Bison and Morel Mushrooms

Anyone who lives on the Westcoast knows about the abundance of wild mushrooms, no not the psychedelic type that teenagers and hippies harvest, I’m referring to delicious gourmet mushrooms like chanterelles and morels. While most mushrooms are harvested in the fall, the morel is the exception that shows up in the spring and early summer.

Morels are found in areas affected by forest fires in the previous 1-2 years, and are unmistakable given their sponge-like appearance, ranging in colour from black to yellow-brown and can grow to be 4-6” in height. I was thrilled to find a local mushroom forager at the Metchosin Farmers Market with fresh morels from Quesnel BC. I bought myself 1 pound of mushrooms for $16 and started planning dinner for Sunday and Monday. Tonight we would enjoy an appetizer from our local market!

In addition to the morels I bought some fava beans, DiMaggio onions and a fresh baked baguette. I started by sautéing the onion in some pernod butter, then added a half pound of sliced morels, which were cooked until softened, about 7 minutes (this is important when cooking fresh morels since they can cause an upset stomach if eaten raw). Whipping cream was added and reduced, followed by the prepared fava beans with their brilliant bright green colour.

We grilled slices of baguette, rubbed the toasted crostini with garlic, topped each with the mushroom sauté and finished them with fresh chopped tarragon. What a delightful way to start dinner.

Our Sunday dinner continued with bison striploin and local veggies. The bison striploins were grilled for barely 6 minutes for medium rare, and were dressed with only olive oil, salt and pepper to let the flavor of the young bison shine through. Served alongside were oven braised baby fennel and DiMaggio onions, sautéed rainbow chard and smashed german gold new potatoes. While I was tempted to prepare a sauce for this dinner I decided to let the flavours of the local bounty stand on their own. Now we are ready for a full and busy week of work!

Cooking at Home

I really enjoyed our four fabulous days in Montreal with the great variety of food and wine the city has to offer. At the same time I missed cooking! In preparation for Thursday night dinner I picked up my weekly meat and veggie box from Alex and Virginie at Wind Whipped Farm (http://www.windwhippedfarm.com/) . They are an amazing couple who have partnered with other local farmers who supply lamb, chicken and pork for the meat portion of the box program. The variety and quality of the veggies are always excellent. Dinner started with grilled hearts of romaine then the main course featured a smoked chicken from Stillmeadow Farm (http://www.stillmeadowfarm.ca/).

The grilled hearts of romaine were topped with oven roasted roma tomatoes from Glanford Greenhouses, croutons and Caesar salad dressing, heavy on anchovies and capers. Grilled romaine is always a nice start to a summer BBQ menu!

This beautiful local organic chicken was rotiserried on low heat while we smoked it with cherry wood chips. Wind Whipped Farm provided first of season red beets, served on top of their wilted greens, steamed new purple potatoes, and a sauté of baby zucchini, snow peas and DiMaggio onion tops.


We are so lucky to have so many great people providing top quality local ingredients for our table. They are all passionate about local, sustainable food supply for local residents and restaurants. In the coming weeks I will share with you some of these great local restaurants and their amazing food!