Eating Your Way Through the Spring Shad Run
I love shad but haven’t had it for a long time. It is not in the stores anymore. No one wants to deal with the bones, l guess. I could catch my own, or get some from the artisanal drift netters, but don’t. We cooked it baked or fried. I never heard of these recipes. They sound good. I never ate the roe, or heard if it around here, but saw lots of references in print.
I remember Steve writing a shad story set back in his early 20’s when he lived a self described hippie subsistence life. I think it was on the North River that he caught them. It may have been in a Gray’s Sporting Journal story. I am not sure if it is in one of his books somewhere.
A good read on the topic is “The Founding Fish”, by John McPhee. I couldn’t put it down.
Yes, I going to mention it but declined. I figured if anyone was shad savvy here it would be brought up as it is one of few, if not only, decent books on shad. I think l have it downstairs. I should check. (Yes, l do and, yikes, it is 20 years old.) McPhee is a great essayist but as a fishing lit book it didn’t really grab me. I liked his other books on geology, etc a lot. The thing I remember most is how he came up to the Miramichi for shad*. He asked the guide how much pressure the shad were getting. “You are it.”, he said. True enough. There never was much interest in shad here like the States. Everything was trout and salmon. That has changed but shad is still a casual fish as far as l know. I fished for them some but not much.
When I did survey trawls on the shelf and George’s bank some alewives came up. I was impressed since it was a whole other aspect of their life cycle made concrete instead of abstract. I can’t remember if we got any shad but l would not be surprised. The 50 lb halibut topped everything though. Halibut are incredible.
*page 126
Used to catch so many each year in the Columbia. The roe is truly delicious.
Will a shad horde take over the Columbia River?
I have heard they exploded there to the point of being a possible threat. I love pickled herring so I wonder why they could not be used for that.