Chefs cook up support for wild salmon

WASHINGTON – You can grill it, broil it, bake it, poach it, barbecue it, smoke it, turn it into croquettes or serve it raw as sushi, with lemon and butter, in a cranberry reduction sauce, with fennel or dill or garlic mashed potatoes.

But nearly 200 chefs from around the country warned Tuesday that unless lawmakers act quickly, wild salmon could disappear from their restaurants faster than it takes to boil an egg or ruin a souffle.

Their campaign is called “Vote With Your Fork.” Among other things, the chefs support legislation calling for Congress’ investigative arm and the National Academy of Sciences to study how to restore the wild salmon runs on the Columbia and Snake rivers in the Pacific Northwest – studies that could include the controversial breaching of four lower Snake River dams.

“It’s a marquee item on our menu, and everyone has a stake in this,” Greg Higgins, the chef and owner of Higgins Restaurant and Bar in Portland, said of the wild salmon he serves.

Since the 1990s, more than a dozen wild salmon and steelhead runs on the Columbia and Snake rivers have been protected under the Endangered Species Act. During that time, the issue of breaching the four dams had been on a slow boil.

Environmentalists say the dams represent an almost insurmountable barrier to restoring the runs. Irrigators, power officials and barge interests say there’s no scientific evidence that breaching the dams would help salmon, adding that the price tag to do so would be enormous. A federal judge in Portland has rejected the Bush administration’s plan for restoring the runs, which didn’t include dam breaching.

Many of the wild salmon served in restaurants come from Alaska. But the chefs want to see the restoration of sustainable wild runs elsewhere on the West Coast.

Opponents of dam breaching said the chefs are welcome to lobby, but they have their facts wrong. Darryll Olsen of the Columbia-Snake River Irrigators Association said studies have shown that there’d be no biological benefits and enormous costs for the region’s economy.