Chefs Collaborative

Monkfish is a big, ugly fish. Nestled down into the ice among sea-robins, striped bass, oysters, and conch sits a whole monkfish, a less lucky prey hanging from its gaping, many teethed mouth, it kind of looks like a giant, killer tadpole or toad. This is dinner.

Thursday, October 13th Leigh, our Program Director, and I were fortunate enough to attend the “Nose to Tail Fin Dinner” Hosted by 606 Congress in the Boston Renaissance along with Chefs Collaborative, the Boston Chapter of Slow Food, and Bostonchefs.com. The whole monkfish, and all the other sea life, was there to let diners see just what whole-fresh fish looks like, as we passed into the private dining room for seven courses of perfectly prepared ocean bounty.

The sea-robin in the display surprised me. Growing up fishing in southern New England, sea-robin had always been a trash fish, a throw-away while trying to snag flounder.  But as the nights menu proved, changing long-standing traditions about the way we approach seafood consumption yield impressive, important, and delicious results.

As we progressed from “Live Green Sea Urchin” from New Brunswick, through Gloucester “Deep Fried Cod Tongue and Cheek” and onto, Rhode Island “Sous Vide Long Fin Squid.” Chef, and Chefs Collaborative Local leader for Boston, Rich Garcia paused to take the time to explain to us the intricacies not so much of the cooking techniques, as the ways in which these fish were caught and the relationship between the plate and the ocean, and chefs and fishermen.

Perhaps this relationship was best represented with the squid, which came complemented not just with pork belly and squash gnocchi, but a small business sized card bearing a QR barcode, a way to track where the fish was caught and by whom. The Trace and Trust technology spreading around the East Coast from Rhode Island, that we’ve often touted here.

But for me the dish that most nicely captures the evening was the “Monkfish Carpaccio.” Don’t let the fish’s appearance fool you; it is delectable. Here the fish was rolled, sliced paper thin, and served raw with its own crispy gills and skin, and a ponzu made from its liver, pushing the boundaries of what most people would think of for a seafood dinner.

It pushed the boundaries in other ways too. Monkfish is still a Red-Listed seafood by most accounts, including the venerable Monterey Bay Aquarium. As Rich pointed out, by working with the fisherman and taking the time to ask questions about his products, he knows that the particular fishery he works with has a sustainable population of monkfish. What’s more, these relationships give piece of mind that the techniques of the fisherman don’t produce the terrible seafloor damage and by-catch of large-scale, conventional fishermen.

What the monkfish and all of the dishes reflect is that while lists and guidelines make for great frameworks, we need to be more proactive. For years now, and in growing numbers, chefs have worked with farmers to source sustainable produce and, more and more, meat, practices, we need to promote and embrace in every facet of sourcing. Ask the questions; find out where your seafood is coming from and how it’s caught. Stop being a buyer and seller of food and start being a link in the complex relationship of community from start, in the ocean, field or pasture, to finish in the diner’s mouth.

“It all comes down to grain. Yes, because it’s delicious – a whole world of flavor that’s been ignored for the past 50 years – but also because it’s a critical missing link in any community’s ability to feed itself.” – Dan Barber

Whole grains for sale at Upingil Farm

On a recent visit to Upingil Farm I asked Clifford Hatch, owner and head grower, what motivated him to start growing grains. “Purely youthful rebellion,” he replied with a chuckle. His father had told him he wouldn’t be able to make any money growing grains, and Clifford set out to prove him wrong. He bought some used equipment on ebay, and slowly started integrating grains into his crop plan. Today he grows about 25 acres of organic grain on his farm in Gill, MA, selling both whole grains and his freshly milled flour to local bakeries, and occasionally using it as animal feed on his farm.

Clifford is one of several farmers rebuilding the infrastructure and knowledge base for growing grains, lost in New England after a variety of factors pushed grain production to the Midwest in the late 1800s. In the last few years, small-scale grain production has begun making a comeback.

Farm stand at Upingil Farm

While commercial grain operations grow grain for uniformity and strip most of its bran and germ during the milling process in order to extend shelf life of flour, small-scale grain production prioritizes taste and nutrition. During small batch milling, grains retain their bran and germ producing truly whole grain flour that is tastier and full of nutrition. According to Clifford, this is really one of the eureka moments for people sampling home-milled flour for the first time. It really contains the whole grain. And you can taste it.

Although there are a plethora of challenges to growing grain, as there are for growing any crop, growing grain also has an abundance of benefits for small, diversified farms. Winter wheat varieties are seeded in the fall, and can act as a cover crop over the winter, protecting the soil from harsh winds rain and snow, and then harvested the following summer. At Upingil, they often plant grain in fields that need a rest, rotating in a planting of grain between plantings of more high value crops. Hatch also mentioned “Sometimes land just needs the cleaning up.”

In addition to selling the whole grains and grinding them into flour for sale, Hatch harvests the wheat straw to use as mulch on his strawberries. He is also able to use the chaff that gets cleaned from the grains in his chicken coop. Thus, in addition to growing delicious grain, farmers see other benefits for their farm when they integrate grain into their farming system.

Flour mill at Wheatberry Bakery in Amherst, MA

From the farmer perspective, there are a many reasons to integrate grains into the farming system. For chefs, the draw to sourcing local grains should be their improved taste and nutrition. Just like you can taste the difference between a mass produced tomato and a fresh heirloom tomato just picked, you can tell the difference in taste of locally grown grain, milled in small batches.

Heritage varieties, specifically, have unique flavor and qualities that are becoming more and more desirable to bakers and chefs. These are ancient varieties of grain that have not been patented and thus growers are allowed to save the seed and re-grow them. Another key quality of heritage varieties is that over the years, they will adapt to the climate in which they are grown in. Many of these varieties are still on trial, and are not yet grown in enough quantity to be widely distributed. With enough willing farmers and gardeners to grow out these varieties, and enough willing bakers and chefs to source them, however, over the next few years we can hopefully bring back some of these ancient grains and start seeing them more regularly used in the kitchen.

Wheatberry Bakery

On my way home from Upingil, I stopped into Wheatberry Bakery in Amherst, MA. Wheatberry grows some portion of their own grains on their family farm nearby, and is doing a lot of work with heritage grain varieties. They also source some of their grain from Clifford Hatch . They bake with these in their bakery, and also run a local grain CSA, providing members with approximately 100lbs per year of ancient and heritage wheats, heirloom dry beans, milling corn, barley and rye.

I treated myself to a bran muffin to eat on my way home. I told the woman at the counter that I could just take it in a napkin. No need for a bag since I was excited to eat it as soon as possible. Pulling out of my parking spot as I bit into the muffin, I had to stop the car to fully appreciate how delicious it was. The flavor was deep and complex and I knew I was tasting the whole grain. As the bite melted away in my mouth, I couldn’t wait to take the next one. And the next. The muffin was gone before I knew it.

Whether you are a farmer, a chef, an eater, or some combination of the three, this is a call to get involved in local grains. Grains have an incredibly long history. They are the most ancient of our domesticated plants. Today, our growing, sourcing and eating of grains is history in the making. According to Sylvia Davatz of Solstice Seeds in Vermont, grain is a subject around which it is possible to feel a lot of hope. By supporting small-scale grain growers, we can relearn the delicious tastes of whole grain.