Chris Martin has a mission. “I’m all the time pushing again after I hear somebody say which you could’t make a fantastic dish out of redheads and different diving geese,” says the proprietor of Bay Flats Lodge. His lodge sits on San Antonio Bay, a scorching spot for the migrating red-head geese that swarm the Texas coast in winter. In contrast to puddle geese akin to mallards that feed in shallow waters, diving geese thrive on underwater vegetation and prey, resulting in a popularity that they’re not as tasty. “However all geese are actually good,” Martin insists, “and we don’t waste something right here.”
Positioned close to 100 thousand acres of protected wildlife protect, Bay Flats Lodge sits within the crosshairs of a few of the finest saltwater fishing and waterfowling within the nation. Visitors can go all in on a waterfowl quest—redheads are one in every of numerous species of geese that use the bay—or combine it up with airboat rides to distant marsh flats to forged for redfish and trout. Irrespective of the schedule, friends filtering again to the lodge are greeted by the wealthy aroma of Martin’s duck soup, a beloved household recipe. He remembers his grand-mother making the soup, after which his mom. “We’ve tweaked it for twenty-five years,” he figures. One of the vital important modifications: including salt pork, which helps bind all of the flavors. Additionally secret’s the real-deal duck inventory. “The inventory, the greens, and the meat—it’s like a holy trinity,” he says. “It solely works whenever you put all of them collectively.”
