma magnivelare) began to fruit in the local hills. This is always one of my favourite times of the year. The discovery of the first pine and the deep inhaling of the heady aroma is always a thrilling sensation. Our first pines where whisked back to the kitchen and thinly sliced into a steaming pot of duck broth, garden greens and fresh udon noodles – much happy slurping ensued.

Around the first of November, the welcoming of the rainy season began to wear out its welcome. We started to wish the rain would stop. The-rain-did-not-stop. Just when we thought the sky could not shed more tears along came the Pineapple Express. Warm moisture laden winds from the mid-pacific dumped mind-numbing amounts of moisture on our heads. The pines initially flourish and we picked baskets of wonderful specimens – but eventually too much rain caused many of the mushrooms to become water saturated and rot underground. This is terribly disappointing to a forager who has slogged hundreds of meters up wet hillsides – only to be greeted with soggy rotting pine button and worm-riddled mature specimens.

After the torrential rains we have now settled into a steady drizzle. Proving that every cloud can have a silver lining, we have recently started to see a new crop of pine buttons return to the hills. Adding to our elation, we’ve found a few specimens of one of our most aromatic fungi, the caulifower fungus (Sparassis crispa). Despite the name, this fungi looks more like a large ball of creamy white ribbons with an aroma that is forest, floral and spice in a crisp and delicious package. My favourite preparation is a cream of squash soup with handfuls of cauliflower fungus thrown in just before serving.

If we can only fight that urge to curl up with the dog in front of the woodstove, the mushroom season looks poised to make a run deep into December. Who knows, perhaps we’ll have (freshly foraged) pine mushroom stuffed turkey this Christmas.