Foraged Thanksgiving

The beautiful places foraging takes me--Provincetown The kid, framed by two middle-aged men holding rifles, cradled the pheasant in his arms. The body of the limp bird flapped against the boy's body and he smiled, proud of the pheasant. The sun was low on the horizon, the ocean only a distant blue smear. Vast dunes spread before us.

"Thanksgiving dinner?" I asked.

They smiled.

I could feel the elation of the hunt, the story of how they got this bird early on Thanksgiving day. I wanted to ask who was going to pluck the bird, clean it and cook it. There were a lot of soft brown feathers to deal with. For a moment I was jealous. Pheasant tastes delicious. But I knew I wouldn't be capable of killing the bird. And this day was devoted to eating only food we had gathered ourselves.

Jody gathering cranberries--it's a mystery why I can't post this photo vertically. Turn your head...Jody and I started our day gathering cranberries, one of a few ingredients for our all-foraged Thanksgiving dinner. We have done this for a few years and knew what we were able to take from the land:  mussels, clams, cranberries and watercress from the Province Lands. The day-long gathering always made us tired and hungry and our foraging took us to some of the prettier parts of the end of Cape Cod.

Jody knows these lands well, having lived in Provincetown for almost thirty years. She can lead me to the cranberry bogs, but also to where I might see some Horned Larks and Snow Buntings in the open grassy areas. At one beach there were seals floating nearby, heads bobbing in the cold ocean. We hoped to see whales but did not. Throughout the vast dunes, Jody pointed out fox prints, raccoon, coyote.

This year, the cranberries were sparse. In the past, we had plunked down in a bog and filled our plastic shopping bags. But the first bog we tried was bare. The second patch, nestled around small pitch pines, had a few berries. We worked for them, squatting to see the few bright red berries, taking one or two, then moving on. After an hour we had perhaps two cups. Enough for our meal.

Common EiderNext: mussels. The breakwater stretches out from the tip of Provincetown. It's a great place to walk on a sunny day, and that is what we had. We pulled on our waders, and headed out, along with others enjoying the fresh ocean air in November. A few hundred yards offshore we clambered down the rocks in search of mussels. On the underbelly of the big rocks we found oysters galore, mussels hugging close, and some strange new invasive slime that has arrived in these waters. It was an orange glutinous substance, other worldly. I promised myself I would not think of this while eating the mussels. This is the downside of knowing where your food comes from. Later, I scrubbed those mussels extra clean.

Pulling mussels was easy. We wandered, took a few, then wandered more at low tide. In the distance stood a huddle Black-Backed Gulls and a few fleeting Sandpipers. On the Bay side of the jetty, Common Eider floated near to the rocks, diving for fish. They have beautiful yellow bills and in the clear water we could see them paddling strong to gather their food.

People out for a walk before or after their turkey dinners asked us what we were doing. We boasted about our day of food gathering and a young woman from Manhattan looked incredulous. "Mussels grow here? and you just take and eat them?"

I am no prophet of right eating. I eat organic when I can, eat meat when I want to, but live by no rules. And yet I know we are divorced from what we eat. For one day, I want to know where my food comes from. And I want to know that I could provide that meal. But it's all a game--I wouldn't last long like this and the truth is, cranberries and mussels are not a great pairing.

A Gray Seal coming to greet usMid-afternoon we were both tired from walking, the sun, the light wind on our faces. The talking too--we had a lot to catch up on. I've known Jody since high school. We both went to Penn State where our fathers taught. We shared one particularly boring literature class. We'd meet in the bathroom during the class break and commiserate. I think once we shared a beer in one of the gray stalls, laughing as we numbed ourselves to Stendhal.

Since those college days we have seen each other at least once a year. I make an annual pilgrimage to the Cape, where my parents spent their honeymoon and where their ashes are scattered in the dunes. I have known all of Jody's jobs, friends, loves—and her pets. On this trip there are two new orange cats George and Fred, and Griffin, the wonder dog who as a puppy joined us on a forage day. We both ponder aloud our single lives. There is no regret; we are both enjoying our freedom, and the fact we are meandering freely together through this beautiful day.

WatercressThe green of watercress is astonishing in November. It floats the surface of the Herring River, which makes for easy picking. We fill our bags, load back into the car and head home to begin the cooking. "Pumpkin pie isn't foraged, but I think I have to have some," I admitted. But then much of our meal isn’t foraged: the wine we cook the mussels in, or the garlic, and we turn the watercress into soup made with milk and onions. Our foraged meal is a bit fake but it's a good fake. It has allowed us a day outside, a day of sun and beautiful walks, of time to share stories from our lives. Thanks indeed.