(gentle upbeat guitar music) - [David] From the soil of our family farms to your table, there's something special about Georgia, something you can taste in every bite.

Fresh flavors, local farms, unforgettable experiences, Georgia has it all.

Support local, taste the difference, and make memories along the way.

Look for the Georgia Grown logo wherever you shop, or visit georgiagrown.com.

(light upbeat music) - [Announcer] Community, learning, working, playing, celebrating.

Doing life is always better together.

At GPB, we aim to provide you with the tools to be able to do life together well.

Our mission to educate, inform, and entertain inspires everything from our wide range of programming to our stimulating radio conversations, to our fun in-person events.

We've got something for everyone.

Visit gpb.org/community to learn more about our upcoming events.

- The fascinating and ever-changing world of agriculture.

Let's hit the road here in Georgia and meet the farmers, producers, makers, and bakers who keep us all fed and keep us coming back for more, straight ahead at "The Fork in the Road."

♪ Mm, mm, mm ♪ ♪ Mm, mm, mm ♪ ♪ I came from the mud ♪ ♪ There's dirt on my hands ♪ ♪ Strong like a tree ♪ ♪ There's roots where I stand ♪ - [David] Georgia farmers, artisans, merchants, and producers, we depend on these men and women every day of our lives through the choices we make and the food we consume.

Their strategy and approach is always shifting, but the end game remains the same, results.

(gentle expectant music) ♪ I was born in the river one day ♪ ♪ Washed me clean and cold ♪ ♪ Oh Lord, I won't come home ♪ ♪ Till the river runs dry, my friend ♪ - [David] These back rivers tell a story.

Much of Georgia's coasts and marshlands have been protected through the years, offering a safe habitat for marine life and nesting birds.

Shrimp boats that line the Darien River aren't as prevalent as they used to be, but they remain an important part of the region's identity and its history.

Let's spend some time with a few folks from McIntosh County, chefs, business owners, and boat captains who've planted their roots in this beautiful coastal community.

They believe in using what the land and water provide, and they help keep traditions alive while welcoming visitors and neighbors alike to slow down and take in the simple, natural beauty that makes Georgia's second-oldest city of Darien and its surrounding communities so special.

(gentle upbeat music) In season four, we witnessed the rehabilitation of the historic Adam Strain Building in Darien, one of the oldest commercial tabby structures still standing on the Eastern Seaboard.

Dating back to the early 1800s and a rare survivor of the 1863 burning of Darien during the Civil War, it stands as a significant landmark in this coastal region.

(bright music) - We were driving through town, saw it, and became very interested in it and found out that it had been on the Georgia Trust Places in Peril, and that was probably a couple years before we ended up purchasing it.

It took a while to get that done.

- Yeah, we had some conversations with the then owner, who was also local.

Those conversations were time-consuming.

Then the beginning started (laughs) of the resurrection of the Adam Strain.

- Adam Strain will remain mostly what I call clean, I guess, so that everybody can see and enjoy that.

We're gonna put a nanobrewery in the first floor, and the second floor will be a museum of Darien history.

(lively music) - [David] This construction project was spearheaded by the Savics and an impressive team who honored the original tabby construction method.

The historic Adam Strain Building has been rebranded as the Tabby House Brewing Company and Museum and has helped reinvigorate Darien's entire waterfront and stands proudly as an iconic symbol of this city's perseverance through the generations.

So before we explore the local food and brews within these rehabilitated tabby house walls, let's hop on a boat with the folks of Georgia Tidewater Outfitters, explore the natural beauty of the area, and taste a little Georgia-grown goodness along the way.

(relaxing guitar music) - We're a tour business on the Darien River on the Altamaha Delta, and we do a couple of things as public tours.

We do wine tours usually right around sunset, and then we do a nature tour, and then we do a lot of private tours where people wanna go bird watching, or they wanna go to Sapelo.

We get a lot of people that wanna see the Sapelo Lighthouse or that kind of thing.

And then we do a nature tour that's a lot of fun 'cause we talk about the river system and the rice canals.

And we come home through Rifle Cut, which is at the top of the Darien, which is a 200-year-old cut, which is just... I see people all the time that live here that have never been through Rifle Cut, so it's a lot of fun to get to do that.

- [David] I think what's so neat about Darien, I'm sure it's stuff that you share, is so many people that come here don't know the history of this place.

There's so much history here, and you can share that, and people can learn a lot coming here with you.

- Darien's Georgia's second-oldest city, and it was important when the colony of Georgia was being formed.

It's always been that city.

People come here, and they learn that.

I joke, you get a little bit of that Altamaha River water in your system, and you just can't get it out.

It's that kind of fishing community.

Just that old town is still there, and it's just rare on the East Coast.

- Yeah, but there's plenty of things to do, and if you wanna get out and get on the water and understand why people came here in the first place, you're the guy, Georgia Tidewater Outfitters.

- Yep.

(rustic gritty music) - We've made our way along the river here.

I've had some cheese already.

- Yep.

- Had a little wine.

- Made in Georgia right here local.

- That's right, tell me about what we got here.

Tell me about the spread.

- [Paul] You had some of the local cheese, and we've got chocolate-covered pecans.

My wife would say pecans, but I believe the packet said pecans, the Mascot Pecan Company.

We've got a cream cheese with candied jalapenos, which is a great alternative to what your grandmother would've done with pepper jelly.

- [David] Jesus Palomino.

- [Paul] Jesus Palominos.

- Nice.

- Yep, and then you've got your cheese sticks over there, which are locally, you know, made.

- [David] Oh yeah, Mama E's.

I know Mama E.

- Yeah, they're good.

- She makes some good straws.

- [Paul] That's right, you get those cheese straws, can't eat anymore.

They're good stuff.

So we just pair that with wine.

We usually keep three or four reds and three or four whites, and we'll have some of the Horse Creek Peach.

It's kind of our signature sweet that we do.

And people really respond well to being out in nature and enjoying the view, riding down the river.

We've got like today this beautiful sunset.

(relaxing upbeat music) - [David] Tell me about the different experiences people can have on this boat.

I see you got the pillows.

It's just made for comfort.

- That's right.

So we're the only Coast Guard-certified vessel in Darien, and that means that we can carry more than six people for hire.

And we're actually certified for 24, but to keep the experience like we like it, we usually cap those at 16, is the maximum that we do.

If you come along with eight or more people, you can book the whole boat yourself, or you can join a public tour.

And sort of our mainstays right now are the wine tour like we're doing here, which is a one-hour wine tour where we run down the river.

We go down to Fort King George.

We talk history and ecology of Georgia's second-oldest city.

And then we also do a nature tour where it's a two-hour tour where we basically see the top third of the Altamaha Delta.

We go down river, cut across the Butler, the Champney, the South Altamaha, go up the South Altamaha, and come back down through Rifle Cut, which is, to me, the highlight of the trip.

- [David] That is perfect.

And I love watching birds.

That's one of my things.

- [Paul] We've seen several egrets today.

We're commonly this time of year seeing the eagles are back.

They're gonna be nesting soon.

If you wanna see birds, we don't do this as a public tour, we do it as a private tour, but we'll go down to Wolf Island, down to Egg Island.

And you'll see birds that otherwise you'd have to go to Tierra del Fuego or somewhere to see 'em.

They're just coming through on the Atlantic Flyway.

- [David] And this is just such a unique part of the country.

Tell me why this part of Georgia is so special when it comes to the entire Eastern Seaboard.

- You're on the "Delta Belle" on the Altamaha River Delta.

And the river starts up near Atlanta as the Ocmulgee and up near Athens as the Oconee.

They come through the Piedmont of Georgia, and that little town of Lumber City, they come together.

137 miles from Lumber City to the ocean, not dammed.

The Nature Conservancy, I love their phrase.

They call it one of the last great wild places in America.

It's the way that it's been for the last five or 10,000 years after the last ice age.

I mean, Native Americans paddled around this place.

It looks much like it did then.

(upbeat music) - [David] Is this something people can do all year round?

- [Paul] I always tell everybody we'll be just as adventurous as you are.

- [David] (laughs) Okay.

- [Paul] If you wanna get out there, we'll get out there with you.

- [David] All right, all right.

Well, we got it tough right now.

What is it?

70 degrees, nice breeze.

- [Paul] Nice breeze, sun low in the sky.

The marsh is golden.

Like Sidney Lanier talked about the wonderful Marshes of Glynn with their golden splendor, we're seeing something.

This is a magic time right now.

It's magic time of day.

Bring your friends and family and come down and experience the Altamaha.

It's something to see.

This watershed touches 60% of the counties in Georgia.

Everybody can relate to the Altamaha.

(stirring string music) - [David] Along your winding river journey, you no doubt witnessed the flora and fauna of these stunning marshes.

Paul will share his stories along with stories of those who navigated these back rivers in the days of old.

From the reconstructed Fort King George, the oldest English fort remaining on George's coast, to the working shrimp boats that elegantly define Darien's shoreline, this trip is a must, especially at sunset, moreover, a perfect sunset like this one.

(stirring string music continues) I think what is so neat about this river in this area is the history mixed with the nature, and it's not overcrowded.

It can be very serene out here.

- [Paul] I tell people all the time, I'll say, "I'm willing to put money down and wager that we won't see another boat," and oftentimes we don't see another boat on the whole trip.

The Nature Conservancy talks about the Altamaha, and they say that it's one of the last great wild places in America.

And when you can go on a two-hour boat ride and not see another boat, it sort of proves that, that it really is one of those special places.

(subdued music) - [David] And as our sunset ship returns to its dock, we discover one of Darien's latest local hotspots.

Grab your matey and head to the Marsh Pirate Outfitter, Taproom, and Marina.

- We were in Madison, Georgia.

We had a family printing business in Covington for 40-some years.

We've always vacationed here.

My family had been coming here for about four generations to fish on the weekends and things.

And it just felt like what we needed to do, so we made the move.

- [Christina] The people, the salt air, the water, the palm trees, I mean, not many places you can get this.

It's like we're on vacation every day.

- [Chuck] This is home.

- [David] All right, so who's the Marsh Pirate, you or you?

Where'd the name come from?

- I'm Mrs.

Marsh Pirate.

- Okay, okay.

- And it's on my apron at home when I bake.

(Chuck laughs) And he's the Marsh Pirate, and it's our boat's name.

- Yep, that was the name of the boat.

We wanted to offer the marina environment, you know, incorporate everything into one place.

So we took advantage of an old shrimp facility here, the dock already built pretty much.

Needed a little love, but it was here.

We said, you know, "Why not come up with the marine atmosphere where people can come by boat?"

They can come get their frozen bait in the morning.

They can fill their coolers with ice for the catch of the day.

They can grab their snacks.

They can spend time on the water with family.

There was no facility like this.

And we're seeing more and more and more travel by boat to town, and it helps everybody in the community.

(relaxing upbeat music) So the store is kind of something we had wanted to do for a long time.

It's kind of a nod to things we saw when we went vacationing in Florida, a store that has clothing options, this tackle.

It has rods and reels.

We can spool line.

It was just a way to service the fishing community, and it was kind of lacking.

I mean, we're a fishing family, so we've always been around the water, and it's just where we wanted to be.

- [David] Well, I also saw a little section here with some Georgia-grown products.

Tell me about why that's important to y'all.

- [Chuck] We took great pride in trying to offer things that come from Georgia, from many of our brews, many of our local seafood options from seafood dips and things like that.

There's several dry good companies that we use for popcorn and pretzels, and all of those are Georgia companies.

And it's that way on purpose, and people expect it.

You know, they wanna know something that's local.

They can get national brands anywhere.

That just makes us different, makes it special.

- [David] Now we're getting to the fun part.

We're in the bar.

I came here less than a year ago, and that beautiful copper tap had been put in.

Tell me about this bar here.

- [Christina] Well, it wasn't easy.

It's a custom tap system, and we wanted it special 'cause we felt like a lot of customers, they recognized the local breweries and those brands, and we wanted those handles to look like a piece of art.

We wanted the whole tower to look like a piece of art, a lot of details.

And it took probably nine months before we figured out, you know, who could build it for us and then getting it delivered.

It was actually delivered on Christmas Eve.

It was our Christmas present.

(Chuck chuckles) - [David] Wonderful, and it's not just the taps itself.

It is the architecture of this building.

You're almost like scuba, like underwater.

You're in a ship almost.

- We wanted it to have an old feel like it had been here a long time.

And Darien's the second-oldest city in the state, so we wanted this to feel like it had been part of the town forever.

The buildings have been here since the '60s.

Some of the beams that are in the building here are original.

And when we uncovered things as we were going through construction, we said, you know, "How nice would it be to have a post-and-beam construction in here and really get that look we want."

A lot of the brass and copper accents just give a nod to the old seafaring boats and things, and it creates a warm feel, and I think we accomplished it.

(bright tranquil music) - [David] Just got out here on the porch.

(chuckles) - Yes.

- That's got a story, right?

- So that's the original beam, and we were told by several locals that it was obtained from the Georgia Department of Transportation when they built in '95.

And we told 'em to keep it, don't cut it off.

So it's has some history.

- We couldn't bear to cut it off.

- You might find a use for it, right?

- Well, I'm thinking, you know, it's a good spot to hang a pair of scales and weigh fish for tournaments.

- There you go.

- You know?

- Yep.

- We're over the water now.

This is beautiful furniture.

It's got a story.

- [Christina] So I spent probably a year and a half researching furniture for the dock that we could also sell to customers.

And the best one happened to be right in our backyard, Eastman, Georgia, SoPoly.

And it's a family business just like our business, and we got to tour the plant, and they're just great people.

It's extremely comfortable.

You can ask a lot of our customers that sit out here for three hours at a time, talking and enjoying a cold one.

- [Chuck] Well, the furniture's great.

You know, it's a plastic product.

They do a lot of recycled material, so they have very little waste.

- Well, I love it.

The furniture's Georgia made.

We got Georgia-grown goods in there, from popcorn to pretzels.

The bait's from Georgia.

- Shrimp.

- (laughs) The shrimp.

Y'all got it all.

This is just a wonderful place.

I can feel the breeze from the Darien River here.

Marsh Pirate's happening.

- Yes, yes.

- All right.

(dramatic Western music) So now that I've connected with the local Marsh Pirate, it's time to hit the bar and play the role of Marsh Pirate.

(laughs) Let's see what's on tap.

Oh nice, I see you got some coastal collaborations here.

Some have mead and beer.

Some are different types of beer.

What's this?

Scallywag?

- Oh, Scallywag!

(patrons cheering) (bell ringing) - [Character] You scallywag!

- [David] Uh-oh.

- Scallywag!

(patrons cheering) - All right.

Thank you, Matt.

I gotta cheer somebody.

Here we go.

(glasses tapping) I will be amazed if this is good.

(laughs) (David speaks in French) That is very good.

(patrons laugh) Why?

(laughs) So, yes, the Marsh Pirate is about good food, good drink, all your dockside accessories, and of course good times, (bell ringing) all rolled into a riverside escape with your marsh-side mateys.

♪ Mm, mm, mm ♪ - [David] Let's now walk inland a few blocks past the gorgeous tabby wall Dockside Inn, where I was actually staying, over to one of Darien's dining hotspots.

Let's chow down on a few locally grown favorites with Chef Megan Savic at Canopy.

(gentle upbeat guitar music) - I'm Megan Savic.

I'm the executive chef of The Canopy Restaurant and Tabby House Brewing Company.

At The Canopy, we make everything that we can from scratch with the most local ingredients possible.

This house was built 1875.

We believe it was built to be the postmaster general's house.

We're standing in a later 1900s edition of it, but the whole front of the house is original.

- [David] I think it's really neat.

You walk around.

Maybe we're in the library, maybe we're in the dining, but it still has the feel of a house, but the restaurant is blended into it.

- Yeah, and we did that on purpose.

We did not wanna take away the homey feel that you get when you walk into here.

We really wanted it to be obvious that you were dining in a former living room or the parlor, you know?

So we really wanted that to be part of who we are, to have that feeling for people when they come.

We really wanted this house and the Tabby to embody that homey feel.

So upstairs we have our lounge, which is very casual, almost speakeasy, to just relax.

It's just a great hangout space.

- [David] Yeah.

(laid-back music) Well, Tabby House is also a great hangout space.

- It is.

- We were here for the construction with Fred and that team.

It was fascinating.

And now to see it finally come together, I was excited.

I can't imagine what it was like for you all.

What's it been like to see it all come together the way it did?

- [Megan] I've just been over the moon.

You know, there's always gonna be a little bit of, "Will they like it?"

"Will they like me when you open a new concept?"

But the outpouring of support has just been wonderful.

People seem to like it.

People seem to understand what we're doing there.

It's just been wonderful.

And here I get to be creative with my menu, and I get to make art and feed it to people, which is all I ever wanted.

- [David] And you are a fan of local.

Tell me why local Georgia-grown products and Southeastern products are important for you.

- 'Cause that's where we are.

As an Indigenous person, I try to cook as locally as possible.

You know, we have the knowledge of what is edible all around us, and we need to be doing a better job as chefs of sharing that knowledge with our community.

I have done a lot of research into what is edible around here that may be often overlooked, and it's just such a fun, new challenge every time to take a recipe that comes from across the world and say, "Okay, well what do we have here that we can use to kind of bring this recipe to life without using far-away ingredients?"

(energetic music) So we got our peat-smoked boar.

Peat, it's kind of like a natural, live soil that they dig out of the bogs around Scotland and Ireland, and it is what they use to smoke their barley and their rye when they make whiskey.

So this dish is an homage to the Scottish immigrants that landed on the coast of Georgia so long ago.

So we have our local boar loin that we sous vide to 125.

So then we can just sear it really hard on all the sides and have a nice medium loin at the end.

It is also gonna pair with our wild rice risotto.

So it is wild rices from along the coast.

In a ripping hot pan with a good amount of oil, we're gonna take our fat side and just lay that down.

(pan sizzling) And we're gonna let that sear on all of its sides while we make the risotto and do our Macallan glazed apples.

So we'll take our wild rice risotto, and we'll go in.

We're also going to pick it up with some garlic and shallot, some aromatics for flavor, (skillet rattling) a pat of butter.

And so you'll notice that our wild rice risotto is a little less starchy- - Yeah.

- Than classic risotto.

And that's because the wild rices of America actually just contain less starch.

They're a little bit better for you in terms of health.

- [David] I guess a lot of rice was grown in this part of the state back in the day.

- [Megan] Yes, it was.

So we're gonna hit it with a little bit of salt, a little bit of pepper.

(skillet sizzling) - [David] Whoo.

- [Megan] Perfect.

So we got a beautiful sear on the top.

We're flipping that pork over to sear the bottom.

We'll do the sides next.

- [David] Is this Ossabaw hog or just local hog?

- It's local hog.

It's not from Ossabaw.

It's much more local than that.

But the local hogs have Ossabaw flavors.

You know, they're all eating the same things.

These are our Macallan apples.

(skillet clanging) (flame roars) The flame allows me to create a Macallan glaze really quickly.

Such high heat instantly burns off all the alcohol and start caramelizing the sugars left over.

So we're gonna let our pork rest.

So we've got our wild rice risotto, which we're going to spoon into our mold.

(lively music) So it is a common misconception that pork is a quote, unquote, "white meat."

Pork is a red meat and can be cooked like one.

So the same temperatures that you can cook steak to you can cook pork to.

So it is not like chicken that needs to be cooked to 165 degrees.

It is a red meat that is safe at 135.

- [David] And these micro greens?

- Also local.

So they come from Greener Roots Farm.

And this is micro mizuna and micro tatsoi, which add a really nice licorice-y tartness to the whole dish.

So now what we're doing is the star of the show.

We are peat smoking the whole dish.

- [David] Ooh, yeah.

- [Megan] And then we let it sit for about 30 seconds, and once it's done, we release- - Oh yes.

- The smoke.

- [David] That smells incredible.

- [Megan] Good.

(gentle upbeat music) - All right, this is stunning.

Here at Canopy, the peat-smoked pork with the caramelized Macallan apples, local micro greens on some local wild risotto, and of course the local hog.

Oh boy, where do I start?

Unbelievable.

From the beauty of the marshes of McIntosh County explored at sunset on an incomparable river cruise to a local marsh pirate dwelling serving local Georgia-grown brews and chews, and a topnotch classically trained chef at Canopy and Tabby House Brewing, who believes in the power of locally sourced ingredients to deliver the best dining experience possible- - Scallywag!

(bell ringing) - [David] It's fun to spend time with the local folks of Darien and this entire coastal region who truly believe in the importance of this historic city, sharing stories of its past with the local cuisine of today, all in a beautiful setting along the banks of the Darien River.

I'm David Zelski.

See you at the next "Fork in the Road."

(lively upbeat music) (lively upbeat music continues) (lively upbeat music continues) "A Fork in the Road" was brought to you by... (light upbeat music) - [Announcer] Community, learning, working, playing, celebrating.

Doing life is always better together.

At GPB, we aim to provide you with the tools to be able to do life together well.

Our mission to educate, inform, and entertain inspires everything from our wide range of programming to our stimulating radio conversations, to our fun in-person events.

We've got something for everyone.

Visit gpb.org/community to learn more about our upcoming events.

(gentle upbeat guitar music) - [David] From the soil of our family farms to your table, there's something special about Georgia, something you can taste in every bite.

Fresh flavors, local farms, unforgettable experiences, Georgia has it all.

Support local, taste the difference, and make memories along the way.

Look for the Georgia Grown logo wherever you shop, or visit georgiagrown.com.