I was born and raised on the coast of North Carolina in Pender county. My dad worked his entire life in wholesale seafood, so we ate all kinds of seafood regularly. But the seafood never tasted so good as on our trips to the sound.
You may not be familiar with the word "sound" to simplify it's the intercoastal waterway between land and the ocean. It starts up north around Jersey and goes all the way down to Florida. The locals call it the sound.
We lived about 1/2 mile from the sound and a couple of Saturdays a month we would pack up and go there to gather seafood, cook and eat, and just lay around on the bank. In this particular place you could stand on the bank of the sound, look across and see the Atlantic Ocean. There were no houses, it was out in the sticks with huge oak trees everywhere. There were broom straw fields all around, and not grown up vegetation.
Moms job was to catch the crabs, the sound was full of blue claw crabs. Dad would bring 2-3 old fish from the fish house and Mom would tie a string around the fish and cast it in the water and wait about 5 minutes. Then she would slowly start pulling in the fish, crabs all over it. It was tricky, if you didn't pull in the fish far enough the water level was to deep and when you lunged the crab net in the water the crabs had time to get away. If you pulled it in to close the crabs would see you and scatter. You had to find the sweet spot to pull in the crabs, and Mom was good at it. She had been doing this for years and she had a pile of crabs in no time.
My younger sisters job was to fish with the rod and reel. Sometimes she would catch bluefish, croakers, and if she was lucky a pig fish or two. A pigfish when pulled out of the water makes a loud grunting noise and sounds just like a pig grunting. Good eating. She never failed to catch enough fish for us.
My dad liked to progg for flounder. Of course we always went to the sound on a falling tide or would get much of nothing. What he used was basically a pitch fork but with straight forks instead of angled. Sometimes he would catch 2 or 3 and sometimes nothing.
My job was to gather the oysters and clams. Dad liked single oysters and taught me how to separate the nice singles from the clusters without killing the oysters. I would have a peck or so less than 45 minutes. The clams were more difficult to find. On low tide the oyster beds were everywhere and here and there between the oyster beds was mud. This is where the clams were, down in the mud. My Dad taught me that when the water was up the clams shell would open and feed, on low tide the water level would drop and the clams would sink into the mud with the shells slowly closing. When the clam would sink all the way into the mud and the shell would close, it left a keyhole imprint in the mud. This keyhole looks like the old timey keyhole like back in the 1800's. So I would walk around on low tide in the mud until I found this keyhole, dig down around it and pull out the clam. I would only get 8-10.
After a couple of hours we brought everything to the bank and Dad would clean the fish, Mom and sis would get everything out of the car we brought and needed. I would lay a 2x4 on the ground and begin stacking the oysters with the mouths facing the same way into the wind. Then gather some broom straw and place it next the the mouth of the oysters and set it on fire. The wind would blow the flames through the oysters and as the mouths began to open the flames would scorch the inside of the oysters. It was a charred taste, if you ate these you would never boil another oyster in water.
Mom would fry the fish and crabs, down in these parts we don't boil crabs we fry 'em. Then we break out the drinks and crackling cornbread. Now I have to say right here that crackling cornbread is a must, if you don't have it, that is a SIN, and it will be a long time before Jesus forgives you for this one!
Then you crack open that oyster and dip it in some of Moms hot pepper vinegar/ketchup sauce, take a bite of crackling cornbread, and this is the nearest you will ever come to heaven in this life!
I suppose me and sis were very lucky to have Mom and Dad, and all the great memories we had growing up. Didn't intend for it to be this long.
You may not be familiar with the word "sound" to simplify it's the intercoastal waterway between land and the ocean. It starts up north around Jersey and goes all the way down to Florida. The locals call it the sound.
We lived about 1/2 mile from the sound and a couple of Saturdays a month we would pack up and go there to gather seafood, cook and eat, and just lay around on the bank. In this particular place you could stand on the bank of the sound, look across and see the Atlantic Ocean. There were no houses, it was out in the sticks with huge oak trees everywhere. There were broom straw fields all around, and not grown up vegetation.
Moms job was to catch the crabs, the sound was full of blue claw crabs. Dad would bring 2-3 old fish from the fish house and Mom would tie a string around the fish and cast it in the water and wait about 5 minutes. Then she would slowly start pulling in the fish, crabs all over it. It was tricky, if you didn't pull in the fish far enough the water level was to deep and when you lunged the crab net in the water the crabs had time to get away. If you pulled it in to close the crabs would see you and scatter. You had to find the sweet spot to pull in the crabs, and Mom was good at it. She had been doing this for years and she had a pile of crabs in no time.
My younger sisters job was to fish with the rod and reel. Sometimes she would catch bluefish, croakers, and if she was lucky a pig fish or two. A pigfish when pulled out of the water makes a loud grunting noise and sounds just like a pig grunting. Good eating. She never failed to catch enough fish for us.
My dad liked to progg for flounder. Of course we always went to the sound on a falling tide or would get much of nothing. What he used was basically a pitch fork but with straight forks instead of angled. Sometimes he would catch 2 or 3 and sometimes nothing.
My job was to gather the oysters and clams. Dad liked single oysters and taught me how to separate the nice singles from the clusters without killing the oysters. I would have a peck or so less than 45 minutes. The clams were more difficult to find. On low tide the oyster beds were everywhere and here and there between the oyster beds was mud. This is where the clams were, down in the mud. My Dad taught me that when the water was up the clams shell would open and feed, on low tide the water level would drop and the clams would sink into the mud with the shells slowly closing. When the clam would sink all the way into the mud and the shell would close, it left a keyhole imprint in the mud. This keyhole looks like the old timey keyhole like back in the 1800's. So I would walk around on low tide in the mud until I found this keyhole, dig down around it and pull out the clam. I would only get 8-10.
After a couple of hours we brought everything to the bank and Dad would clean the fish, Mom and sis would get everything out of the car we brought and needed. I would lay a 2x4 on the ground and begin stacking the oysters with the mouths facing the same way into the wind. Then gather some broom straw and place it next the the mouth of the oysters and set it on fire. The wind would blow the flames through the oysters and as the mouths began to open the flames would scorch the inside of the oysters. It was a charred taste, if you ate these you would never boil another oyster in water.
Mom would fry the fish and crabs, down in these parts we don't boil crabs we fry 'em. Then we break out the drinks and crackling cornbread. Now I have to say right here that crackling cornbread is a must, if you don't have it, that is a SIN, and it will be a long time before Jesus forgives you for this one!
Then you crack open that oyster and dip it in some of Moms hot pepper vinegar/ketchup sauce, take a bite of crackling cornbread, and this is the nearest you will ever come to heaven in this life!
I suppose me and sis were very lucky to have Mom and Dad, and all the great memories we had growing up. Didn't intend for it to be this long.
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