There’s something particularly American about watching the topography change through the window of a vehicle hurtling down the interstate. Gas money and a bit of gumption is all that’s required to take one from the big woods of Arkansas to the watercolor swept bluffs of the West. Make it a journey taken in pursuit of the wild turkey, and you have an expedition endemic to the American experiment.
I had rendezvoused with my friend and outdoor exemplar, Jay Beyer, at a brewery in Houston with plans to hunt our way across the Southwest. Our first stop was a friend’s family ranch, emblematic of the basin and range landscape of west Texas. The friendship state proved more than hospitable when barely an hour past sunrise I’d managed to call in two ornery Toms that expired within moments of each other. As Jay and I enjoyed a leisurely walk back to the van, I paused to cut a few pads from the clusters of prickly pear cactus that grew in vibrant green clumps all around.
The pads and the fruit of the cactus are edible and are culinary mainstays throughout Mexico and Texas. These green pads, or nopals, can be eaten raw or cooked and inhabit a realm of flavor somewhere between green beans and okra. A bit of care must be taken when foraging for nopals to avoid the spines. I prefer to take the smaller, new growth cacti, before the large needles have hardened.
After a wildly successful hunt, Jay and I hit the road with birds and cacti in tow. We headed to meet a pal for the turkey season opener in New Mexico. After passing so close to the U.S., Mexico line that we went through a border patrol checkpoint, we left the oven-like heat of west Texas for the wintery temps and snow-covered crags of the northern New Mexico mountains. We followed a shared GPS pin to a flat spot off a Forest Service road. It was chilly, blustery, and the wind whipped through the surrounding hollers like a skateboarder negotiating the railing of a spiral staircase. With an hour before dark, we stood around a crackling fire, sipping beers and making plans for the morning’s hunt. As we talked, I busied myself by cutting one of the turkey breasts into bite sized pieces and seasoning it simply. This was no time for involved preparations or contrived plating. It was, though, a perfect occasion to share food and a story.
I sautéed the turkey in a small pan with a bit of butter until it was cooked through then turned my attention to the cactus pads. With the flat side of my knife, I scrapped the spines off, and after a quick rinse chopped the nopals into small pieces as well. Another quick sauté and a splash of hop infused water to deglaze the pan and dinner was served. We huddle about, shoulders shrugged to our ears in an attempt to keep the chill at bay and ate with our fingers. It was a plain moment and an unencumbered meal, but it was as present as I’d been in a long time. We stood as part of the lexicon of hunters and like the ones who came before we found ourselves sharing a fire, eating food, and reveling in a productive hunt. We had gathered both flora and fauna from the same place and those ingredients had come to serve as a reminder of where we had been. Like the accompanying story, they became a part of us and fueled our burgeoning adventure with the fruits of the last one.
Bellies full and hopeful for the next hunt, we retired to sleeping bags for the night. We wrapped ourselves in the terroir of Texas as we found ourselves on a New Mexico mountain. We drifted off to sleep, straining ours ears to hear imagined gobbles and lulled by an American wind.
