Sacramento foodie’s cookbook will drive locavores wild

illustration by Mark Stivers

Are you the type of person who fishes shad out of the Sacramento River and who treks along the American River to forage for blackberries, fennel, miner’s lettuce and all sorts of other goodies? Do you go down to Napa to shoot wild turkeys grown fat on thieved grapes from the vineyards or crawl into Dixon to blow away a few quail for dinner?

Local food writer Hank Shaw is best known for his food blog Hunter Angler Gardener Cook (http://honest-food.net), where he chronicles his gourmet approach to wild food. Shaw has recently come out with a new book. Hunt, Gather, Cook: Finding the Forgotten Feast (Rodale, $25.99) is the must read for the hunter/fisher/forager and all-around foodie.

Since Shaw is based in Sacramento, the book covers a lot of amazing foods that can be caught or found right here in Northern California, such as wild gooseberries or grapes. Heck, he even tells you how to use local acorns to make acorn flour (acorn flatbreads, anyone?). It’s as locavore as you can get.