I have a small break from school as I await feedback on my thesis, so I did what folks like me do. I jumped into a frenzy of urban farming activity that I had been meaning to do but haven’t had the time for, the results of which became something like summer camp!

The week started with dispatching the ducks. Then I took them to the woodsy “summer camp” location at Chef Lauren’s where she showed me and another eager student, Jacinta, how to render duck fat, make confit, duck prosciutto, and roast duck. This is no small deal. Lauren is a duck master from Bay Wolf. She co-authored the Bay Wolf Restaurant cookbook. She also, unknowingly, happens to be responsible for one of my pivotal Bay Area food experiences. An amazing dinner at Bay Wolf in 1996. (This same dinner inspired, my then boyfriend, to create a fake menu for his creative writing class in college. A big hit.)

I learned confit is a lengthy process that takes a few days to implement and then another several months before the legs are ready to eat. The time inbetween salting, washing, slow stewing, and rendering was spent sitting around a camp fire, eating, drinking, preserving, and fruit picking. At one point, focused on the end of a fruit picker I noticed the orange flesh of a loquat cluster against the bright blue sky and felt like I was on vacation at a cool chef ranch. Apparently, this is not the only “summer camp” going on these days. Across town, Stefani and Denise have been busy holding jam preserving workshops!