Hank Shaw is more than just a modern day Euell Gibbons.
This former line cook-turned-journalist says he hasn’t bought meat or fish for his home since 2005, yet he is most decidedly an omnivore, feasting on grouse, rabbit and boar as well as wild morels, berries and mint.
He hunts, fishes, gardens and forages.
Shaw’s blog, Hunter Angler Gardener Cook has been nominated twice for a James Beard award. It won best blog from the International Association of Culinary professionals in 2010, and was nominated again this year. His articles have appeared in Food & Wine and Field & Stream.
Now he has a brand new cookbook, Hunt Gather Cook: Finding the Forgotten Feast and he’s hitting the road, bringing his back-to-basics methods of gathering and hunting for food to share with the rest of us.
On Wednesday, June 8, Shaw will be at Rancho Pinot in Paradise Valley, AZ, cooking with a kindred soul, Chef Chrysa Robertson.
Robertson, founder of the Phoenix chapter of Slow Food USA, was recently inducted into the Scottsdale Culinary Hall of Fame. She has cooked at the James Beard House and has been featured in Gourmet and Food & Wine, and yet she prefers to raise hens, forage the desert and keep a low profile at her cowboy chic restaurant, letting the simplicity and freshness of her food speak for itself.
Shaw and Robertson walk the same talk when it comes to food, so when Shaw decided to make a stop in the Valley, Robertson’s Rancho Pinot was a natural fit.
The two will prepare a feast of wild harvested foods from the area: prickly pears, mulberries and cholla buds, to name a few.
The menu is a work-in-progress, as Robertson is still gathering local foodstuffs, but it might look something like this, paired with three Arizona wines:
APERITIF
Mulberry ’elixir’
APPETIZER ‘BITS’
Crisp guarijio squash blossoms
Sweet n sour iitoi onions
Sauteed spanish peppers
Acorn meal piadini
Venison sausage
TROUT
New Mexican cornmeal-crusted, on a salad of tepary beans, grilled nopales, corn, iitoi onion & bacon with Mexican oregano vinaigrette
QUAIL
Elderberry glazed, mesquite grilled, with a mole of cholla buds & local squash
MESQUITE FLOUR CREPES
Local peach ice cream with chiltepin chile & prickly pear-desert honey sauce
Photo © Holly A Heyser from Hunt, Gather, Cook by Hank Shaw
Details:
Wednesday, June 8, 6:30 p.m.
Rancho Pinot
6300 North Scottsdale Road, Paradise Valley, AZ
480-367-8030
$75 per person, including 3 Arizona wine pairings (excluding tax and gratuity)
Copies of Shaw’s book will be available for purchase
Marianne Belardi | JUNE 01, 2011
Wow! With the possible exception of the ‘crispy’ squash blossoms, this wonderful feast seems entirely free of wheat/gluten. Must phone or write Chrysa to check…
LivedinItaly | JUNE 01, 2011
Oh how I would love to be there! Darn conflicted calendar.
Book signing with author Hank Shaw « Phoenix Public Market | Urban Grocery and Wine Bar | JUNE 01, 2011
[...] Also, on Wednesday, June 8, at 6:30 pm, Shaw will be at Rancho Pinot (6300 North Scottsdale Road, Paradise Valley, AZ; 480-367-8030) in Paradise Valley, AZ, cooking with Chef Chrysa Robertson. The price of the dinner is $75 per person, including 3 Arizona wine pairings (excluding tax and gratuity). Click here for more details. [...]
Michele Redmond | JUNE 04, 2011
What a superb concept and menu. Hank can gather nopales from my front yard…just a friendly offer!
Gwen Ashley Walters | JUNE 07, 2011
Michele: thank you for helping to get the word out to the Slow Food members!