Passport to Texas

Holly Heyser, image from www.flickriver.com

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Journalist, Holly Heyser, didn’t grow up in a hunting family. She says she eventually took up the sport to spend more time with her boyfriend who is a hunter, author and chef.

13— I got sick of being alone on weekends when he was out duck hunting all day long. He would get up at two in the morning and be out forever….well…it didn’t take that for me to join him. What it took was for him to cooking a lot of ducks, and wild ducks, especially where we live in the Sacramento Valley. Amazing. Really great food.

Holly says she’s gained new respect for the meat she consumes, and not just wild game, but domesticated animals, as well.

33— Since I started hunting, I am so much less wasteful of meat. Even if I’m at a restaurant, if there’s a burger on my plate, I will not leave one single bite of meat on my plate, because I know an animal died for that. And when it’s animals you hunt, especially…we invest a lot of time. We can spend 12 hours and a lot of money on gas, to go and maybe get two ducks one day. That’s a precious gift, and you don’t waste it. So it’s really made me understand the value of the food we eat. And, I appreciate it a lot more than I ever used to. And the fact that it’s wild food and it’s absolutely delicious is icing on the cake.

Wild game is free range, organic, sustainable, and nutritious. And if you’re a hunter, you can donate deer to hunters for the hungry to feed those less fortunate.

Sign up for the Hunt Texas e-newsletter on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website, and learn about hunting for and preparing wild game.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Hank Shaw (left), image from www.corksoutdoors.com/blog

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Hank Shaw knows where his food comes from because he forages, hunts and fishes for the majority of it—skills he learned from his mother growing up on the east coast.

13— It’s always been part of our lives. Digging clams in the Atlantic, picking berries, and all that kind of stuff. It’s an awareness that there’s food all around us. I’ve always had it. And that’s really helped spur a lifelong passion.

He records his passion for wild food on his popular blog Hunter, Angler, Gardener, Cook, which inspired his book Hunt, Gather, Cook, published by Rodale Press. He says the deepest level of food satisfaction one can achieve is only possible when it’s wild sourced.

18— Think about it: on a very basic level, anybody who’s ever fished, you catch a fish and then you eat it in a frying pan on a camping trip. It tastes so much better than one that you buy at a store. And it is that satisfaction of having worked for your food. It’s difficult to explain if you’ve never done it, but once you do it, it become addicting and you never want to stop.

Hank Shaw cooks and eats everything he forages, hunts and fishes, and shares the experience and what he’s learned on his blog and in his book.

09—I want to do justice to the things that I bring home. And I want to help people who are also hunting and fishing and foraging to cook their food better—give them new ideas.

Sign up for the Hunt Texas e-newsletter on the TPW website, and learn about hunting for and preparing wild game.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Chef John Besh, Image: Cheryl Gerber for The New York Times

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It’s deer season in North and South Texas, and hunters are headed to the field with the hope of bringing healthy meat home for the table. Chef John Besh, who has a PBS Cooking Series, My New Orleans, grew up in hunting and fishing, activities he says helped him develop respect for life.

13— You see something running or swimming one moment, and then the next moment it’s in the frying pan. You don’t waste as much of it. You don’t look at it as lightly as you do as meat wrapped in cellophane on the grocery shelf.

If you like knowing where your food comes from, Chef Besh says you do when you hunt and fish.

12— If you’re a carnivore, it’s the purest form—to take it from the field to the plate. It’s something that I do on a personal level quite a bit. I have four sons, and they’re growing up with the tradition as well.

Chef Besh apprenticed in southern Germany, where each fall the restaurant served wild game brought in by local hunters and farmers, and inspected and approved by the health department.

16—I so loved that, and so appreciated that that added just yet another layer of understanding of how to treat game and the importance of this tradition. So you were field to plate before field to plate was cool. I don’t know if it’s cool yet [laughter].

Sign up for the Hunt Texas e-newsletter on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website, and learn about hunting for and preparing wild game.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Bastrop State Park

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Some of my fondest thanksgiving memories were those I spent with family and friends in state parks. Make some holiday memories of your own this year. Our state Park Guide, Bryan Frasier tells us how.

54— Thanksgiving is traditionally one of the most popular and busiest times in our state park system. We encourage people to plan their family outings in a state park; we have so many group facilities you can rent and have your get together and your Thanksgiving meal in a state park. But also, we have a tendency to really enjoy that Thanksgiving turkey, so get out the next day and hike. See the beauty, the changing colors here in Texas, and walk around and use some energy and burn off that Thanksgiving meal. So, get outside and enjoy some time outdoors this Thanksgiving holiday. And if you’re going to, I also encourage people that if they’re going to be camping to make some advance reservations. It is a popular time. It is great weather. People historically have time off for the holidays — so make those camping and overnight reservations as early as you can to come out and enjoy state parks at Thanksgiving.

Thanks, Bryan.

That’s our show for today…with funding provided by Chevrolet, supporting outdoor recreation in Texas; because there’s life to be done.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Hunter Education

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Ryan Adams, an engineer by day and food blogger by night, discovered just because a dove takes a nosedive into your domicile that doesn’t mean dinner is served.

08 – It would have been a waste of that dove’s life for me to just chuck it in a trashcan. I value every single life that goes toward food.

Yet, it’s illegal to possess and eat wild game not harvested by legal means and methods. He knows that now thanks to friendly talks with Parks & Wildlife; and he wants to know more.

21— As a matter of fact, I decided that I should probably get my license. And so, I’ve gone online; I’ve found a course on Hunter Safety and I’m going through the process right now. I have another friend who has already done this, and is looking forward to doing the field day test. So, here, within the next couple of months, I will be properly licensed.

Go to the Texas Parks and Wildlife website to find online and classroom opportunities for Texas hunter education.

For someone like Ryan who cares about where his food comes from, learning to hunt is the next step on his culinary exploration, and something he looks forward to sharing.

06 – This is Texas; [hunting] that’s part of our heritage, that’s part of who we are. And I personally look forward to it because I’m going to be able to go hunting with my dad for the first time ever.

It’s never too late to go hunting for the first time. Find hunter education, license information, and wild game recipes on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.