Ep. 104 - A Culinary Journey with Hank Shaw, Discussing His 6th Cookbook, BORDERLANDS

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Hank Shaw's latest cookbook "Borderlands: Recipes and Stories from the Rio Grande to the Pacific" takes readers on a captivating journey through the often misunderstood culinary landscape of the U.S.-Mexico border region. This remarkable work, his sixth book, showcases not just 125 recipes (and 300+ photos) but also tells the rich stories of the people, places, and traditions that make this cuisine so special. 

The borderlands themselves emerge as a character in Shaw's narrative. He describes them as "neither fully American nor fully Mexican," a unique cultural space with its own identity. This is reflected in the food, which often incorporates elements from both countries but transforms them into something distinctive. 

Shaw's experiences crossing the border, interacting with locals (aka the "fronterizos"), and exploring remote desert regions and saltwater shores, bring this vibrant cultural landscape to life for readers who may never have visited.

Beyond recipes and ingredients, "Borderlands" is about connection—connection to nature, to culture, and to other people across perceived boundaries. In a time of division, Shaw's book offers a path toward understanding through shared appreciation of food traditions. As he notes in the conclusion of the interview, one of his hopes for the book is that it will take readers "a little bit outside your bubble" and help them see new perspectives. 

In this way, "Borderlands" is more than a cookbook—it's an invitation to expand our culinary horizons and, in doing so, perhaps broaden our understanding of the rich cultural tapestry that exists along the U.S. - Mexico border.

The book is available now at HuntGatherCook.com or through major retailers, and Hank invites listeners to follow him on Instagram @huntgathercook or read his Substack "To the Bone" for more insights. 

To learn more about George Blitch, visit:
SonofaBlitch.com

To watch the video version of this podcast, visit (and subscribe) to:
youtube.com/@sonofablitch

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello, Hank, Welcome to the podcast.
I'm so glad you're here.
I cannot wait to talk aboutyour latest book.
But first, how the heck youdoing man?

Speaker 2 (00:23):
I'm doing all right.
I you know I'm pretty busy.
Uh, it's, the book has justcome out and I have been
spending all my days Well, mostof my days um, trying to get
books, book tours, things ready,to try to make sure that the
people who order the books aregetting their books, and just
generally trying to sell thisthing, cause it's.
I think a lot of people don'trealize how hard it is to get
people to know about a book.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
The writing part's the easy part, but I'm doing
pretty good, yeah, well, youknow I was going to ask you
about that too, and the ideathat you know this is your
fourth book there with H&H, andhow did that first start, where
you decided to make that journey?
And then, of course, I'm goingto dive into Borderlands and
talk all about that.
But yeah, I was kind of curiousabout how the publishing side
of that went for you and goingin and, you know, producing your

(01:06):
own thing.

Speaker 2 (01:12):
Uh, it was kind of a leap of faith.
So my second book is a duckduck goose and that's a
waterfowl cookbook and that wasdone by basically random house.
It's a 10 speed is an imprintof penguin random house.
And so big giant publisher uh,they were actually great people
to work with, they were reallygood.
And then I came with them witha proposal to write Buck Buck
Moose and for some reason theythought it was too niche and
that there wouldn't be a bigenough audience for it, so they

(01:35):
declined it.
So they said no, and I don'tblame them.
If you don't think you can sellthe book, then don't take the
book on.
So I kind of wandered aroundlooking for other publishers and
da-da-da, and that didn'treally pan out.
So what I ended up doing wasdoing a Kickstarter in 2015 for
that book and it raised enoughmoney to make Buck Buck Moose

(01:57):
and that book's been prettysuccessful and I realized very
quickly that, yes, it's superhigh risk, super high reward,
super high investment and it's alittle bit of an adrenaline
junkie kind of thing where youput a lot of money and time and
blood, sweat and tears into abook and now you got to sell it.

(02:17):
But I had been doing that withmy first two books Hunt, Gather,
hunt gather, cook and duck duckgoose except I was getting like
this much money off of eacheach book.
Well, this one, I'm gettingthis much money off of each book
.
So I I it very quickly becameapparent that even a moderately
successful book is going to makemore money and it's going to

(02:38):
allow me to do more things andso that each book kind of allows
me to, you know, do the nextthing and then do the next thing
and do the next thing.
And that's been, it's beenreally liberating, it's.
I've been blessed with a teamthat, like my sister, laura, has
designed all four of my mostrecent books, most of the photos

(03:05):
for the books.
Borderlands is a littledifferent.
She did a lot of the platephotos, but I did all of the not
plate photos and I actually didsome of the plate photos too.
So it's been a kind of aninteresting transition but super
positive, very kind of you know.
I mean it's not like I don'teat triple duck or stress
sandwiches for breakfast, butit's paid off so far.

Speaker 1 (03:23):
Well, it's a phenomenal book, man.
I've read it cover to cover.
I love that there is so muchstorytelling.
That goes on as well.
I mean, you have 125 recipes,over 300 photographs and, like
you talked about, there's a lotof plate dishes but there's a
lot of murals, there's a lot ofthe markets, there's a real
sense of these regions and youknow the book itself Borderlands
, borderlands, recipes andstories from the Rio Grande of

(03:44):
the Pacific, uh, six book hereand it's, you know, obviously
it's, it's out now and it'sreally kind of a love letter to
a region, as you kind of said.
And I'd love for you to.
You know, for people who maynot be familiar about it for the
first time, before we dive intoit, why don't you go ahead and,
in your own words, talk about alittle bit about what this book
is for you and what you hopereaders will get from it?

Speaker 2 (04:13):
Sure, it is kind of the culmination of really two
decades of traveling all alongthe border from the Rio Grande
to the Pacific.
And what I realized when itsort of started out as a
straight up Northern Mexicanbook and that initial idea was
there, because a lot up NorthernMexican book and I and I that
initial idea was there because alot of Northern Mexican food is
kind of poo-pooed by foodpeople in the United States.
It's like man, it's just, it'sjust Tex-Mex and Tex-Mex sucks,
which well, a it's not justTex-Mex, and B Tex-Mex doesn't

(04:36):
suck.
So so those two things werelike got me kind of got my
dander up a little bit.
I'm like, yeah, you know what,there's a whole lot more to this
food than you might think.
So I was going to set up to dothat.
But then as I wrote the book,I'm like realizing, well, you
know what?
I have spent so much more timeon the American side of the
border hunting and fishing andforaging and, of course, eating
and talking to people and allthat.

(04:57):
And it just made it a richerbook and it made it a more
personal book.
And it made it a more personalbook and it made it a more fun
book.
So you know, I mean there'ssome pretty interesting foraging
stuff and hunting stuff andfishing stuff in this book that
wouldn't necessarily make thecut if it was a straight-up
Mexican cookbook.
So this kind of idiosyncraticjourney, and we decided to

(05:20):
structure the book like ajourney.
So you start inBrownsvilleville and you work
your way to the west all the wayto where tijuana meets san
diego, and and we weave back andforth and back and forth across
the border and you would.
It's.
It's just a really super cool.
It's really hard to explain howmuch this region is.

(05:43):
It is in my heart, because Ilove the desert, I love fishing,
I love hunting and hunting.
All of this stuff is in thisborder region and there's
something about the desert andthe deserts are different.
You know, there's thechihuahuan desert, there's the,
there's the sonoran desert,there's the mojave desert and
all of that all.
They're all very different.

(06:03):
They act differently, theysound, the foods are different
from there and then the peopleare different.
It's just this incredible,incredibly rich place that is
neither fully American or fullyMexican.
That is really reallyattractive.

Speaker 1 (06:19):
Well, and I love how you kind of walk through all
these places, talk about thehistories, the culture, really,
the legacy of the people, thefoods there.
I mean it's a historical bookin a sense too.
There's so many things Ilearned like, oh, that's from
there, mattis Morris, the minitacos, okay.
Like there's so many thingsthat I learned along the areas
and those regions that I wasjust fascinated with to bring it

(06:40):
back to cause you talk about.
You know, the birthplace reallyof this book is there.
You know, right around, uh, inRoseville, california, near
Sacramento, when you're sittingdown with Patricio Wise, owner
of Nick's Taco, and you talkabout how that was kind of, if
there was a birthplace of thisbook, it's there.
Why don't you tell me a littlebit about that and how that was
kind of started you on thisjourney that lasted multiple

(07:02):
decades?

Speaker 2 (07:04):
Yeah, so Patricio, he owns this restaurant, nick's
Taco, just outside of Sacramentoand he's a really good friend
of mine and again, the originalidea was for us to team up on
the book, but he's arestaurateur and he's very, very
busy so he really helped me alot in that book.
But the whole idea of itstarted in Sacramento and it's

(07:27):
really also the first place andI lived there for 19 years it's
really the first place I got achance to do a deep dive into
Mexican food, because in all theother places I've been sure
there's Mexican food but nothinglike Sacramento.
So you could see the origin ofthat Norteño kind of cuisine in

(07:48):
Sacramento.
And then it just sparked a fireand soothed an interest.
It got me to learn thetechniques and working in
Patricio's restaurant he taughtme a lot too.
So yeah, I kind of had to do ahat tip to Sacramento as just
the just the birthplace.
You know, it's like it's peoplewho read the book are like
what's up with Sacramento andthat's that's why.

(08:09):
That's why that's there.

Speaker 1 (08:11):
Well, in there there was actually.
You know, I've I've talked tocertain uh, you know chefs
before and ask them kind of well, what's your?
You talk about the deathbedtaco that you got from Patricio
on your birthday.
Why don't you tell me a littlebit about that and maybe kind of
walk us through a little bit ofthat recipe, if you don't mind?

Speaker 2 (08:30):
It is the it's all it's.
In some ways it's the platonicideal of a Norteno taco.
So so in the Northern Mexicoand in Texas and in Arizona,
beef is king, so and also flourtortillas are king.
So I actually have a kind ofsomething of a rant in the in
the book about flour tortillasare real tortillas and flour

(08:51):
tortillas are really mexican.
They really are basic guys likeat 400 years in, or are they
allowed to be?
Okay, to be mexican?
I mean, I get it.
Yes, corn is older, but still,you know, people change, things
change.
This is real.
So it was my birthday, I, Idon't know six, seven years ago,
and Pato, his nickname is Pato.
He's like, I'm going to makeyou a really good taco.

(09:13):
So like, okay, cool.
So he has these really goodthin flour tortillas they're not
like Texas style, they're verythin.
And then so he put a costra onit which is basically grilled
cheese.
It's like a grilled cheesetortilla.
So you put some cheese down onthe flat top and then you put
the flour tortilla over it andyou let it caramelize on the
tortilla and so that you thebase of your taco is flour

(09:34):
tortilla plus melted crispycheese On top of that he had, I
don't know.
He had like 40 day old ribeye,you know 40 day dry age ribeye,
that he grilled and then choppedup and put that on there and
then he put roasted bone marrowon there and so like this is a
fat rich bomb, right.
But then he adds white onionssoaked in lime to cut everything

(09:57):
, and so the raw white onionssoaked in lime, so it takes all
that, that burnout, but you'vegot all of the crunch and you
get the acidity.
Then he puts a little cilantroon and then the kicker are green
chili piquines.
So Texans will know what chilipiquines are, but if you're not
from that region, they're a wildchili that's shaped like a

(10:17):
little bullet, like almost likea .22 bullet, and they hit as
hard asa .22.
So what you do with this tacois you place them in the taco.
You need maybe three or four orfive of them and you get one
with each bite.
So each bite of the taco thatyou eat has a chili piquin in it
and it's like plus.
It all works.
It's beautiful, it's this I canthink about it right now and a

(10:40):
perfect one is four bites Firstbite's discovery, the next bites
amazement, the third bitesbliss.
The fourth bites regret becauseit's gone.

Speaker 1 (10:54):
That is so well said and I love the idea when you
talk to about the.
You know those, those peppersthere that I think you described
as like firecrackers in thebook, because they're they're
powerful but they're notsomething that's going to like
leave your tongue raw andrunning, for you know some kind
of dairy, it's like they'regreat.

Speaker 2 (11:11):
Yeah, because it's, it's, it's, and they're small
too, so it's not like you can.
You can moderate your dose aswell, as much as you want.

Speaker 1 (11:18):
Yeah, no, indeed, no, we, my, my father, basically, I
grew up with like a jalapeno asa pacifier and chili pateens
were a big part of my youth.
So especially with friendswould be like here you want a
candy and you know, run to thehose, right it's.
But yeah, that was always funtimes.
The devil's tic tac, indeed,indeed.
I need to get them in a littlecase there.

Speaker 2 (11:38):
Oh, my God, that would be so rad.
Just buy everything at Tic Tacsand just eat them all and then
just put chili piquines in there.

Speaker 1 (11:45):
Or just have the chili piquine like actual Tic
Tac box, like maybe we need tocontact them and be like guys,
listen, you need to expand youruniverse.
Here we're ready, we're ready.
Well, you know there was anothertaco too that I wanted to talk
about.
I think it was the Guarneros.
That is, oh, guarnonunciationthere.
But you talk about that as kindof being a close second to your
deathbed taco and like that.

(12:06):
You mentioned ribeye is common,but you also prefer and as you
do in the book, you talk aboutwhere wild game can be
substituted.
I think you've mentionedvenison backstraps there and
inside the book I'll justpreface this too there's
iconography where it talks abouthey, you could use this here,
or this type of meat, and so Ilike that.

(12:27):
You have that idea of domestic,um, you know, wild game.
You know there's, there's fish,there's so many different
things that you can have, andthere's a lot of vegetarian
meals as well.
But, uh, I'd love for you totalk about those tacos as well.
And what region was that from?
And you know, let's talk aboutthat and the interchange, maybe,
of that domestic and wild foodin that particular dish.

Speaker 2 (12:46):
Sure.
So Gowanera is a what was thename of a bullfighter a Mexican
bullfighter back in the day andthen but he gave his name to a
particular bullfighting movewhere you kind of drape the cape
over the bull just to piss itoff, but you get real close to
it over the bowl as to just topiss it off, but you get real

(13:06):
close to it.
So there's a taqueria in mexicocity actually, because tacos el
califa that they are creditedwith having invented it, but
it's super, super popular inmonterey and in the north of
mexico and that's where Ilearned it and it's it's.
It's at its very core.
It is a tortilla.
It can be either corn or flour,but it's a tortilla.
It can be either corn or flour,but it's a tortilla with a very
, very thinly shaped piece ofribeye over it, and then that's

(13:29):
it.
So it's like it's not choppedmeat, it's a very thin slab or
sheet, or like a ultra thincutlet put on the tortilla, and
then that's what you get.
And then you go to the tortillabar and you dress it up however
you want, but the key is forthat meat to be so tender.
I mean, everybody who islistening to this right now has

(13:50):
had a taco where they've bitteninto the taco and everything
comes out because, like it's tootough, your teeth just pull it
right out.
So that is the key with agalanera is the meat has to be
so tender that you can just biteright through it, no problem.
What I found was if you make avery thin venison cutlet, like
so, you take backstrap and thenyou put it between two pieces of

(14:11):
plastic wrap and then you poundit super thin, it makes this
insanely good galanera, becauseit's thinner, it's leaner, you
can bite through it much moreeasily.
And then you top that withwhatever it is that you want.
I do like a spicy pico whereit's like regular pico de gallo,
but I might put pequins in it,or I might put habaneros in it,

(14:31):
or I basically want it to be alittle bit more uh fuerte than
than a regular pico de gallo.
And then I actually like thatcostra as well, that grilled
cheese underneath it, because itadds a little bit of heft.
Or another fun one is you canspread refried beans on the
tortilla and then put the meatand then put the toppings on it.
So the refried beans act askind of like delicious glue, so

(14:54):
that when you eat that thing,it's just ah, it's such a good
taco, it's so good.

Speaker 1 (14:59):
That is.
It sounds amazing.
I mean, this is also a warningto all the listeners and viewers
of this podcast.
Do not, when you get this book,have an empty stomach, because
it you will be growling man.
I swear like there was so manytimes I was like, oh, I want to
make this right now.
Now I want to make this.
It's, there will be drool allover your book.
It just happens.

Speaker 2 (15:19):
It's a.
It's a bunch of craveabledishes is what it is Really.
So if you're looking behind you, if you're watching this, it's
the tacos on the bottom of thefront cover with the blue
background.
Those are Gowaneras.
Perfect, excellent, pointingjob.
I've been practicing.
There you go, but yeah, Iwanted to go.
I want to answer your secondpart of your question about the
interchange between wild anddomestic meat and all these

(15:40):
things.
So we started that idea withpheasant quail cottontail.
So one thing I realized withPQC was that yeah, it's a
pheasant recipe, but there'sliterally no reason you couldn't
use a grouse or quail or wildturkey or rabbit.
They all work together.
So we decided when we made thatbook to do those icons, and so
if you see it as a pheasantrecipe, for example, but you see

(16:03):
like a little bunny icon or aquail icon or something like
that, you're like, oh okay, I'lluse this with quail and it's
going to be perfectly cool.
And then so we translated thatto Borderlands because we did it
with both meat and fish.
So there are a few dishes thatare like beef only, like, for

(16:27):
example, the mollejas, which issmoked sweetbreads and that's.
That's a texas dish, um, andthat is a.
That's something that I reallythink you can kind of only do
with beef, beef sweetbreads and.
But you know, I mean there's a,there's a great stew.
There's a bunch of stews inthere, like puchero or pozole or
gallina pinta, and I almostalways do gallina pinta.
So that's a sonoran dish that,if you think about, puzzle

(16:47):
everyone not everyone, but mostpeople here have had pozole.
If you think of pozole, butwith beef and beans in addition
to the corn and the chilies,that's gallina pinta and it's
very sonoran and they willalmost always use beef, but
there is zero reason not to uselike venison shanks or or
shoulder or neck, and it's everybit as good, if not better,

(17:10):
because it's a little bit leanerand less greasy.

Speaker 1 (17:12):
Nice.
Oh, good, good advice there.
I'll be checking that out.
You know I wanted to jump intokind of.
You know we.
You started off in Sacramentoand of course there's nine
regions.
You you run through one in theGulf.
That I thought was a cool story.
Was you going to the mouth ofthe Rio Grande for the first?

Speaker 2 (17:27):
time so cool.

Speaker 1 (17:28):
Tell me a little bit about that experience, you know,
and kind of what happened thereand kind of what you, you know
you reeled in there.
But I'd love for you to talkabout that.
And when was that that you did?
This Was during this work onthe book, or was this kind of
during a trip.
So yeah, why don't you walkthrough that?

Speaker 2 (17:43):
it was kind of a it was almost to tie a bow on it a
little bit.
So I, that was 2024 that I wasthere, so it was just last year.
So I went down there againbecause I've been down to
brownsville a lot of times.
I have a friend named, uh, mikeortiz, who's a good guy and a
farmer down there, and so wehunt and fish together all the
time and just generally eat lotsand just you know, it's like

(18:05):
time out for good, for badbehavior, if you know what I
mean.
And and so we were having agood time, and we were.
I've never been to the mouthlike.
I've been to all, like almostthe whole length of the rio and
I've never seen it dump into thegoal.
He's like oh, we gotta go.
So it's because it's right nearbrownsville.
So we went there and, sureenough, elon blocked us because

(18:26):
SpaceX, if you don't know, isthere.
That's where it is.
It's right above the mouth ofthe Rio Grande, for whatever
reason.
He has some weird arrangementwith the cops there.
When he's doing rocket testing,the cops block all the roads.
He was testing one of his toysand so we're like, ah God, we
couldn't go, we're all mad.

(18:46):
So we went and did all thethings that day and that's uh,
we found texas ebony.
We ate a whole bunch of tacos.
We just hung around.
So then it was kind of gettingtowards the end of the day, like
you know what, let's just tryit again, maybe they're done.
So we drive down there and weget past the checkpoint, like
yes, we're there.
So we get in and to justactually see the mouth, you
basically drive on the beach allthe way to the mouth.

(19:08):
It's, you know, and you kind ofgot to be a little careful
because even though they don'thave big tides there, the tides
will come up and in some placesit'll come right up to the where
you'd get a drive.
That's that's no bueno.
So we go out there and wefinally make it and there's like
there's a border truck.
That poor guy has got to bebored to tears because there's a
guy in a border truck standingand sitting in his truck.

(19:28):
Here's the mouth.
And it's crazy because themouth of the river is not A it's
not really huge and B it's notreally deep.
On the Mexican side there's awhole bunch of people picnicking
and fishing and having a greattime.
We wave and the border guy islike bored and there's nobody on
the U?
S, so it's just me and Mike,and so we're looking at I'm

(19:48):
looking at the shells and takingpictures and it's just.
This is it?
This is super cool and it'sreally interesting to see how
inconsequential the borderreally is, because it's just
like those are the people oneither side of the border having
the same kind of fun, you know.
And so I'm thinking all thesethoughts and Mike's like we need

(20:11):
to wet a line, like, yes, we do.
So he brought, he brought acouple of spinning rods and a
little some some lures calledthe electric chicken and it's
basically like a swim lure, likea bit of a swim bait, and it's
just, you know, you cast out andjig it back and he's cast a few
times while taking smartpictures.
You know you need to say thatyou wet a line in the mouth.
Real grand, like absolutely 100.
I do.

(20:33):
So I grab, grab a line, tie anelectric chicken on and cast out
right in a good spot where Ithink it's a kind of like edge
of a current, and it's literallylike five yards in front of a
mexican guy who's who's fishingfrom the other side.
So he's waiting and I'm waiting, and so it's like we're.
We're meeting in the middlewith rods and reels and then I
start to jig.

(20:53):
I start to jig and I'm like,there it is, there's freaking
fish on and I'm like, holy shit,it's a fish, so I'm bringing it
in.
I do not want to lose this fish.
And it comes in and sure enough, it's a legal speckled trout.
So it's like a.
It's a good size, not huge, butI mean it's a good size
speckled trout.
I'm like that's amazing, like Icaught a fish in the first cast
.
When does that ever happen?

(21:14):
Like almost never.
So mike's like we got to catchmore.

Speaker 1 (21:17):
I'm like no, we don't .

Speaker 2 (21:18):
I'm gonna stop right now because I want the story
where I caught a fish on myfirst cast and call it good.
It's like.
It's like a gambler being ableto leave with your winnings
Right.
This is a super cool time.

Speaker 1 (21:30):
Well, and you, you guys didn't have everything
ready to kind of transport itback, so you release the bag
there.
So you can catch it next timeyou go.
That exact one, right?
I think his name's Paco.
I thought so too.
He looked like a Paco.
You have a great picture of himthere, um, in the book, which I
thought was pretty cool.
No, it's phenomenal man, agreat story.
I love that you kind ofincluded that there's so many

(21:53):
different stories that you kindof bring up through all the
different regions and we'll justjump to the next, like South
and West Texas.
There, what are some of thethings that really stuck to your
mind about that region and thatchapter, and what is it that
you really wanted to include to?

Speaker 2 (22:08):
uh, you know your readers about that, I think the
general public of the UnitedStates has a very blurry view of
Texas South of I-10.
I think they, I think a lot ofpeople think that Texas stops at
San Antonio.
And there's actually a wholelot of Texas that's south of San
Antonio, a whole lot.
And especially once you getsouth of I-10, west of San

(22:37):
Antonio, all the way out to ElPaso, it gets wider, bigger
spaces, wilder, drier, lesspopulated.
I mean, it is true that there'snot a lot of towns between san
antonio and el paso.
So you get this real feeling ofbigness, real feeling of kind
of age.
You know, it feels a littlelike the old west and it looks a

(23:01):
little like the old west thatyou start to get into the
chihuahuan desert proper andthat's a really cool desert
because it's it's kind of ayucca desert as opposed to the
sonoran, which is a cactusdesert.
And so they, you know youreally kind of get this.
You know you start playing,like you know this, the theme
song from good, bad and the uglyor something like that, in your
head over and over again, andthen you kind of drive and drive

(23:24):
and drive and drive and you'rejust, you're kind of soaking in.
It's mountainous too.
This is.
The other thing that peopleforget is that that southwest
texas is mountainous, there'slike actual mountains, and then
you get over one of thesemountains and you see this glow
on the horizon, and that glow isel paso and juarez.
And it's just weird because elpaso juarez their sister cities,

(23:45):
like this isn is the thing thatthat I also try to talk about
in the book is that virtuallyevery town on the border has a
mimic, so like it's piedrasnegras and eagle pass and huevo,
huevo, laredo and laredo and soon and so forth all the way out
to california.
So the, the juarez and el pasosisterhood is a super, super

(24:06):
strong and B is they're isolatedthrough by themselves.
So it's hours to another realcity from El Paso.
So you really get this kind offeeling of like, a like.
If you're, if you're a StarWars fan, it really makes me
feel like Mos Eisley, where youknow that's the, that's the
place where, where Luke and uhand Obi-Wan first come off the

(24:27):
farm in the first movie, andit's this huge, sprawling,
slightly lawless, veryindependent place that is just
in the middle of nowhere.
And I love El Paso.
I was shocked at how cool it isand also I think it needs to be
said that Juarez is not exactly, you know, a resort area, but

(24:52):
neither is it as dangerous aspeople say it is, and now it had
been, but these days it's, it'sfine, like I'd go to dinner,
dinner there anytime across theborder and do stuff there
anytime.
I think another thing that'ssort of the side note for people
who read this book and thinkabout Northern Mexico especially
is that, generally speaking,the only way you're going to

(25:16):
find trouble in Mexico is ifyou're looking for it.
If you're looking for it like,if you're going to strip clubs
or looking for drugs or gettingsuper wasted at two in the
morning at a bar, yeah you mightfind some trouble.
But if you're just, if you'rejust minding your own business,
it's no more dangerous andarguably less dangerous than
being in an American city.

(25:37):
So, yeah, there are places,like especially in Tomolipa
south of Brownsville, that I'mnot going to just drive around
like a tourist, you know and but.
But for the most part I feltpretty, pretty okay, pretty safe
and I actually had oneinteraction with a cartel member
.
I guess I was going to walk intoa bar and this guy it was a

(26:00):
great bar, but this guy.
There's a guy at the door andhe's dressed all super nice and
I thought he was just like theyou know the maitre d' or
something.
He's like you American, andhe's dressed all super nice and
I thought he was just like theyou know the maitre d or
something.
He's like you, american.
He says it's in english andbecause usually I speak mostly
spanish in mexico but he says itin english because I guess I
look american and he's like areyou an american?
Like yeah, yes.
And he's like, yeah, you know,maybe you shouldn't go to this

(26:22):
bar tonight.
And I said, oh, is like aprivate party or something.
He's like something like that.
And then he points to likeanother place across the street,
like you should go there, it'sa really nice spot.
Like, okay, cool, thanks.
So I knew exactly what washappening because I grew up in
New Jersey and in New Jersey,where I grew up, every now and
again you go to an Italianrestaurant and the mob would be

(26:44):
there.
So there would usually be a guybe like yeah, it's private
party.
And then you just get themessage and then you just move
on.
It's, it's no harm, no foul,but I a I was interesting to see
that that rule applied thereand be.

Speaker 1 (27:02):
Uh, I respected the courtesy he gave to the
foreigner.
Yes, that's a gentle nudge inthe other direction.
Right, it's an important thing.
Well, you actually talk.
I wanted to mention too,because there was something that
I thought was pretty remarkablewhen you talk about heading
over those mountains, when youfirst see those lights of el
paso, you said it's time topress play on a song, the

(27:22):
soundtrack of driving into that.
Will you please tell us alittle bit about that?
down in the west texas town ofel paso, I fell in love with a
mexican girl, marty robbins butI'd love, I loved hearing like
this idea of like a soundtrackthere and I was like I kind of
it.
It made me want to ask you tooabout other soundtracks of the

(27:44):
regions, that other ones too.
So at some point maybe we'llhave to do like a playlist of
this I'm actually working on.

Speaker 2 (27:49):
I'm wearing a two playlists for for this book that
people can listen to when theywhen they cook from the
borderlands.
One's going to be like all kindof classic, either norteño
mexican or classic old country,because I just thought kind of
like that rich history of boththe regions and then the other
one, I mean there's an entirenew genre of like psychobilly

(28:13):
and sort of more modern, youknow narco-corritos and stuff
like that, where so there's thekind of the comforting and then
there's the edgy and they bothexist in that region and it's, I
think it's sort of indicativeof the feeling of being in the
borderlands sure, no, I, when wego down to our ranch in south
texas, there's a playlist ofthat region, of that area.

Speaker 1 (28:33):
Man and it's I mean, it's always like my buddy's,
like why are you listening to?
Like tayhom music?
All the time I was like whatare you talking about?
Why, that's what this is here,this is.
I can't listen to anything else.
You know, how can you notlisten to selena South Texas?
There you go, the birthplaceright Of her, san Antonio.
No, I'm Corpus, actually, right, yeah.

Speaker 2 (28:51):
Yeah, yeah, I know, bitty, bitty boom while you're
catching a snook in Laguna Madre, that's money.

Speaker 1 (28:58):
Laguna Madre, too, you also pay homage to that area
.
Why don't you tell me a littlebit about your, your trip there?
Cause that place is so rich.
I I mean there's so manyamazing uh I mean things to do,
places to go.
It's a beautiful area, I meanit's very unique to united
states and too it's uh, you know, with all the, the, that, just
that little region, that pocket.

(29:19):
I don't know if you can maybepaint a picture for people, if
you don't mind so it's kind ofthe beginning of a very big
barrier island chain kind ofthat.

Speaker 2 (29:27):
I guess there's a little bit of it in galveston
and then it's kind of thebeginning of a very big barrier
island chain kind of I guessthere's a little bit of it in
Galveston, but then it reallysort of picks up in Corpus.
But once you get to the borderwith sort of the Brownsville
Matamoros area, you get thisliterally gigantic, the Mother
Lagoon, laguna, madre.
It's just this huge thing andit's got some separations to it.
But it's unique in the sensethat it is a unbelievably rich

(29:50):
fishery and it's one of the veryfew places in the united states
that you can catch snook on theregular.
And now snook is a huge.
It's such a huge fish in inmexican cuisine and mexican
culture that I have a mexicanversion of logo, my Hunter
Angler Grinder Cook logo, and sothe English language one has a

(30:11):
salmon as the fish for theangler.
The Mexican one's got a snookand it's robalo in Spanish and
the snook if you don't know whata snook is, it's sort of a
prehistoric looking fish butthey're silver with a black
racing stripe.
They're vicious, they're toughfighters, gorgeous fish, kind of

(30:32):
tough to catch because they'rewily, they they're really good
at like of swimming aroundsomething to break your line, um
.
But they're also arguably themost delicious fish in the gulf
of mexico, uh, or gulf ofamerica, or gulf of tecate,
whatever you want to call it.
That fish is amazing.
So it's considered kind of arare-ish sport fish in the

(30:53):
United States.
So a lot of people just do catchand release, especially in
Florida, which is another placeyou can catch them.
But in Mexico you see them infish markets and oh, it's so
good, it's so good and there'scrabs there, redfish, speckled
trout, trigger fish.
Then right outside the Lagunais some of the best tuna fishing
and big game fishing you canget in the entire Gulf.

(31:14):
So it's the duck hunting, theLaguna Madre duck hunting in the
fall.
I keep trying to.
So one of these years I'm goingto get down and get some
whistling ducks, because I'venot yet shot whistling ducks and
I've always wanted to see whatthey taste like and I hear the.
I hear good things about them.
So there's so much like nil guyyeah, you know, they're a nil

(31:36):
guy that come right up on thebeach in some of these places
and it's just wild have youhunted them in in this that
region?
yep, I've, uh, I shot a cow nilguy um with with mike ortiz
three years ago, four years ago,yeah, I think it was 2021 it
was.

Speaker 1 (31:54):
It's amazing me.
It's some of the best.
I absolutely love it.
What so?
That area there's so rich of somany things and I I love too
when you talk about, like,obviously, like, bird hunting
too.
You bring in an element whereyou talk about dove hunting in a
lot of the different regionsthat you travel, about how
celebrated it is and sometimesdangerous.
I think you and your friendkind of experienced some

(32:14):
birdshot head in your way, butyou know you really kind of pay
homage to that and there's somesome dishes there too, um, and
it sounds like that's somethingthat you have.
It's kind of a you know, theopening season, that first day,
is something that you try to getout to a lot.
Why don't you maybe talk alittle bit about that, if you
will?

Speaker 2 (32:30):
So, again, if you're in the northern parts of the
United States, doves are kind ofnot a thing, partially because
there's some really old,straight-up, bigoted laws that
were set up in the Northeastabout 100 and some odd years ago
.
Laws, um, that were set up inthe northeast about 100 and some

(32:51):
odd years ago specifically tokeep people who weren't rich
white hunters emphasis on richum from having a good time,
basically.
So they, they pass legislationin the northeast to make doves a
songbird.
Well, they're not a songbirdbiologically and they're not a
songbird legally in most states.
So outside of that, you, youknow you've these dove seasons

(33:12):
have been a tradition for Idon't know, probably 200 years
and it's just such a big socialthing.
It's, you know, you, it's, youcan talk while you're doing it.
You don't have to wear camo.
Um, you know, there's abarbecue after each time and
this is where that sort of thetraditional dove popper comes in
that most people probablylisten to.
This, know, or at least somekind of a popper.

(33:33):
Basically, if you don't, it'sthe dove breast with cream
cheese or something, a jalapenoor another pepper, and then it's
all wrapped in bacon, thengrilled and there's a good good
poppers, actually not that easyto pull off.
I've had acres of bad poppers,so the so doing a good popper is

(33:55):
kind of a.
It's kind of a celebration in alot of ways, but I just I love
it.
I just love it because they'rehard to shoot, um, they're very
delicious and in places likebrownsville or Yuma, arizona or
South New Mexico they'reeverywhere.
They're the dominant bird inthe landscape.
So it's great for all kinds ofreasons, not the least of which

(34:20):
is that you get to have thatvery traditional Labor Day
barbecue and sure, there'sprobably going to be steaks and
salads, but but that doveappetizer or that, you know, I
sometimes will do a dove maincourse it's, it's super special
and it's a really regional sliceof americana well, I have to
ask you, when you say that yousometimes use that as a main

(34:43):
course, what is it that you'd bemaking with that?
Um, so they, the poppers, are atraditional appetizer, but a lot
of times I'll either grilldoves I have a dish called doves
a la mancha, which is inpheasant, grill cottontail, and
that's kind of one of mysignature dishes period like,
let alone just for doves.
But doves a la mancha is whereyou pluck the doves and if
you're sitting out there rakingyour nose about plucking it up,

(35:05):
once you get used to it you cando it in about 90 seconds maybe.
Uh, the doves fly off the, orthe feathers fly off the doves.
It's really easy to pluck themand then you get that skin and
fat.
But the believe it or not dovescan be fat, so that fat's
delicious because all they'redoing is eating seeds.
So you get that kind of itlooks like a tiny little chicken
.
I mean, all the doves are redmeat.

(35:27):
You should know.
I mean you know, but I'm justtalking for real.
And so what I do is I willstuff that cavity with fresh
herbs like rosemary sage, reallyaromatic stuff.
Then I'll paint the dove witheither olive oil or bacon fat

(35:48):
and then salt it and then grillit so that the breast meat is
about medium, so it's still pink, and then, when it comes off,
I'll hit it with salt or I hitit with pepper and smoked
paprika and you just kind of sitthere and eat them.
You know, most people, if youcan do like if you're a hungry
hunter, you'll eat four or fiveor six, but most people you put
three of those on a plate.
That's a really good maincourse.

Speaker 1 (36:08):
Oh, it sounds phenomenal.
Well, you know, that also kindof triggered my idea that I was
going to ask you about too, andkind of like part one of your
book and I should mention thisearlier you have like part one
where it's kind of like thebasics, the essentials of kind
of like what you might need togo ahead through.
You call it the basics and whenyou just mentioned herbs, there
too there's a lot of inclusionabout certain types of herbs of
these regions, some that werekind of you know, I forget the

(36:29):
name of the one, but it was kindof similar to cilantro, and you
know, I know you kind of talk alot about a lot of the
different things that areincluded.
Obviously you know differenttypes of peppers and chilies and
things there too.
But as far as some of the herbsthat you use a lot in some of
these dishes, if you can kind ofmaybe run a little list of
those just for people, and maybewe can kind of talk a little

(36:49):
bit more about the basics ofwhat should be in your pantry
for making some of these dishes.

Speaker 2 (36:55):
Sure.
So with the herbs, cilantro isking and cilantro it's my theory
Now, this is just me talking,but it's my theory that cilantro
is so popular in Mexican foodbecause there's a native herb
that lives in the Gulf regioncalled culantro, and culantro is
it's also, you see it, assawtooth herb, because the

(37:18):
Southeast Asians have adopted itand they like it a lot.
It needs kind of hot and wet.
I've tried to grow it inSacramento.
It doesn't really grow thatwell.
It won't grow up here inMinnesota, where I live now,
because it's not hot enough.
But it's a rosette plant soit'll set a taproot and then
it's got all the big fat leavesradiating around it.
But it tastes a lot likecilantro, really only used in

(37:48):
the gulf region.
So once you start to get west,it's all cilantro.
But the I think the the twoherbs that are um requirements
uh, the one that's 100 ofrequirement is mexican oregano.
Like, if you want to cook fromthis book, buy yourself some
mexican oregano, because it'severywhere.
Um, it's not oregano, it'sclose, and you and no babies
will die if you use regularsupermarket oregano in these

(38:11):
dishes.
But if you really want to getthat flavor and it's different,
you'll find real Mexican oregano, and then you can find there's
like four or five differentkinds.
Most of them are in the verbenafamily and they're perennials.
So I have one.
Actually, if I look this way,uh, my porch, I have a little
potted one outside and it's twoyears old and it will come back

(38:34):
every year.
You can't, they're frost enoughfrost already, so you've got to
bring them in before when itgets really cold.
But it's floral.
There's one that's almost likebubble gum.
It's like it's so different andit adds so much to the flavor
of these dishes and you can buythem in any Latin market.
You can sometimes buy Mexicanoregano in bigger regular

(38:54):
supermarkets, but every Latinmarket will have it and it's
usually dried.
So that's number one.
Number two would be epazote.
So epazote, a lot of people aregoing to know it right, because
it has a very specific smelland it grows in like sidewalks.
It's like it's one of the mostunkillable plants on the planet.
And, of course, this hugetaproot, and it's just you can,

(39:17):
it's the, it's the tammy winetteof herbs, like you can beat on
it and it just keeps coming back.
It's just, it's not, you can't,you can't kill this thing.
So, that said, somebody's gonnabe like I killed one.
I'm like oh, I'm so sorry your,your thumb is so black, but so
epizote smells like like ozone.

(39:38):
It smells like asphalt after athunderstorm.
There's a very specific smelland I either like it or you hate
it and in, but it's mostly used.
There's sauces that put it inand you can put it in stews and
stuff, but it's mostly used umwith beans, and so it it flavors
the beans and it is said toreduce farting from beans.

(40:00):
Whether that's true I don'tknow, but it absolutely adds a
good, good flavor.
Use it like a bay leaf, likeyou throw a sprig in with the
beans and you fish it out whenyou serve the beans.
So that gets to some of thebasics.
You need beans and I reallyprefer dried beans because you
can cook them to your own likingand you can get the cooler

(40:21):
varieties.
But canned pinto beans are fine.
You need to learn how to makerefried beans, because refried
beans are really important tothe order.
Uh, and I have a great recipefor refried beans in the book.
If you have one, use yours, Imean this isn't one of those
things that you have to use mine, no, it's, but I have a really
good one, but just go ahead anduse any.

(40:43):
I don't love canned fried,refried beans.
They're kind of gloppy, sothat's a thing you would need.
Find decent tortillas, so go toa Latin market.
Some big supermarkets havedecent tortillas and there's
different tortillas fordifferent things.
So there's little corn ones forstreet tacos, there's the

(41:04):
bigger corn ones for, like,tostadas.
Then, with flour, you've gotthe texas puffy, puffy ones.
Now texans don't think theirflour tortillas are puffy, but
they're puffy.
Um, and well it's.
You know they're like oh, it'sjust flour tortilla, like it's a
texas flour tortilla and it'sgood.
It's just different from asonoran flour tortilla which you

(41:25):
can practically read throughand they, they're kind of
amazing and I and I have arecipe for how to make those, so
you don't have to make your owntortillas.
It's great.
If you really want to dive intothis book, learn how, because
it's foundational, but you canbuy good tortillas and that's.
That'll be fine.
Um, you're going to want toreally get to know the holy

(41:48):
trinity of white onions, plumtomatoes and jalapenos or
serranos.
So those three ingredients showup everywhere and it's just,
it's just a thing.
Um, it's, you know, salsabandera is, is is another name
for pico de gallo, because thecolor is the mexican flag.
You know, you can vary yourpico any way you want, but it's

(42:10):
uh, and it's obviously not theonly salsa, but it's a great
fresh topping.
It's actually used more as likea fresh topping as opposed to a
salsa, and I've got tons ofsalsa recipes in the book.
Um, and those you know, that'sa little bit more hot sauce-ish.
The reason I'm doing this isbecause there's a lot of people
who equate pico de gallo.

(42:31):
That's salsa.
That's what salsa is Right, andthere's a lot more to it than
that.
So sauces are a really big deal.
Other sort of basics, if you canget it, good, good, plain beef
jerky.
Good, good, plain beef jerky,because the one super cool thing

(42:52):
about the borderlands on bothsides is the really rich use of
both beef and venison jerky.
It's very simple.
It's usually only salt andchilies, or just salt sometimes,
and there's stews with it.
They will cook it with eggs.
It's shredded and that's calledmachaca, and that's wild.
I've never like when I firsthad it.
Well, let me, let's get somemachaca and eggs, whatever that

(43:13):
is so they have a.
Historically, what you do is youtake a piece of beef jerky and
you take like a garlic clovertoo and put it in a basalt
mortar and pestle a more mochahete and you beat the crap out
like you run the.
You run the big piece of beefturkey on a grill to like give
it a little bit of grill-yflavor, and then you put the the

(43:35):
uh, the garlic cloves down anda little bit of water and you
just beat the crap out of itwith your mocha jete until it's
like shredded and it would andit can form like almost like
cotton candy, looking like meatcotton candy, and they now have
machines that will do it for you.
But the net effect is thisfluffy tender.
It cooks faster Because if youdo like a beef jerky stew and I

(43:58):
have one in the book it's great.
But it takes a little while forthat beef jerky to sort of get
pliable and tender enough towhere you want to eat it with a
spoon.
But this machaca and eggs,that's a big deal and it's one
of those things where it's notgoing to make you leave chorizo,
but you might step out onchorizo for machaca.

Speaker 1 (44:17):
Well, you also talk, excuse me, about chorizo, and
that's one of the things if youcan find it and it's authentic
for me you have a bunch ofresources in the back of the
book too that you can kind oflearn from.
But you talk about there's someinterplay and some inner
exchange there where if, like,you can't find this, but there's
certain stuff where you're like, if you're going to do this,
you have to do this.
And this particular meal no,pico, whatever it is like I love

(44:40):
how you kind of lay that out asfar as eating it traditionally
for that region and maybe forthat purpose of, like, trying to
have a full, authentic meal.
And you know, that wassomething that I really enjoyed
about the book, kind of findingout what areas this is included,
what areas the charro beans arenext to the chili, how some of
these areas that you know.
I mean that's the right.
The quintessential question too, like chili, is there beans or

(45:03):
no beans in?

Speaker 2 (45:05):
certain regions.
I told you this is my theoryright?
So, like in Texas, where chili,as we know it, was invented,
texans eat charo beans.
So if you go down to certainplaces in Texas and order a bowl
of red, you might also ordercharo beans, and it sits right
next to it and the entire restof the country is like well,
that's dumb and pours it rightin, but, like Texasxas, like no,

(45:28):
get them separated go the wallbetween them all.
Yeah, go the wall between charrobeans and chili there's a
t-shirt here, man we got the tictac the jeans.

Speaker 1 (45:39):
I mean we gotta be amazing.
We got a marketing wheelrunning here.
I love it.
I'm gonna get to work on these,no, but it's true it's one of
those things, but ittraditionally, you know it's one
of those things, but ittraditionally, you know, that's
something that I've seen a lotof different places when I've
gone across the border.
When I was younger, my family'sin the Rio Grande Valley like
going and having a meal therethat could be completely
different than something that'son the flip side of the border.

(46:01):
You know, and that's I love toreally dive into this book.
I think that's something that'sgoing to be very educational.
Not only is it entertainment,because you kind of walk us
through you know this prose ofyour, you know experience of
going to these different regions.
I love that there's nuances ofeach place that I think is
really gives a very specific,whether it's like Sonoran hot
dogs or just, you know, likethese things that you're like I

(46:23):
didn't think about that regionbeing having this thing here
that it's known for, but it'sreally enriching man.
I really love that you diveinto that so deep in this book.

Speaker 2 (46:33):
It's been a journey, man, it's been, it's so it's.
It continues, right.
So I I decided I decided towrite this book, because I
needed to write this book andit'd been a few years since I
published a book and I think Iwas ready, years since I
published a book and I think Iwas ready.
But that said, I guarantee youI could find another 125 recipes

(46:57):
and to put in there and thecutting room floor on this book
was profound, like there were somany dishes that I'm like well,
it's great, but it's notnecessarily going to make the
first 125.

Speaker 1 (47:03):
So I can imagine that that that's still a laundry
list of amazing meals there.

Speaker 2 (47:09):
Yeah, and I also wanted to balance it from east
to west too.

Speaker 1 (47:14):
No, that's true, that's true.
Is there a particular regionthat you find yourself kind of
going to?
That flavor if you're likemaking meals, or do you kind of
throughout this experience isthere?
You know, I'm sure that there'sso many that you love, but is
there one particular region Ifyou were like, if I'm going to
eat this, if you had one monthto have the meals, is there one

(47:34):
spot that you're going to?

Speaker 2 (47:37):
depends on the, depends on my mood, but it's
probably either sonora or bajaand why is that what?

Speaker 1 (47:42):
is it about those uh spots in that kind of cuisine
there?

Speaker 2 (47:45):
that really spoke so baja is so seafood centric and
you know I grew up on the waterand you know if you, of all the
six books, the hook line andsupper is my most
autobiographical and I'm I'm afishy guy, like if it's.
If I had to choose betweenhunting and fishing, I would
take fishing, um, just becauseit's been with me as a human

(48:07):
being longer and I'm probablybetter at it.
I mean, I'm a good hunter butI'm a pretty fishy guy, um, and
baja is all about that, andthere are some things about baja
that are unique to baja.
So the, the shellfish in theSea of Cortez Now, you can't get
that, of course, in Sonorabecause they're on either side

(48:27):
of the Sea of Cortez, but thatSea of Cortez shellfish, the big
game fishing in Southern Baja,it's.
The seafood centric nature ofthe place is really really
exciting to me and it speaks tome.
Food centric nature of theplace is really really exciting
to me and it speaks to me.
Sonora is.
The other place that speaks tome is the sonoran desert, and
it's a weird desert in the sensethat if you know what you're

(48:51):
doing and you know your wildplants, you can get fat in the
sonoran desert, like there's somuch to like just wild food to
eat there that it's just thiscornucopia all the time and
there's fruit and there'sstarches, and there's vegetables
and there's game and there'seven some fish here and there
and it's it's.
It's such an amazing region andI think the the separation

(49:14):
between arizona and the state ofsonora is fairly minor in terms
of cuisine and you know even tosome extent the people where
new mexico and chihuahua arequite different.
They share a desert but newmexico has been kind of a thing
since the 1500s, like it was a,it was an actual independent

(49:38):
colony.
I mean it was spanish but itwas like new mexico was a thing
and then underneath it was waschihuahua.
So their cuisines have divergedand have they've had longer
time to diverge, whereas inarizona and sonora it's kind of
all of a piece and I like thatseamlessness because you know if
you slide across the border,food's a lot pretty darn similar

(49:58):
, except everyone's speakingspanish well, I one of the
things that you just pointed ontoo, yeah, the word unique, and
there is some things that youhave that I find very unique, um
, and I'd love to touch on a fewof those if you don't mind.

Speaker 1 (50:12):
One of them is ari, the resin.
It's made by ants and thechihuahuan reason.
Why don't you talk about thatand what that's included in?
Because that was prettyfascinating okay.

Speaker 2 (50:20):
So one thing you have to know about me is, with every
one of my cookbooks there's atleast one recipe that is super
gonzo, weird, and hey, if youcan't repeat it, that's not my
problem.
Like, uh, I mean, I have a likea venison tripe recipe in the
deer book.
I've got crispy fried fishskins and a client supper.
I've got, uh, duck tongues andduck duck goose and like you

(50:43):
name it.
Like I have some, like I havesome weird ass shit here and
there.
So, uh, in this one there's acouple of them, but the one that
is truly I'm I had to put it inthere um, even though it's damn
near impossible to get in theunited states is that re.
It's a, it's a resin that issecreted by ants on a particular

(51:03):
set of shrubs in like where thetarahumara indians live in
chihuahua, and it's it'sessentially like chihuahuan msg.
So it's, it's, it's as anenormous amount of umami savory
flavor to whatever it's put into, and it's a little bit like
honeydew, if you think about it.
Um, but that's dried and it'sit's got to be ground, very fine

(51:27):
, because otherwise it's gritty,and so it's ground.
You keep the little nuggets andthen you grind them in a mocha
hete or in whatever, and thenthat's kind of the beginning of
your salsa or the beginning ofyour sauce.
And my friend, christian dutoy,who is a chef in chihuahua, he
uses it extensively and he'sdone some really cool stuff with
it and I include a couple ofrecipes from him that use it in

(51:48):
in the book uh, short version.
Uh, you're never gonna find it,you can't buy it online, um, but
if you're ever in chihuahua youwill find it.
You know people sell it on thestreet and it's not cheap but
it's.
You know it's like 20 bucks fora sandwich bag, full American,
but it's worth it and it'sunique and it's just one of

(52:10):
those things where this isChihuahua and it's not Sonora,
it's not New Mexico, it's notTexas, it's very unique to that
region.

Speaker 1 (52:19):
Well, there was something that and it's in the
book, but it's just the questionthat I had that popped to mind.
We were in South Texas huntingand we came across a Mexican
wasp and these.
The honey apparently that theyproduce is something that's used
in regions around there and inMexico.
Is that something that you havecome across and have you done

(52:40):
any work in cooking with that bychance?

Speaker 2 (52:43):
Not that particular wasp, but there's another set of
stingless bees that live insouthern Tomalipas, all the way
out to Yucatan, and then that'sa super cool honey.
And you'll find mesquite honeyin the Sonoran region, where
it's not mesquite beans, it'sthe bees are going to the
mesquite flowers and makinghoney from that and it's a kind

(53:07):
of a golden.
It has a very specific taste.
Like you can, I can tellmesquite honey, and so there's a
few of those all around theregion and it all kind of really
depends on the, on what thedominant flower is.
But yeah, it's super cool, like, like there's wild food in in
everyday Mexican food has a big.
Let me rephrase that the wildelement of Mexican cuisine is

(53:29):
bigger than the wild element inan American cuisine.
So you will, you will, you willsee a wild thing kind of on the
regular in all parts of Mexico.

Speaker 1 (53:39):
Well, you know, when you just mentioned there too,
about mesquite beans, aboutmesquite, there's something that
you have is a lot of differentthings with mesquite bean syrups
, uh, flour that's made.
And then also, you know, wetalked a little bit about,
mentioned like cacti, andthere's a bunch of different
dishes there, whether it's tunasorbet, tuna chews.
There's cactus salad, barrel,cactus chula buds there's.

(54:00):
That's another thing that Ifound very unique but enriching,
because I know I've done a lotof stuff in experimenting with,
like, the tuna from the pricklypear stuff that we have around
Texas.
But I'd love for you to kind ofmaybe touch that, maybe you
know, speak about some of yourfavorites out of those lists
that you created.

Speaker 2 (54:15):
Sure, the foraging on the borderlands is amazing.
I think people forget aboutthat, like, oh, it's a desert.
I just went to the ChihuahuanDesert Research Center not too
long ago and that's in WestTexas and there are so many
edible plants that are deliciousthere and so many, and

(54:36):
including the pink pine nuts.
The only place you can get pinkpine nuts in America is West
Texas and they're sweeter andand it's just they're sweeter
and they're pink because they'recool, um, but they're sweeter
and they're they're the bestpine nut, and so that's an
example.
But in terms of the cactus andand cholla and yucca and all
those kinds of things, those arethe plants that live there and

(54:58):
there's, there are lots of waysto to eat them.
And just because they havespines on them doesn't mean
they're you know, it doesn'tmean they're not edible.
And I find the the like it'sreally a testament to the
ingenuity of the people who arefrom there.
And you know the people.
People will be like, oh no, youcan't.
They, they have spines.

(55:28):
Well, you can cut the spinesoff, like oh well, they're slimy
, well, you can deal with theslime.
And sure, it's not, uh, youknow, a loaf of white bread, but
it's, it's, it's better, it'smore fun.
Um, it can be preserved.
Uh, it's just.
It's just a an extra set ofthings, and I think there's a
lot of texans who, who get itlike I.
I know a bunch of texans who,who will eat prickly pear fruit,
who will, you know, who eat thenopales, the young paddles in
the springtime, and so that's,it's going to be more and more

(55:48):
known by the general culture.

Speaker 1 (55:54):
And I think that's a good thing of not only just
foraging those areas, maybecooking something that would
have been eaten, or, you know,just along the lines of of, you
know, that animal that you're,you're, you know, hunting or
whatever it is, and that wassomething that whenever I do
turkey dishes now, I always loveto take the prickly pear fruit.
I'll go ahead and kind of youknow, there's also you you uh,

(56:15):
graciously talk about ways thatyou can, you know, make sure
that you're not left with abunch of these invisible needles
in your hands.
I mean, there is a to-do listhere of how to do this safely,
but the the idea of that too.
And I think you know youmentioned earlier there was
something that you know tasteslike bubble gum, and that's like
I remember reading that youknow, with these tunas, like,
yeah, there is a taste ofwatermelon and bubble gum, and I

(56:37):
remember like I was like that'sunique, and then you taste it
and you're like that's exactlywhat it tastes, like it was
phenomenal and it's, you know,being able to do sorbets and
things like that kind of makingit this desert sweetness.
But also I love doing it withturkey, just having a little
drizzle or something.
A little bit of that color poptoo.
It's something nice about that.
I think Makes a cool barbecuesauce too.

Speaker 2 (57:01):
Okay, tell me about that.
How would you prepare?
So I've done a barbecue saucewhere you take onions and cook
them in lard, and that's yourbase, and then you add a shot or
three of tequila and then kindof cook off the onion you or for
the barbecue sauce.
Well, one's for me, but thebarbecue sauce gets some as well
, and so that's sort of yourbase.
And then you know yoursweetness, you can either add a

(57:24):
prickly pear syrup or wholeprickly pears, obviously taking
the thorns out.
So you, where's your sense ofadventure?
Gotta be terrible.
So you get that, that red color, and then you've already got
that basis for it, and then youadd chili pequines or or chilled
to bean chilies, to add heat,and then you just kind of tinker

(57:46):
with the salt levels and it's avery light.
It's good for Turkey, it's likeit's a good light barbecue sauce
, because a barbecue saucebasically has a fat as something
sharp and tangy.
So in this case you wouldprobably put put, um, probably
the easiest source of aciditywould be lime juice, uh.
But you could also do, youcould do a vinegar, you could do

(58:08):
a vinegar of any kind, um, andthen it's.
You know, it's a fat element,it's a tangy element, it's a
spicy element, and so your spicyelement, chili piquins, and
there's usually often some sortof a fruity-ish element, usually
tomato and barbecue sauces, butit makes a really good.
It makes a really good, veryunique, very regional sauce.

Speaker 1 (58:29):
That's great.
I'm going to try that out.
You know, and I know we'regoing to be wrapping up here
soon, so I'm not going to diveinto everything.
There's so many questions Ihave for you and there's.
I just wanted to make sureeveryone checks out the dessert
sections too, because you haveso many amazing ones, and one of
the ones there that I didn'treally expect to read much about
, but I was fascinated with thestory, is there's a connection

(58:51):
there to the Moroccan King andDateland, and I'd love for you
to kind of talk about that,cause that was something that I
was.
Again, another piece of history, delicious history to learn
about, and I'd love for you tokind of talk to people about
that.

Speaker 2 (59:00):
Yeah, so that's so.
Dateland is a town, well, townis really overstating it.
Dateland is a place in Arizonaand I don't know, it's been a
while.
It might've been after WorldWar II, but at some point in the
20th century there was like adate blight, like a date disease
going on in Morocco and so theKing of morocco basically gave

(59:25):
examples of all of the bestvarieties of dates and there's
lots of different varieties ofdates and he sent them to this
place in dateland in arizona tobasically preserve the stock so
that if it were to all die inmorocco, they at least have the
stuff over there in the unitedstates.
So that is one of those, one ofthe catalysts to start a date
industry in Arizona, baja andSouthern California where they

(59:46):
grew up.
Fantastic.
So dates are a thing in thatregion of the world and first of
all, okay.
But there is a little bit ofreal, like unique, um, deep
history.
That goes why.
So there's a the.
The Washington palm is a nativepalm in that, in the Mojave

(01:00:08):
region.
So you'll find them in Baja,you'll find them in SoCal, I
think you can.
You think you can find them inArizona, but it's definitely
Southern California and Bajait's a native palm that in in
all palm fruits are dates.
Just not all the dates are yummy.
There's a bunch of them.
There's a Canary Islands palmthat everybody grows.
You can eat them, but it's likethe size of your thumbnail and

(01:00:32):
then it's mostly pit.
But this wild one, this nativeone that the indigenous people
have been eating for a billionyears, it's basically an edible
date.
It's the best native date thatthe indigenous people have been
eating for a billion years.
Um, that it's basically.
It's an edible date.
It's the best native date inthe united states.
So there's a kind of a.
It's a little bit like theculantro cilantro thing.
So there's a?
Um, a native analog that thisnew date from, from africa,

(01:00:57):
really just in me, it took itover and it became a thing.
So the their date shakes.
If you've never had a datemilkshake after a dove hunt, you
need to.
Uh, and I do a dove popper, youknow, sort of homage to, to
that labor day dove huntingtradition and a sort of little
arizona side on that.

(01:01:18):
Um, and then at baja you getthese date cakes and they're a
light cake and what's wild aboutit is I researched it and
researched it and researched itand like no, they, they, they
really do have mayonnaise inthem.
So a mayonnaise cake is a, it'san old school thing from like
the 50s and it's like you.

(01:01:40):
If you talk to people who arelike good home bakers, like oh
yeah, mayonnaise cakes the thing, and but I hadn't, you know,
I'm a savory cook so I hadn'theard of it and it was really
cool to see that and damn, thatcake is good and like it's so
good and you can add pecans toit or pine nuts and like pecans
are also that's a thing there.
Like Chihuahua and Arizona andto some extent, baja, they all

(01:02:03):
grow pecans and it was cool tosee that.
Oh well, those apples andpecans are like a big Chihuahua
thing.
So it lends itself to a lot ofdifferent desserts, including
that green chili apple pie thatI put in there.

Speaker 1 (01:02:15):
Dude, seriously, there are so many amazing
desserts that I was just likegoing through that are just
phenomenal, earmarking thosebecause they're so unique.
And I loved hearing about theregion and the history of like,
how did this become a datecentric area?
Like, wow, it was phenomenal.
And I mean, they all look great.
In the mayo thing too, I've mygrandmother, I remember, rocked
out some recipes with that.
So I was like, ok, I rememberseeing those, like wait, what

(01:02:37):
are we doing?
Because, you know, growing uparound Southern border, there's
a lot of things that that youknow were different and I but I
just kind of took them as theywere, man, and there was
something that was part of ourlife, but that's something we've
used as as some substitutionsbefore as well.
And, uh, when you need to, um,you know the one thing, I, I, I
wanted that you know you'regoing to be doing a book tour

(01:03:00):
and you're there's going to besome really cool experiences.
I was reading through justbefore we kind of got on.
Uh, you've added some otherdates and some laundry list of
all these amazing meals that youcan get or places you can kind
of go and, you know, pick upsomething, uh, you know, while

(01:03:20):
you're there at Nice Taco andand you know to be enjoying some
of the meals, these regionsthere too, and some of the
things you talk about the book.
So yeah, if you can just laythat out for the listeners, I
appreciate it sure, after um,it's technically my sixth rodeo.

Speaker 2 (01:03:34):
So once I have a book that comes out, um, it's really
important to me to to basicallyspread, spread the word.
I mean, that's sort of the corereason.
But what has what has happenedover the years is that what I've
discovered is that people wantto celebrate whatever the book
subject matter is with a meal.
I mean, they're cookbooks,after all.
This book is actually theprobably the first one that I

(01:03:54):
could do in theory, a readingfrom you know, like the like you
would go to a regular booksigning, right.
But I still love the idea of aparty.
It's just a party, andsometimes it's at a brewery and
we just do a special.
Sometimes it's a fancy dinner.
The ability to bring people to aspot to celebrate whatever the

(01:04:14):
book is about is really what Iwant to do, and every market's a
little different.
So you know, there's someplaces where I'm going to do,
you know, a white linen dinnerand there's some places where
we're going to be slinging tacosand some places where we might
not even do that.
So it's, I want people to beable to come to it too.
So that's why I've been some ofmy earlier books I did more

(01:04:37):
white linen experiences and Ifound those were great, but they
were so expensive that noteverybody could come to right,
um, and so my goal is to a sellbooks.
Obviously this is my job, butalso for people to have fun.
And also also and this don'tdiscount this there are so many
people out there that that Ieither know online or I've met,

(01:05:01):
you know, with previous booktours or whatever, and it's a
chance to.
It's like, it's almost like ayou know, homecoming kind of
thing, where I'll see these fiveor six people that I've come to
every book tour event and orsomebody who's driven this.
This is the thing that just iswild to me.
It is not uncommon for peopleto drive hours to my events, and

(01:05:21):
so which is incredibly humblingand incredibly daunting in a
way, because I wouldn't drivefive hours to see me- but some
people do.
But people do, and so it'sreally, really important for me
to, when I discover that, togive that person at the time if
they put that kind of effort in.

(01:05:41):
I want to put some effort intoconnecting with that person, and
so book tour is really the wayto do that.

Speaker 1 (01:05:47):
Well, and you haven't had one in seven years.
I mean, covid kind of stoppedthe last one from happening.
So it's kind of a chance for agood reunion of you know,
friends, compatriots, to kind ofget together and celebrate.
And you know, the other thing Isensed a lot through this was
you celebrating the culture, theland, the people, the food, the
cuisine.

(01:06:07):
I mean, there is so much thatyou celebrated the legacy of
these people and I was curiousabout your own take on legacy.
Is that something that youthink about on you know, on a,
on a day-to-day, or is thatsomething that comes into your
mind, like, as far as you've,you've created so much through
your website, through you knowthese six books here, and I'm
just kind of curious your takeon, what your view is on your

(01:06:29):
legacy and you know, maybe aprofessional and a personal
setting.

Speaker 2 (01:06:35):
I mean, I don't.
I'll be honest, I don't reallythink too much about it because
I'm kind of too busy, you know,being um, but I think when I do
think about it it's it's aboutleaving people with something
good.
You know, I want to add to thisworld.
I want to be a decent human, um, I'm trying my best and I want

(01:06:57):
to, you know, provide whateverit is that I can add to the
conversation, to the largerconversation, and be kind of a
teacher.
I wanted to be a teacher when Iwas a little kid and then I
kind of got away from teachingin a traditional sense for a
number of reasons.
I'm a little too impatient forthe academic world, which the

(01:07:18):
gears of the academic worldgrind very slowly, so I kind of
chafed against that.
But teaching is still superimportant to me.
Like I don't have kids, uh, andI'm single.
So like what am I doing here?
I am, I am learning stuff, andthen I'm like helping you learn
stuff, and it's that, at itscore, is kind of my life's

(01:07:41):
calling, is to, and in the, theavenue through which it is, is a
connection to nature and aconnection to the wild world.
It's to hopefully help peopleget a little bit closer to where
we used to be a long, long,long long time ago.
We live in a place with scaryai.
We live in a place where, longtime ago, we live in a place
with scary AI.

(01:08:01):
We live in a place wheredivisive politics.
We live in a place where everyyear we seem to get less
connected to nature, and I knowit seems like I'm sticking my
finger in the dam to try andblock everything, but so be it
If I am remembered for a guy whohelped people in the early 21st
century connect with nature.

(01:08:22):
Just a little bit, that'll begood enough.

Speaker 1 (01:08:25):
Well, I think you do just that and for those who
aren't familiar yet on theresources of that, I'd love for
you to kind of talk about yourwebsite real quick, substack.
And then obviously, you know, Iknow you can get the books, all
your books, there too on that.
But if you can kind of go andlay that out where people should
go and then maybe where peoplecan follow you on socials as
well, Sure, so I have two basiccore places where you can find

(01:08:49):
what I do.

Speaker 2 (01:08:50):
And one is Hunter, angler, gardener Cook and that's
a website I've been runningsince 2007.
And that is huntgathercookcom.
That's the easiest way to findthat and that's mostly recipes,
that's how-tos, it's news.
You can use, it's informationfor your working on game and
fish and edible wild plants andmushrooms.

(01:09:10):
That's what that is.
But the other place I spend anenormous amount of time is a
sub-stack called To the Bone,and To the Bone is really where
I get to think big thoughts.
Uh, it's where I write aboutthe intersection between nature,
food, uh, and really life.
I've been writing a lot aboutsort of bigger things over the

(01:09:32):
last couple of years and it'sbeen very rewarding and I find
very often that the things thatI'm going through in my own life
A have a connection to thenatural world and B I'm not
alone and the idea of being ableto write about a breakup or a

(01:09:54):
struggle that I'm having itoften takes a form of there will
often always be like a walk inthe woods or a hunt or a fishing
trip or just sitting therelooking at my garden and then I
can write about that and kind ofopen a vein in a way, and what
I found over the last couple ofyears is that people respond to
that.
The idea of me not being alonein that thing has been

(01:10:18):
incredibly rewarding.
In that thing has beenincredibly rewarding and I think
that might be in a way, asimportant a legacy as the strict
recipes and straight upknowledge.
So I'm very, very grateful thatthat has become reasonably
successful.
So those are kind of the twoplaces you're going to find me.

(01:10:39):
You can find all my books onAmazon.
You can also buy the last four,so Buck, buck, moose, pheasant
Quail, cottontail, hook Line andSupper and Borderlands.
You can also buy them directlyfrom me and that helps me out a
little bit better and that's.
You would find that on thewebsite on huntgathercookcom and

(01:11:04):
there's a shop and there's anew book stuff there.

Speaker 1 (01:11:05):
but I mean, I'm not you know I'm not going to come
to your house and beat you up.
If you buy it on Amazon,amazon's fine.
But even if you do buy it onAmazon or through you, make sure
you guys go and leave an Amazonreview and you know any place
you can leave reviews.
Those are very helpful for allthe authors.
Man, it's important.
I really think that that'ssomething everyone should do.

Speaker 2 (01:11:20):
And social media wise .
Uh, I am on Facebook.
I have a Facebook group calledhunt gather cook.
It's I.
I'm there every day, but Ithink the real action is on
Instagram.
And so on Instagram, I'm huntgather cook and it's pretty
obvious who I am, because I'mthe guy with all the weird food.
Um then you know holding a fishand stuff like that.
But I'm on instagram every dayand I do my very level best to

(01:11:44):
answer anybody's questions thereor on the website, because one
of the things that I view isimportant to you know, I think
calling my mission is a littleover, a bit of an overstatement,
but to what I do, like, why amI doing this?
Is to help people be betterwith the fish in the game and
everything, and so if you ask mea question, I'm going to do my
best to give you an answer, asbest I can.

Speaker 1 (01:12:06):
Well, it's phenomenal .
I suggest everyone go check outthe website, follow the.
You know the sub stack there tothe bone.
I love reading it.
It's phenomenal.
Make sure you get a copy ofBorderlands in your hands as
soon as possible and, you know,for you know, just kind of
closing out, is there anythingthat you'd like to share about
this book, or maybe to youraudience and your supporters, as
kind of a last word before wedepart?

Speaker 2 (01:12:28):
Yeah, I think this book is a great journey and I
think you can see my journey inthe book.
You can see it will probablyopen your eyes to some things
that you haven't seen before,and I think that's an important
part of human experience.
A lot of times we get inbubbles and I hope this book
takes you a little bit outsideyour bubble and makes you think

(01:12:49):
a little bit and say, oh, Ihadn't thought of that or I
hadn't seen that perspective,and you can use that experience
for the next time that you mightsee your bubble getting pressed
against and then you might beable to pop it yourself and say

(01:13:10):
what is on the other side.
And I think the path to healingin a larger sense is to talk to
somebody like a human being, incalm, measured tones, who maybe
doesn't agree with everythingthat you agree with, and figure
out a place to sit in the middle.
This is this is important rightnow, and I think a book like
this can help spark thatconversation in a number of ways
.

Speaker 1 (01:13:30):
Well said, Hank.
Thank you so much for joiningme.
Thank you for sharing yourtalents with the world.
I greatly appreciate it.
I mean, these recipes arephenomenal.
The story in this book of yourtravels and of the people, the
culture, it's just so enrichingand educational and entertaining
and it's everything and more.
And I, I, I know this is goingto be your one of your most
successful books yet, and justthank you so much for everything

(01:13:52):
you're putting out there, man.

Speaker 2 (01:13:54):
Thank you so much, thanks for giving me all this
time and I really hope you likethe book.

Speaker 1 (01:13:59):
Good deal.
Well, make sure everyone gocheck him out on tour.
I will see you when you comethrough Texas, my friend, all
right, you will Cheers.
You take care, hank Bye.