Seaweed whispererJacob Harth's new eatery will help you learn to love oft-overlooked creatures

GROWING UP ON his family farm in Southern Oregon's bucolic Applegate Valley, chef Jacob Harth learned not only how to farm, forage and fish from his logger grandfather and fisherman father, he also developed an innate sense of responsibility to the land and waters that fed his family.

Harth's deeply rooted ethos grew stronger during stints at ingredient-obsessed San Francisco culinary heavyweights such as Saison, Quince and SPQR, as well as prized Portland kitchens like Clyde Common, St. Jack, Davenport and Bar Casa Vale, but his latest project is his most personal.

Erizo, a fourteen-seat sustainably sourced seafood restaurant in the inner Southeast Portland industrial district, unites Harth's passion for ecology and sustainable fishing, penchant for exquisite plating and some of Oregon's least-loved ocean dwellers---bycatch, offcuts and invasive species like purple sea urchin, the spiny creature behind the restaurant's name (in Spanish, erizo del mar means hedgehog of the sea, or sea urchin).

"We have all these amazing ingredients in Oregon, especially on the coast, but there's not a market for them, so we're going and getting them ourselves and putting them on display and trying to change the conversation," Harth said.

Harth is especially proud of the relationships he's built with Oregon Coast food luminaries such as Kristen Penner, the jill-of-all-trades fisherwoman behind North Coast Industries in Garibaldi. Besides sourcing everything from butter clams and cockles to black cod for Harth, she also helped him get his commercial fishing license, a boon for Erizo's menu.

"I wanted to really redefine what we think about sourcing locally, and having a commercial license allows us to put products on the menu that no other restaurant in Portland has, like limpets, Pacific red rock crab, wolf eel, gooseneck barnacles and wild mussels," Harth said.

On his days off Harth heads straight for the coast to harvest seaweed, dig up horse clams and reel in rockfish. He's also working toward joining ZeroFoodprint, a global coalition of restaurants committed to going carbon neutral.

"We're trying to change the culture around both what ingredients we're using and what we're buying, because the [carbon] footprints that restaurants have is insane," Harth said. "You have to be conscious of what the story of your restaurant is, what you're doing and why you're doing it. I don't think there's any doubt about ours."