Viewers like you make this program possible.

Support your local PBS station.

>> BOURDAIN: It's all salt and the sea in this episode of The Mind of a Chef.

>> Yay!

>> BLOOMFIELD: All right!

>> BOURDAIN: April goes clamming with her friend, Chef Anita Lo.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So you just kind of wiggle around, you know, do a little like clam dance.

>> BOURDAIN: Scrapes salmon spines with Chef Brandon Jew.

>> BLOOMFIELD: That's not bad for a first time.

>> Yeah, seriously.

Maybe just a tad more salt?

>> BOURDAIN: Goes salt harvesting in Portland, Oregon.

>> BLOOMFIELD: I harvested my first salt.

>> BOURDAIN: Prepares clam chowder.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Gotta taste before you put it in, right?

>> BOURDAIN: And Harold McGee explores the magic that is salt.

Enter the mind of a chef.

>> BOURDAIN: Seafood is probably not the first thing that comes to mind when you think of English food.

But really, it should be.

I mean, it is an island.

With a rich culinary history with the sea.

So it makes perfect sense really that a chef better known for her relationship to the pig would move seamlessly to mastering seafood.

>> BLOOMFIELD: I love to fish.

I love everything about it.

I love the tying of the lure, I love baiting my hook, throwing the line out there.

I think it's very kind of meditational, you just kind of like, you lose yourself.

There's nothing more amazing than when you finally catch a fish.

It's such a special experience.

And then to be able to take it home, scale it, gut it, again it's like you're using this whole thing.

You're making a stock from the bones of the fish after you've filletedfileted it, using it right there and then.

It's just spectacular.

It's something internal.

It's primal, yeah, it's like a... it's like a primal feeling to be able to like, "I caught my lunch."

>> BLOOMFIELD: Anita Lo has an amazing restaurant.

She's a very dear friend of mine.

She's a great fisher, woman, person, whatever you want to call her.

We go clamming together, fishing, we have fun, we get drunk, you know, I love her to death.

The first time I ever went clamming was with Anita, and she taught me, just find some soft sand, and kind of just wiggle your foot around underneath the surface of the sand, and then you should touch something hard with your big toe, and then you just kind of grab down with your hand and you kind of reach it out and you pick them up.

So these are little necks, right?

The size.

>> Yeah.

They're great for eating raw.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So you just kind of wiggle around, you know, do a little like clam dance.

But there's nothing like kind of catching your own food, and then eating it.

You know, like fishing or just searching for a clam, you know?

You're going to take that back to your home and cook it, or eat it raw.

It's like really pleasurable.

It's like the most amazing thing, you know?

Just kind of doing that.

Just makes you in touch with life, with food.

You know you have this connection.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Do you like tomato base or do you like creamy base?

>> I like creamy base.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, me too.

>> Yeah.

I spent some of my formative years in Massachusetts.

But I do remember the clams.

I remember clamming.

>> BLOOMFIELD: When was the first time you went clamming?

Because my first time clamming was with you.

(chuckles) That sounds kind of... (chuckles) >> Was it good for you too?

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, it was good.

It was an amazing experience.

I think I'm blushing.

Anyway, what I thought we would do was maybe do a take on a regular chowder, but make it more spring-like.

So we've got some fava beans, peas, spring potatoes, we've got these amazing garlic scapes.

And some clams, we went clamming and that was super cool.

A little bit of white wine with some olive oil.

Pass me the old bacon, doll.

>> Here you go.

>> BLOOMFIELD: You know, making soup is all about like layering the flavors, you know?

And this is where all the flavor's going to come from.

So all that's cooking and then I'm going to put some cream, some potatoes, some milk and some clams, and I'm going to make this creamy sauce.

What I'm doing is, I'm just going to make a silky smooth base for my soup.

I don't really like using flour, so that's why I puree my potatoes.

So these are nice little fingerlings that I got from the market, you know?

And then there's like a few purple in there too, which is amazing.

There.

This is a good texture.

You know?

>> Looks beautiful.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Kind of like just coats the back of the spoon.

All right, so that's good.

Got to taste it before you put it in, right?

So this is a Sauvignon Blanc.

So it's got a nice balance, it's got a little bit of tartness, because if you think about it, this is starchy and then this is creamy, this is sweet, so you need something to kind of cut through that heaviness.

So that's why we're going to use a little Sauvignon Blanc.

So you just want to cook off a little of that alcohol, you know?

Isn't that great?

Yummy.

We're going to add these little neck clams, just drop them in there.

Give them a nice hot bath.

>> That looks awesome.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah?

Right?

So the clams are opened, we'll just take it off, it's coming up to the boil a little bit.

Turn it off, because we don't want it to boil too much.

We'll just kind of layer it up, you know?

I think that's pretty amazing.

I've got some celery, and these stalks are nice and sweet on the parsley.

So we're just going to give those a rough choppy woppy.

And we're just going to sprinkle that on top.

Okay, so I'm just going to add a little bit of lemon.

>> Yeah, I put lemon zest in so many things.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, it just livens everything up.

So that's that chowder.

I think these guys are going to like it.

>> Yeah.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Delicious.

>> These are all stuff that is just leftovers that... >> BLOOMFIELD: Most people would throw away, right?

>> Exactly.

When you filet salmon, there's always meat left on the spine, so we're going to use that today.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So I'm going to just scrape it... >> Yeah, scrape it with the spoon.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Look how easy, it's like butter, isn't it?

>> Yeah.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Just kind of comes off.

I think in general, the Western world knows how to use whole animals and they know how to do that really well, from the snout to the tail and everything in between.

But a lot of people actually, when it comes to fish, just kind of end up throwing all that stuff away.

And that's the best bit.

>> You know, when there's such a limited supply of fish, it's nice to know that you're going to use all the parts and everything.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, it's kind of respectful, right?

>> It's respectful, it really is.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Look how much I got off that two sides.

>> Damn.

>> BLOOMFIELD: That's a lot, right?

>> I'm going to actually take the skin now.

I want to take all the meat off and all this.

There's a lot of like fat under here too, and when you make this salmon chip, you want to get all this stuff off of it.

I usually like really big chips, so I'll cut it pretty big like... >> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, they kind shrink more than you expect them to, don't they?

>> Yeah.

>> BLOOMFIELD: It's so, so amazing.

I just love that.

Look, it almost looks like snakeskin there.

>> I know.

Make some shoes with that.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Salmon shoes.

That might not smell so nice.

>> So I'll put this in the oven, just for like four, five minutes, 350.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Cool.

>> Just to dry it up just a little bit.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So what do I do with this then?

>> Okay, so now, you really want to chop that all up.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Fine?

Like really fine?

>> Pretty fine.

>> BLOOMFIELD: What do you think?

>> That looks good.

So I like to think of this as sort of like tartare.

In my tartare I usually like egg.

Today we're going to use salmon eggs, pickles-- these are Japanese pickles-- and then for the mustardy part of tartare I use yuzu kosho.

It's yuzu with a little bit of, like, green chili.

It's really powerful, really spicy, but like really fragrant.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Really big on the umami, that's like... >> Yeah.

>> BLOOMFIELD: That's like flavor.

Okay, what's next?

>> So yeah, we'll just put all this stuff in.

I usually put the pickles in first because it has salt on it too, I usually like to put that in and then taste it.

So some yuzu kosho, a little bit of mayonnaise just to kind of give it some more fat.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Oh, this is going to be nice.

It's going to add nice creaminess to it too.

>> And some soy.

I like it because it's a good way to put a different kind of salt into your seasoning.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So a little bit of this, right?

So this is basically your seasoning.

>> Yeah.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So I'm going to mix?

>> Yeah, just mix it all up.

>> BLOOMFIELD: The texture of those pickles in there is going to be that nice crunch.

>> Nice crunch, yeah.

>> BLOOMFIELD: What do you think?

>> I think that's good.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Not bad for a first time.

>> All right, so about four or five minutes, pull out the skin out of the oven.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Okay.

Here goes.

Oh, look at that-- look at the puff.

I love that-- I love that just... >> That was a good one.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Crispy sound.

I think this is ready, right?

It's almost stopped sizzling and, you know, want to take it out.

>> While this is hot, I'll put on some of this seasoning.

This is a little bit of dry seaweed, a little purple shiso, and some yuzu salt.

I'll take some of this tartare and just put a little bit down here, and kind of like when you get beef tartare, like if there's a little pool that has the egg yolk.

So I kind of like to put a little pool of the salmon eggs in there.

So I'll leave you to mix up some of those salmon eggs with some daikon sprouts, and a little bit of olive oil.

Yeah, so just aim inside that little nook in there.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Great.

Looks awesome.

>> Thanks.

>> BOURDAIN: With just five ingredients, this dish seems simple enough.

But it is much, much greater than the sum of its parts.

Behold, the Carta di Musica with bottarga at the John Dory Oyster Bar.

Two sheets of a Sardinian flatbread known as pane carasau.

Paper thin, crispy, and delicious on its own.

The name translates to "sheet music."

Cover each sheet with a healthy spread of cultured butter.

Then add the beauty, a heaping amount of shaved bottarga.

What is this delicacy?

Simply put, bottarga is the poor man's caviar, a roe pouch of grey mullet dried and cured in sea salt.

When you think you've shaved enough, add more, and then a little more.

Dot with thinly sliced red chilies.

Finish with sea salt, and serve.

This dish is rustic in the best sense of the word.

Five simple ingredients presented simply and delicious beyond words.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Good.

That's it.

>> There are five basic tastes that we know of: sweet, sour, bitter, umami, and salt.

Because salt is a flavor, it plays, of course, a very important role in the seasoning of our foods.

If it's missing in a food, we notice it.

Even in a sweet food a little bit of salt can make a difference.

Salt does a couple of other things.

It actually suppresses our sensation of bitterness.

Salt also affects aromas, and there are a couple of different ways that that happens.

One is chemical and the other is physiological or neurobiological.

The chemical explanation is that when you add salt to a food, it actually makes that food less hospitable to the aroma molecules in that food.

The aroma molecules want to leave the food and go into the air, and that's very important because we sense aromas through the air.

We have to breathe them in.

The other way that salt affects aroma is indirectly by our past experience.

We learn to associate saltiness with savory flavors, the flavors of meats and cooked vegetables and so on, and that means that if we up the intensity of saltiness in a particular food, we tend to experience the aromas more intensely as well by association.

One of the more magical things that salt can do is to moisten and tenderize meats, and it does that when we brine meats, and it's a pretty remarkable process.

We start with a piece of meat.

It's got a particular structure, particular moisture content which is going to get cooked out of it.

What happens when you immerse the meat in brine is that salt ions-- sodium chloride ions-- move from the brine into the meat.

They take up residence in there.

They get into those muscle fibers, loosen them up, and that ends up making the meat tenderer.

So brining meat is another way that salt can make cooking better and food more delicious.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Lots of salt.

There's many salts.

There's Himalayan salt, there's Hawaiian salt, there's English sea salt, there's rock salt, fine salt, Kosher salt.

I didn't even know there was Kosher-- what's Kosher salt?

Don't get Kosher salt in England.

Table salt.

Smoke salt.

Chardonnay salt.

Coffee salt.

Sounds like that film, doesn't it?

Walnuts.

Pistachio nut.

(laughing) Peanut.

(laughing) What is that film?

Best in Show, that's it.

Pecan nut.

Ben Jacobsen makes amazing salt, and what makes it even more special is that he draws it from Netarts Bay.

Why did you pick this spot?

>> Netarts Bay is incredibly special.

The volume of water of the bay refreshes almost 85% with each tidal change, which is a pretty cool thing, but by the time the water reaches us, it's washed over this beautiful sandy bed, and it has time to settle so it's really, really nice and clean and pure.

>> BLOOMFIELD: I mean it smells really briny and clean.

You know, sometimes when you get to the ocean it smells... got a little bit of funk, but this is really calm, and still and, you know, it's really just fresh.

(waves lapping gently) >> So this is our tank room.

Like I said, this used to be an oyster farm, but it just so happens that it's perfect for our purposes.

It looks like a lap pool.

>> BLOOMFIELD: It does look like a lap pool.

I want to jump in there.

>> But all the water is filtered through a gravity-fed sand filter before it comes into this room.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So it comes from the bay.

>> From the bay.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Throu>> Yes.sand.

>> BLOOMFIELD: And then into these big lap pools.

>> Exactly.

Into the lap pools.

Come on through here.

Watch your head here.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Oh, you don't want to bang your head on that, do you?

>> I know.

It hurts.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So what's going on in here then?

>> After filtration, this is our boil process where we're boiling not only to remove the volume, but most importantly to pare back the calcium and magnesium that give a lot of sea salts a very bitter taste.

If you taste our salt, it's a very clean, kind of briny taste.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, really clean and quite fresh.

>> And once it hits the right both salinity content, but also calcium and magnesium content, we move it to our evaporation pans.

>> BLOOMFIELD: It's kind of like a big salty sauna in here, isn't it?

>> It is.

On a cold winter day on the Oregon coast it is.

It can't be better.

So here we have our saltpans, and what happens is salt crystals form on the surface of the water like you're seeing here.

And then they become more dense than the brine that they're in, and then they precipitate to the bottom of the pan.

Once the level of the water meets the top of the salt crystals, we'll harvest the pan.

As you can see it's really, really close right now.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah.

>> So we're just going to kind of do it.

>> BLOOMFIELD: I mean this looks chock full of salt.

>> So we'll start from one end of the pan... and carefully drag.

And look at those flakes, it's just gorgeous.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Oh, my.

My knees wobbled a little bit then.

>> I mean it just... >> BLOOMFIELD: Wow.

>> It's just so, so beautiful.

It looks like, you know, shaved ice.

>> BLOOMFIELD: It does.

>> It does.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Can I touch one?

>> Yeah, absolutely.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Oh, my God, look at that.

Oh, my.

>> That's just gorgeous.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Looks like a little salt butterfly.

>> You want to give it a try?

>> BLOOMFIELD: Uh, yeah.

I hope I don't F it up.

I don't think I'm doing a very good job as you.

>> I think you're... just keep on going.

Yeah.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Oh.

I harvested my first salt.

That's amazing.

I think there maybe is five companies doing that in America.

I love that.

I love-- and see again, I love having that connection, and to be able to work with him and get to know him, and kind of count him as a friend.

What's your favorite ice cream?

>> I mean, it's a bit like what's your favorite ride at the amusement park?

Chocolate is amazing.

>> BLOOMFIELD: I like caramel ice cream.

With a little bit of salt.

I saw these floating around your shed.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So you must buy these split.

>> Yes.

>> BLOOMFIELD: For your vanilla salt that you make.

Have you ever made vanilla ice cream before?

>> When I was a kid, yeah, with one of those hand cranks.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Oh, what, your granddad used to have one or something?

>> Exactly.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, that's cool.

So I've got some milk and some cream.

Well, I hope you like this one, babe.

Do you want to whack that on the stove?

>> Sure.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So for this recipe, we're going to do about 20 eggs, but egg yolks.

>> Okay.

Just the yolks?

>> BLOOMFIELD: Not whole eggs.

And I'm going to use your new salt.

>> The Stumptown salt?

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, the Stumptown Coffee salt.

>> That sounds wonderful.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Okay, so if you don't mind passing me the old sugar.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> BLOOMFIELD: So you can put probably six of those in there.

>> Okay.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Go on, heap them up.

Go on, whack it in there.

>> I'm making a mess.

>> BLOOMFIELD: This is good.

So what we're going to do is we're going to whisk this till it goes all nice and pale.

You know?

Kind of brings everything together.

So what we need to do now this is done is grab the old hot milk.

Okay.

So if you want to whisk.

>> Okay.

>> BLOOMFIELD: I'm going to pour it in really slow.

This is just going to temper the eggs.

So the eggs don't cook.

>> No lumpy ice cream.

Smells good.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, doesn't it?

Those vanilla smell great.

Okay, so you can very gently just pour that in there.

Yeah, that's it.

So then we're going to cook this to a custard.

>> Mmm... >> BLOOMFIELD: You know?

Little anglaise.

And then we'll chill it down.

So we're just going to cook the eggs.

>> Okay.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Your egg's going to make it nice and rich.

Your cream's going to make it smooth too, very velvety.

There's nothing like making your own ice cream, is there?

It's like making your own salt.

It's like very satisfying.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Yeah, this is ready.

See that?

You ready?

>> Yes, ma'am.

>> BLOOMFIELD: All right, Ben.

>> Easy as that, huh?

>> BLOOMFIELD: Easy as pie.

Look how fast that was.

So the caramel sauce.

Amazing.

>> How did you make the caramel sauce?

>> BLOOMFIELD: Just a little bit of sugar, a little bit of butter, and got a bit of bourbon in there too, a bit of booze.

You're going to love this.

Mmm... >> This is my favorite consistency of ice cream too.

When it's too hard, it's... >> BLOOMFIELD: Oh yeah.

>> I like it when it's in the melty in-between phase, you know?

>> BLOOMFIELD: You want to do the little drizzle?

>> Oh, I think you need to.

>> BLOOMFIELD: kind of like those little thin ribbons there.

You know, and then you get this chunky one.

And then your salt.

Oh, yeah.

>> Looks gorgeous.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Very refreshing.

>> Beautiful.

>> BLOOMFIELD: Cheers, babe.

Thanks for showing me around.

>> Oh, thank you so much.

>> BLOOMFIELD: I love your salt.

I love cooking seafood.

Meat and fish, two completely different things.

Just as versatile, but you have to have a lighter hand when you cook with seafood.

And I quite like that.

I like the delicate subtleness of fish.

Any delicate, subtle cooking process that you can give the fish, if any at all.

Actually raw fish is just as beautiful and pristine and perfect as a nice, perfectly cooked piece of fish.

And the biggest compliment to me is that people notice the details of the fish that we cook or prepare.