Transcription
It's fair to say that few people know Rhode Island clams, specifically cohogs, better than Jodie King. At 64, the affable and energetic King has spent over 40 years raking a living from the waters of Narragansett Bay, and he does it year-round in every kind of weather. He's also a natural teacher, frequently conducting instructional classes on shellfishing for the state's Department of Environmental Management. Explore New England caught up with Jody at Rocky Point State Park in Warwick, where he first learned the clam harvesting skills that would eventually serve as the foundation of his entire career.
"So you'll be actually in that shallow of water?"
"No, I was in 19, 20 ft of water this morning getting little necks there with a with a big rake getting cohogs."
"Oh, cohogs. Right. Okay. Coh no. Yeah. So you're not from Rhode Island."
"Only in Rhode Island they're called cohogs. Everything that you catch that's a hard shell clam is called a cohog. We separate them when you go to the market to little necks, top necks, tops, cherries, and hogs."
Okay. Jody gave me a personal lesson on how to rake cohogs, which proved to be a real workout in that rocky bottom. "You have to get literally under the rocks to catch any cohog. Okay. As you pull back and forth. And and how and what uh when do you stop?"
"When the rake is..."
"Oh, hey, look at that. On my first one. First rake. There you go. Huh? Rookie. Oh, it's an undecided. Look, I got two. Yeah, you had to beat me right here. Yeah. Look. Yeah. Yeah. Sure enough, I bought the bottom. Look at that." [Music]
"And once I start finding them in a spot, I don't move."
"You don't move."
"At eight or nine years old, my parents used to walk us down that beach, four boys, and go, 'Don't go past those rocks. Don't go past that street. Catch some cohogs and don't kill one another.' So I literally say, 'I cut my teeth right here.' Every Rhode Islander has the inalienable right to walk down to the shoreline every day of the week as long as the area is open and catch a one-gallon pail of clams with no license at all, seven days a week, and catch a 100 little necks every single time they walk down. It's beautiful."
"Growing up here in Warwick, I'm the oldest of four boys. My parents didn't have a lot of money, so we used to come down to Rocky Point and hang out and have a picnic at the beach. My parents would literally say, 'Fill your buckets with cohogs so we can have a dinner.' I could never imagine 50 years ago making the decision to dig these for a living for more than half of my life, and I'm 63. Who has a better office than I do? Absolutely nobody. I can go on my boat. I get to take my dog to work every single day. Look at this one. That's a big one. That's two, three, four. Think that's a good rake. This is my rake. This is what we call the harvesting basket. These are the nine or 10 or 11 teeth, depending on the rake that come on the rake. You have to get all three and a half or three inches of these teeth in the bottom in order to catch the cohogs. You can actually catch clams anywhere. It doesn't have to be a sandy bottom, a muddy bottom. This is called Rocky Point, and you catch way more rocks here than you catch cohogs for that reason. They are hidden in the rocks. So in order to catch them, you got to dig a lot of rocks. And these are by far in a rocky bottom the best clams you'll ever eat." [Music]
"One of my favorite things to do in Rhode Island is to teach Rhode Islanders how to catch clams on the beach. I've been doing a class called 'Come Clam with Me' for 12 years now for the Department of Environmental Management, and it's mostly to bring Rhode Islanders down to the shoreline, show them that they can catch a meal, take it home and eat it. I get the pleasure of seeing someone smile when they catch a rake full of clams and they get to take it home for dinner. I've taught you how to catch clams. I'm going to teach you how to cook a meal on the beach. So, I've fixed you up for life in Rhode Island."
"There's nothing quite like raking up a bushel of cohogs to spark one's appetite. And Jody had planned for that as well by bringing all the ingredients we'd need for a steamed clam feast based on a simple recipe handed down from his father, who worked as a chef in a well-known Providence restaurant. So, we put the cohogs in the sauce in the pan with very little water because each cohog has its own liquor built into its shell that as it gets warm, it will open up and drop its liquor into the pan, and that starts the steaming process along with the olive oil, garlic, basil, and crushed red pepper. Oh, that looks cool. That looks neat. That's why you need Italian bread."
"This is my best day. 6,049 pieces in 4 hours. Proof that I did it. There's Princess on the 649 clams. There's Dad on the 649 clams. And there's Jody on the 649 clams."
"As soon as the first five or six clams open up in the pot, I shut the heat off and let the rest steam in the pot without the heat underneath. You don't want to overcook these and make them tough."
"Freeb. Hey, that's cheating. Oh, I like the wampum shell. Oh, fresh out of the bay. Oh, man. That is good. After 30-something years of eating these, they're still good. All right, let me try one of these things, man. See, I might I'm not doing it right. I didn't pay attention. It's all right. It's all right. Is there Is there a wrong way to do it?"
"There's no right or wrong way." M [Music]
"I love that salty broth. And that's Narragansett Bay you're eating. Yeah. Right. I love that."
"My name is Jody F. King, and I am a commercial wild harvest bivalve extractor from Warwick, Rhode Island. And I love my job." [Music]