- Let me back up.

- Yeah.

- So this is Joey.

(Crystal and Joey laugh) He's one of my dear, dear good friends.

He's my family member.

At the same time, we love exploring the land.

- You never know when you come with Crystal what duty is going to be happening, but I'm on bag duty today.

(Crystal laughing) So making sure the bags don't touch the ground, that they don't get stolen out of the car.

(Crystal, Joey, and Geronimo laughing) - That's funny.

(Crystal, Joey, and Geronimo laughing) (upbeat music) Today on "Geronimo Eats the Bay," we are here in the Oakland hills.

I am here with Chef Crystal Wahpepah, Indigenous chef extraordinaire.

She's going to show us how to forage down here and also share a beautiful spread of food that is intertribal.

So are you ready to go forge?

- Sure.

- Let's go.

(upbeat music) - So we are off Skyline Boulevard here in Oakland, California.

The history of this piece of land, it comes from the Ohlone, from the Ohlone people, and this was given land back.

This is something that's being preserved and kept for the next generation.

- [Geronimo] There's so much California Bay.

- We got one right behind you.

- It's 360.

(upbeat music) - So this is what I love cooking with.

It's one of my favorites.

It's really kind of a coastal plant.

- [Geronimo] How do you ID these?

- I look for personality.

For instance, I see this vein.

See how the vein goes?

So that's how I identify it.

Wow, you can just smell the medicine when you open it and let it breathe.

- Yeah, it's so fragrant.

- Mm.

- Do you ever use the bay nut from the tree as well?

- Yes, we have.

Especially when it's roasted or toasted, it really reminds me of like a unique kind of coffee.

- Yes.

- [Crystal] Now this might be blackberries, right?

Yeah.

- [Geronimo] I see some thorns.

- [Crystal] But they ain't doing nothing.

- [Geronimo] Yeah, no fruits here.

- This is the blackberry where it has these beautiful spikes along the leaves, but then you go down here, and I'm not going to touch, you can see the poison oak.

It's kind of like you want this rich, beautiful berry, but actually, there's a little price to pay.

(Crystal laughing) (gentle music) (graphic whooshes) You can learn a lot of knowledge, especially from Native elders of one, how to gather and where to gather and things like that.

Instead of like, "Oh, I see this mushroom," for instance.

"I'm going to take, take, take,"- - Just take it, yeah.

- But how you're taking it, is it going to grow back?

- I like to think of, are you purely extracting from the land, or are you leaving it better than you found it?

- Yeah.

(gentle upbeat music) How do we get in here, you all?

- Yeah.

- I think it's this way.

- [Geronimo] Are we still on the land trust?

- Yeah, so are we kind of going.

See, how did we do this?

I don't remember.

Yeah, I kind of remember.

- Poison oak.

(gentle upbeat music) - [Crystal] Well, we getting our hike on, Joey.

- [Joey] Let's go.

(gentle upbeat music) - So Chef Crystal has brought in some Indigenous ingredients here with this beautiful spread, and I'm ready to dig into this delicious food.

- So today, what I have right here is I have a hand-harvested wild rice, which comes from Minnesota, a smoked eel that comes from Humboldt County, Chinook salmon that comes from Warm Springs, and then of course we have our leaf lettuce, but mainly important, we do have a Yocha Dehe olive oil, but then we also have a California Bay infused in the olive oil, and this is what we're going to use for the flavor.

And if you never had it before, I'm just going to change your world right now.

- [Geronimo] Oh, wow.

I'm excited.

- So just grab your leaf and hang in there.

Hang in there, lettuce.

I'm going to add some little wild rice right here and get some of the eel from there.

Add a little oil to make it not so dry.

Joey, come on.

(Geronimo laughing) I know you haven't eaten since yesterday.

- [Joey] Oh my.

Are you sure?

- Positive.

- Oh, sweet.

- Okay.

- Looks good.

- [Crystal] So we really have five different tribes just on this.

Isn't that cool?

- [Geronimo] Yeah.

- [Crystal] Where's my leaf?

Yeah.

Here we go.

We have our leaf on a leaf.

(Crystal laughing) All right, here we go.

- Right.

(lettuce crunching) - Mm, mm-hmm.

Wow.

- Do I got food all over me?

- [Joey] Mm-hmm.

- I don't care.

It's good.

- The smoked eel kind of has, like, a more chewy but, like, satisfying texture.

It almost tastes like brisket.

What I love is, yeah, I can taste the infusion of the bay leaf.

- Mm-hmm.

- Basically the aroma that you smell, but in a much more subtle way combined with that, like, Indigenous olive oil is really cool.

- All this, what you see right here, is actually an Indigenous delicacy where it comes into that.

- It's intertribal, right?

- Exactly, so this is how I tell stories.

And you can always tell a story by the food and land where it comes from.

I was born and raised here and grew up with these ingredients, and I'm very honored to actually have these in my hands.

And also it's that connection with the land, connection with the people in the community where it really comes from.

And so it says a lot just with that one bite.

- [Geronimo] We got to feed our people.

- [Crystal] Yes, exactly.

- For my friend, Hannah.

- [Hannah] Woah.

(upbeat music) Oh, we're on Geronimo cam now?

- [Geronimo] Yeah, we are.

- Vegetarian for six years, no longer perhaps.

- [Crystal] Hey, I turn over vegans.

(Geronimo laughs) - [Geronimo] Everyone, she did it.

- I didn't really set out to have Wahpepah's Kitchen.

I felt like it was well needed to be in deep in community because it offers health and wellness and healing, you know, to have these relationships with these foods.

So I guess it had to be me.

(Crystal laughs) - Yeah, so that's a wrap.

Thank you so much, Chef Crystal, for showing us around the beautiful land here.

And where can people find you?

- We're located here in Oakland, right in the Fruitvale area.

And I just released a book, "A Feather and a Fork," based on intertribal foods, 125 recipes.

You can pretty much find it online anywhere.

- Thank you so much for watching "Geronimo Eats the Bay."

I'm Geronimo Ramos for NorCal Public Media, and I'll see you in the next one.

(upbeat music) Hi, everyone.

Geronimo here.

This show is supported by public media viewers like you.

If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to like and subscribe and consider donating to NorCal Public Media so we can keep making quality content, and I can continue eating the Bay.

Visit norcalpublicmedia.org/donate, and I'll see you out there.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music fades) For my friend, Joey.

- [Joey] Oh, nice.

- [Hannah] We should call it "Joey Eats the Bay."

- [Geronimo] ♪ Joey Eats the Bay ♪ You are eating the bay.

Bay leaf.