December 06, 2001 - The artistry behind eelingSuffolk Times • December 6, 2001
The artl* stry beb i d
I'VE JUST COME IN FROM plantiAg
daffodil bulbs for the coming year
and was surprised to find out how
dry the soil was. We actually had to
use a pitchfork to get through it.
Nevertheless, we
got the ground
FOCUS dug up and our
ON peat moss mixed
in with the soil
NATURE and planted our
by Paul daffodils. In
Stoutenburgh between them,
we planted some
of our iris that
needed thinning. Iris go king of wild
and crazy if you don't thin them
every fourth or fifth year. They
crowd each other out and don't give
you as many blossoms, so it's a good
idea to dig them up, break them up
and give them new space and new
life.
As Barbara and I were working,
we couldn't help but notice the hun-
dreds of robins that were passing
through. When I say "passing
through," I mean that literally, for
they kept moving to the south. New
groups would move in and others
would take off. For over half an
hour we watched these robins in
scattered flocks. Whether the over-
cast weather had kept them from
flying and migrating, I don't know,
but for some reason they were all
about us.
Our little pond down the driveway
drew them like a magnet, so they
must have been thirsty. It was some-
thing to see. There was a "chirping"
in the air, but not the robin call of
spring we're used
to, just a short `There's
"chirp." Many of
them were chasing nothing
each other. Why, I glljte like
don't know. It a Warm
wasn't the time for
mating. Maybe Smoked
somebody took eeLy
the other fellow's
berry or bug. _
There was a continual chasing of one
after the other.
eeli*ng
Photo by Barbara Stoutenburgh
What we smoke depends on what's running at the time.
Here it's snappers. Other times It could be stripers or blue-
fish. This week It was the last eels for the season.
on an entirely different note, I
smoked the last eels of the season
yesterday. My son, who has the ener
gy and skill, went out at night with a
light and speared some 10 to 15
pounds of eels and brought them to
me to smoke. There is miite a hit to
doing that. First they have to be
the cut -up eels in a pot and -pour
boiling water over them and leave
deslimed. I use a mixture of salt an
them to cool. Then I drain them and
ashes, which works quite well. Eels
they go in that paper bag with the
have that slippery coating over thei
flour. Precooking the eels makes '
entire bodies that allows these bot-
them less oily and they fry to a
tom dwellers to slip through sea-
beautiful brown crisp. Being not
weed of all sorts, around boulders,
only the cook but the typist as well,
pilings and whatever they might
I sometimes get a chance
encounter on their end-
for the last word —
,less search for food.
Barbara) Now back to
After a few house in
the story
the salt and ash mixture,
Boy, are they good eat -
all that slime comes off
ing! There's only one
with the help of a rough
bone and you can eat
material like an old towel.
everything but that. It's
Then they're gutted and an eel. Once you feel the eel, with a like eating corn on the
cleaned, leaving the heads quick pull up on the spear, the eel is
cob. Of course, the best
on to attach to one end of pinned, brought to the surface and
eating, as I have said, is
the "S" hook of heavy shaken off the spear. Be careful —if
to get them just as they
bent wire; the other end you leave your eels on the ice for any come out of the smoker.
is then hung on the rack length of time. A seagull might spot There's nothing quite like
in the smoker. them and try to fly off with one.
a warm smoked eel.
The smokehouse is an Basically there are two ways to
That's really eating good.
innovative affair of steel eat eels. One is to enjoy them right
My son told me how it
and cast iron. The reason after they are smoked, which is
was that night he went out
I make a point of letting probably the tastiest way. The othe eeling, how the world he
you know it's made up of way is to take a fresh eel, cut it up
was working in gradually
nonflammable material is in pieces, put them in a paper bag
changed before his eyes.
that two other smoke- with flour and shake them around
It seemed the warm water
houses I made of wood until they're well coated. Then fry
and the new cold air cre-
burned down on me, but them. (A word from the cook: I
ated an eerie mist as he
that's another story. This have an old trick I use, handed
poled through the water.
one uses an old cast -iron own from a few enerations. I put
The atmosphere was so
furnace bottom that acts
drenched with moisture
as a fire box and on top
that he said he had to
of that sits a stainless
breathe out to the side,
steel box that a good
otherwise the air would
friend of mine created
be so clouded in front of
from some surplus he
him he wasn't able to see.
had.
I know just what he
So after I gut the eels
meant by those eerie
and soak them overnight
nights on the creek, when
in a brine and sugar solu-
everything is still about
tion, I make a hot fire in
you and the mist is rising
the fire box of the smoke
from the water and you're
to sterilize everything and
alone with yourself.
give me a good bed of hot
He said it was hard to
ashes to put my cherry or
explain, but there was an
hickory wood on. Then
odd phenomenon taking
it's . just a slow process of
place around him as he
smoking for six or eight
poled along. As the boat
hours, checking now and
slowly moved through the water, the
then as we watch the smoke curl out
fog would sort of rise like a miniature
of the chimney, until the job is done.
tornado and go up into the air, first
Most eels have settled deep in the
on one side of the boat and then on
mud of our creeks by now and that's
the other. These little whirlwinds of
where the eelers will look for them
mist would just spin up and up until
when it freezes over. It is then you
they disappeared, something he had
can go out on the ice and chop a hole
never experienced before on the
through it. With a special long -han-
water when out eeling on a quiet
died spear designed just for mud, you
night.
probe the bottom in hopes of hitting