Boston Common - Niche Media - A side of Boston that's anything but common.
Issue link: http://digital.greengale.com/i/209310
CELLARBRATION T hroughout it all he never stops moving, pinballing from one promising grove to the next—until he comes across our first find. "Here we go, see that?" I don't see a thing. "Right there." Still nothing. He kneels and pulls out a kitchen knife, then points it to the earth. "That is a coral mushroom." Finally I see it, a golf-ball-size fungus that looks like a sponge. Bruce severs the mushroom at the root and then raises it to his nose. "This will go great in an omelet!" he says. "Let's keep moving. We're on the right track." The tradition of eating mushrooms dates back before Christ, when Egyptian pharaohs believed fungi held supernatural powers of immortality and fiercely forbid commoners from picking them. More than 4,000 years later, mushroom hunting is still a cutthroat business. "There are a lot of stabbings," Bruce says nonchalantly. "Foraging is very proprietary in a way. Everyone thinks they own the spot, but—hello—we're on public land. No one owns these places." Even as Bruce gesticulates with his 10-inch kitchen knife, it's hard to imagine a duel breaking out over a piece of fungus. Less hard to imagine, however, is the horror of a casual dog walker bumping into Bruce as he lumbers through the woods with a mini machete in hand. But then again, if he's hunting for mushrooms, Daniel Bruce is pretty much invisible. Only amateurs bump into dog walkers. It's easy to forget who Daniel Bruce is outside of mushroom hunting; how he rose to become one of Boston's most celebrated chefs. After his parents divorced and his mom took a job waitressing at a local restaurant, 16-year-old Daniel got hired as its busboy. But he wanted to be in the kitchen. So when a pot-washing position opened up at the town's only fine-dining restaurant, he grabbed it. The restaurant's owner, Florence Blaisdell-Sterns, recognized the teen's feverish work ethic and fledgling interest in cooking and helped him score a loan to attend Johnson & Wales. After cooking school, Bruce caught the eye of a visiting chef from Italy who invited him to Liguria (Bruce's first time on a plane) to apprentice at his restaurant. Two years later, Bruce flew back to the States fluent in Old World cuisine. Positions at New York City's Le Cirque and 21 Club followed, and then the brand-new Boston Harbor Hotel called in search of a driven young chef. He's been there ever since, nearly a quarter century running three restaurants, three bars, and the hotel's catering operation. In 1990, he founded the Boston Wine Festival, a three-month bacchanal that takes place at the hotel every winter, starting in January. While Bruce's Horatio Alger story finds its way into a few pages of his cookbook, Simply New England (due on shelves this holiday season), you'd never know about his meteoric rise from talking to him. He is as stealthy a self-promoter as he is a forager. "OK, look at this, but do not touch," Bruce says, carefully clearing away some leaves with his blade. "This is an Amanita mushroom, otherwise known as a Destroying Angel." I look down the blade of Bruce's knife, expecting to find a grotesque boil oozing with venom. To my surprise, it's the most innocent-looking mushroom I've seen all day—cute, even. Standing two inches tall with a clean white cap and stem, the Destroying Angel doesn't seem worthy of its doomsday moniker, and yet it's one of the most deadly mushrooms known on the planet. "You usually get really sick, and then you feel better, then three days later your kidneys and liver shut down," Bruce says. "It's not a good way to go." Without a liver transplant, victims enter a hepatic coma and die shortly thereafter. The few who have survived the Angel's wrath describe apocalyptic diarrhea, vomiting, and constipation six to eight hours after consumption. All this from a mushroom you could picture in the produce aisle of Stop & Shop. M orning is slipping away when Bruce gets a call from one of his sous chefs. After hours spent in the woods, a cell phone looks foreign pressed up against his ear. "OK, yeah, get the fish ready for me and I'll be there in 45 minutes or so." I suddenly realize that we're not in the shire anymore, and more important, I have no clue how to get out of the woods. How long have we been walking? How far have we gone? The two of us have been in a trance, zigzagging from one tree stump to another with no discernible direction. "I could stay here all day, but I have to put out two brunches at eleven," Bruce says, slipping the phone back in his pocket. "But we can't leave until we find a Hen of the Woods." With the clock ticking, he scans the tree line, looking for dead oaks, and races from one to the next. "Nope, not this one." My hopes for finding this fabled mushroom are beginning to dwindle fast, perhaps an indication that I would be the first to perish in a survival situation, but Bruce is unfailingly optimistic. "We're getting close, I can feel it." And then, as if he planned it, Bruce calls over, "Check this out!" Sure enough, there she is: a Hen of the Woods in all her fungal glory. Bruce looks over each shoulder to make sure no one is watching, lowers to his knees, draws out his knife and cuts the mushroom with all the care and precision of a master chef. "Isn't it beautiful?" BC The Boston Wine Festival, founded by Daniel Bruce, marks its 25th anniversary with a stellar lineup of events. STARTING ON JANUARY 10, Daniel Bruce will celebrate the 25th anniversary of his Boston Wine Festival, a three-month event that draws some of the most discerning palates from around the world. The festival has become the signature event of the Boston Harbor Hotel, where it hosts renowned winemakers and vineyard owners. "Daniel makes the Boston Harbor Hotel stand apart, and there is no better example of this than what he has accomplished with the Boston Wine Festival," writes hotelier Rick Kelleher. "With the artistic palate that he is so well known for, he creates an original menu in perfect harmony with the wine." Over the course of the past 24 festivals, Bruce has created 4,000 original dishes that have been paired with 90,000 bottles of wine at more than 1,000 dinners. This year, attendees can enjoy his unique cuisine paired with juices from Domaine Pierre Morey, Château Cos d'Estournel, Shafer Vineyards, Duckhorn Vineyards, Staglin Family Vineyard, Peter Michael Winery, Château La Fleur-Pétrus, Trimbach, and more. "Of course, the 25th anniversary is certainly a major milestone," chef Bruce says. "It truly humbles me to be able to say that all of the winemakers and owners coming have become close friends, and to have them host dinners and celebrate the festival anniversary with me is beyond what words can describe." bostonwinefestival.net BOSTONCOMMON-MAGAZINE.COM 134-139_BC_F_Profile_Holiday_13.indd 139 139 11/1/13 4:59 PM