Every Saturday morning during my Hudson’s life, I would go to the Sunset Valley Farmer’s Market to get fresh local seasonal ingredients for the restaurant.  Through the years I did find a bevy of locals that would and did deliver their product, such as longhorn tenderloin, Katz Coffee, Round Rock Honey, local lettuce and lots of locally grown vegetables.

While at the Market, I befriended a young German named Ackheim, who cooked for an upscale fishing camp along the southern coast of Alaska during fishing season and Ackheim suggested I bring a group and do a week long Alaskan Cooking School.  The original idea when we started this discussion was to bring a group of foodies from Austin and the trip would be focused on the food in Alaska, not the fishing.  The direction one takes may be completely different than first thought. I never believe a good idea should be rigid, let the path tell you what direction you should take so I try to remain flexible and go with the flow, stay open to possibilities and float.  When Frank Lloyd Wright designed public places, he didn’t draw the sidewalks into his design, but later when the dirt paths appeared, they showed him where the sidewalks should be.  I tried to use this inspiration throughout my life and the Alaskan fishing trips became just that, started out as a cooking expedition turned into a fishing trip.  My first trip as a fearless leader to Alaska we used the fishing camp that Ackheim cooked at and it was very remote and had bare bones spartan accommodations.  The only way to get to the fishing camp was by plane which was a dramatic entrance and introduction because we flew in so low that we could see bears, moose, etc.  During our stay, there was a National Geographic study group camped on a nearby glacier observing this glacier because it was melting a foot a day.  They found some prehistoric seeds on the glacier that were not yet sprouted and I have often wondered what those seeds turned out to be.

I soon discovered that all of my foodie companions were as passionately into fishing as they were into cooking.  There are seven kinds of salmon in Alaska but sadly our timing was a bit off and the salmon were not coming out of the ocean except one, the silver salmon.  They were just starting to make their way back from the ocean heading upstream to spawn.  So, it was time to readjust and determine what to do during an Alaskan trip that was offering no fish but lots of wild berries?  We took the “make lemonade out of lemon” approach and made delicious wild berry jam.  I saw my first grizzly bear while picking berries.  I’ll always remember when one member of our group asked the guide, “can I wear my 45 revolver for protection from the bear?” The guide said “you should file the sight bead smooth”.  “Why?”, asked the revolver owner.  The guide said “it won’t hurt as much when the bear sticks it up your ass”.  Enough said, we never saw that revolver again.  We weren’t the only ones missing the fish, and beware the grizzlies are looking for any food when the fishing is slow.

The fishing lodge and kitchen were limited and inadequate and the cabins were also disappointingly spartan to say the least and soon were named “tool sheds”.  Pam and Mike Reese were among the roster of folks on this trip and they kindly gave me a seat on their plane and flew me and my ice chest with my foods and seasonings from Austin to Alaska.  When we landed in our fishing camp, it was quite a culture shock going from their luxurious jet to the rugged accommodations at the fish camp.  After getting a belly full of the sparse accommodations, Pam and Mike flew to another fish camp that reputedly was more along the lines of what we had been expecting.  They liked what they found, approved of this new camp and kindly returned in their plane to our camp of disappointments to get me and take me back with them to Rapids Camp Lodge.

Pam and Mike knew this fish camp would be more appropriate for our group and conducive to cooking and it was indeed but there was one catch, I would have to book the entire lodge.  Back in Austin I got busy promoting, I sold the idea to our guests at our monthly cooking schools and advertised it on our daily menu at the restaurant and we successfully filled the fishing lodge.  The Rapids Camp Lodge provided so much more for our guests than we had experienced on our first trip to Alaska the year before.  They had about a half dozen float planes available to transport hither and yon and they used them to transport us to their saltwater fishing boat that was anchored in nearby Geo Bay.  The flight into Geo Bay was a beautiful flight over smoking volcanoes and once in the boat we were further entertained by the jumping whales and barking sea lions.  We caught huge halibut which is great for ‘hot & crunchy’ and if you find yourself in the middle of almost nowhere without a Central Market, know that you can use Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes to pull off the hot and crunchy breading.  The fish camp was located just outside of the tiny town of King Salmon, population 300, which has an Air Force Base, a bar and a general store.  If you happened upon a female while strolling the street of King Salmon, you could compliment her by saying “nice tooth”, you get the idea.  The pilot and our guide were cleaning the halibut on a remote shore we had beached on while my group and I remained in the boat.  A huge grizzly smelled the halibut and appeared on the beach for a shore lunch of sushi.  The pilot and guide knew when to fold ‘em and left the halibut behind for the bear’s pleasure and jumped back in the boat.  No halibut for us!  On another occasion we had caught sockeye salmon and I was preparing a smoked salmon lunch on the river bank in my trusty stove top smoker.  I had 6-ounce fillets in the smoker when a grizzly appeared 50 feet downstream from us.  It was his lunchtime.  Our guide said don’t run, just enjoy your lunch and the side show while the grizzly catches his own fresh lunch.  And sure enough, the grizzly caught and ate 8 sockeye’s nose to tail while we looked on and then happily, he returned to the forest for his afternoon siesta.  And we thought we had overeaten with our lovely 6-ounce lunch. On another occasion I was fly fishing and turned around to see a large grizzly observing me.  But not to worry because bears are friendly when their bellies are full.

Back at the lodge every night for dinner we (the participants) convened in the lodge kitchen and prepared hors d’oeuvres and a 4-course dinner and shared the stories of our day.  Not surprisingly, our menu always included salmon.

It stayed light all night which was great for our guides because once they were done with us for the day, they would go out to do their own fishing at 10pm.  This Travel with Chef Jeff Alaskan Fishing/Cooking Journey became an annual event and we had many people that returned year after year.  As the years went by, I began to take our executive chef, Robert Rhoades, along on the trip because it added another dimension to what we could do in the kitchen during the trip, took the menu planning to a whole new level and it certainly made my job easier.

On one of these trips, Robert Rhoades and I were fishing for sockeye.  Our guide explained that salmon didn’t feed once they began their journey upstream to spawn.  They swim in large visible groups called waves so when you see a wave, you cast your line with a bare hook in front of them.  The sockeye swim upstream with their mouths open because the fish absorb oxygen from the water and the water is taken through the mouth, flows over the gills, and then exits through the gill openings. Anyway, because of the gaping mouths, you feel your line slipping through their mouth, jerk your line into its mouth and voila it’s time for dinner.  This is called flossing for fish, my kind of fishing.  Talk about abundance!  Robert and I had reached our legal limit in one hour.  The Forest Service was in charge of keeping the eco system healthy and that means keeping the salmon population strong.  They employed “fish counters” whose job it is to sit in a tower and count the salmon going up stream.  When enough fish have gone upstream to spawn, the commercial fisherman is now allowed to net salmon in the bays.

My favorite adventure was to fly to Brooks Falls and watch the bears feed.  The only way to get to the falls was by float plane.  After you graduated from bear school (run by the Forest Service) you would follow the path to a deck to observe and photograph the bears as they were feeding.  The largest grizzlies being the “king of the mountain” due to their size and power would stand on the top of the 5’ falls and catch the salmon as they were jumping up the falls hoping to continue their journey upstream.  The smaller grizzlies would feed in the water below the falls.  I always felt “less than” when taking pictures with my camera at the Falls while surrounded by pros with their tripods and 3’ lenses.  Any time you see videos or photos of bears catching fish at a waterfall, it was documented at Brooks Falls.

Flying over the Alaskan wilderness will always be on the top of my list of favorite experiences.  It is breathtaking and awe inspiring; the virgin land is completely untouched by modern times and technology, beautiful scenery peppered with the sight of bears and moose roaming around just looking for a meal.  It doesn’t get better than that.

Below you’ll find a recipe for a compound lime butter.  Compound butters are full of flavor.  They can be frozen in a Ziploc baggy and defrosted in 8 minutes for a fast meal.  The recipe can be adjusted for grilled chicken or beef.  Just add beef stock or Worcestershire sauce to the recipe. It is prettiest when half dollar size dollop is formed out of a pastry bag with a large star tip.  Cool in the refrigerator before freezing.  This is a simple tasty butter atop grilled salmon.

 

Lime Wine Butter

Ingredients

1 cup wine (wine you would drink—not in college)

1 tablespoon minced shallots

1 tablespoon minced garlic

3 limes-zested first and then juiced

2 sticks organic butter-1” cubes and chilled

1 bunch of minced cilantro

1 teaspoon sea salt

½ teaspoon white pepper

 

Method

Combine wine, shallots and garlic in sauté pan. 

Cook over medium heat and reduce to 2 tablespoons.  Cool.

Add lime zest and juice.

Add butter, cilantro, wine mixture and salt-pepper into a food processor and blend.

Place mixture in a pastry bag with a star tip and squeeze out dollops on a plate.

Chill and then freeze if appropriate.

 

Place unfrozen compound butter on top of grilled fish.