Shell Game

Of course, it's probably all hogwash, written by some reporter who was drunk at the time, operating on deadline and coming across some survey.

But for some reason, it's stuck with me, and without getting into whether I can actually remember or not, I'll just say that I do remember eating my very first piñón, which, following that logic, would make me a piñón-holic.

It was about 20 years ago. I'd spotted them in one of those gumball machines inside what is now the Smith's grocery store on Cerrillos Road just south of St. Michael's. I was new to town, and they caught my eye, as they seemed to be staring back at me.

I stopped, threw in a quarter, turned the handle and then went where every dirty hand had gone before as I scratched a few nuts from within the tiny dispenser.

I studied them for about a second and then tossed them back, shells and all.

Already roasted, they were crunchy. They were also pretty "damn good," like that milkshake John Travolta enjoyed in Pulp Fiction. Probably good because of the salt, and it wasn't until a few months later that a good friend made me choke on one, screaming, "Hey, man, you're not supposed to be eating those with the shells!"

They're like sunflower seeds, he explained. They're meant to be spit out, ya dummy. Yeah, hey, I eat what I want to eat and in whatever manner. I never had patience for sunflower seeds or the attention span for cartoons, so I eat what I want. It's my call, my stomach, my intestinal tract.

And so it was with just an hour to go before the Chicago Cubs were to play Sunday night against the New York Mets in the National League Championship Series playoffs that I started thinking about piñón and about getting my fix on.

I knew it'd been a helluva crop this year because of the crazy wet spring we'd had. And bountiful crops don't come around every year, kinda like the Cubs in the playoffs. This was the year of good and plenty, local pickers had told me out in Truchas.

So I took off in my truck, thinking it would be on par with a convenience store trip. I immediately headed for Santa Fe's major arteries, hoping to catch a street vendor. But I had no luck.

So I steered for Smith's, back to the scene where I'd first crunched that mouthful. It was my very first attempt to see if a chain was carrying them or if Smith's had somehow miraculously commercialized this nut. It's off the radar, to be sure.

The New Mexico Department of Agriculture doesn't even keep statistics on them, in a state that has a long line of agricultural commodities, which amount to $4 billion a year.

It's got to be just as popular as the chile, which ranks as the fifth most valuable commodity, and pecans, which are actually the fourth, but no statistics on the edible seed of the pine tree. Why?

Simply because it grows in the wild and is considered a natural resource. If it's not planted or it's not a part of livestock, then it ain't a commodity. It's not a pinto bean (11th) it's not an onion ( 7th) and it's certainly not cotton (9th). Hell, even mohair makes the list at Number 17.

Yet no piñón, which is what Smith's employees also tell me.

But, then one adds: There is an employee who sells them on the side, and "she's making a killing!" Check back with her the next day, she says. Will do.

Now I'm hurtling down toward the Walmart Supercenter at the southern end of town. Ol' Big-Box gotta have them, I thought. Ya gotta believe, the Cubs-fan mantra. Whoa. Strange saying that as I head for Walmart, monopoly of all monopolies. Wait. That's the Yankees, the big box of the Major Leagues. The Cubs are about as non-commercial as you get. More than a century has passed since they won the World Series. Being a diehard is a part of the tradition.

Kinda like piñón. For centuries, Native Americans and New Mexicans here have either been shaking the nuts loose during harvest or merely waiting for them to fall on the ground. They're so popular that the feds have put a visegrip on them along with the rest of their resources, and you pretty much need permission to harvest them before you start thinking about going outside that foul line and into BLM and US Forest Service land, where piñón trees grow in abundance.

But in the Walmart, that abundance hasn't trickled down. No piñón nuts, reports Philip Martinez, 33, who works in the meat department. But he also just so happens to sell them on the side. Swing by the next day, and he'll sell me a pound of them, raw, for $13.

So now I'm 0 for 2 on getting my hands on the nuts, but 2 for 2 discovering people who sell them. Crazy stats, and I'm out the door, headed for Albertsons up the street, near the Target off Zafarano Drive.

Inside, Jonathan, the clerk, says yes, Albertsons has them. I'd just hit a homer. I follow him back, and he points to a very tiny bag of already shelled piñóns, imported from China. Bummer, premature cheer. Thanks, China. Yikes, $3.99 for a few handfuls? Sounds like World Series tickets, relatively speaking; well, in indirect proportion.

"I don't like the way they taste," Jonathan blurts out. "They leave a sour taste in my mouth."

Good to know. Now I'm booking back on Cerrillos and heading for the Giant across from Counter Culture. This time, I'm a Phil Niekro knuckler traveling in the low 70s. The game is drawing near.

"You got any piñónes?" I ask the clerk.

"No," comes the automatic answer, followed by some rethinking: "Wait, let's just double-check to be sure."

There's peanuts, almonds, pistachios, but no piñón. Then she points to Whole Foods, and it all dawns on me. I'm looking for the local kind, the kind in the shells, I tell her.

"Oh, you're looking for the brown, brown, brown kind," she says. There's usually a guy out on Airport Road near the Auto Zone, she says. But he's probably not there.

Thanks. I leave. I'm filling my tank at the pump when a kid approaches me and asks for a buck for the bus. I say I don't have it, but then, like the clerk inside, I double-check inside the car door and score some loose change for him. He's grateful.

"Hey, where you from?" I say.

"Santa Fe, bro," he answers. Love it when I'm called "bro," only because it's one of those words that can either be an insult or affectionate, depending on how it's said. I'm thinking his was more friendly now that I'd given him some money.

It's crunch time. Maybe this is my last chance.

"You know where I can get piñón nuts around here, the brown, brown, brown kind?"

"El Paisano has them," he tells me. "It's a Mexican store down that way."

He bums a cigarette, and then we part ways; he's two dollars richer, but my info is priceless. The rosary dangles from my mirror like a gold neckchain as I steal down Cerrillos again, no umpires around.

Turns out the bro is right. There they are, inside a tiny bag, raw, ready to go. Just under $4, but popular as all hell. All I need now is to roast them.

I'm back home. Two minutes to game time. I turn on the oven, bring out the cookie sheet and then spray on the Pam; I think of a girl I once knew named Pam and then slide the pan into the oven.

I've made it. Maybe it's a good thing that I had to search far and wide for the nuts. It's a good thing that they haven't been commercialized yet. They seem more, how shall I say, "lovable." And leave it to a Mexican grocery store to give me what I want at a very late hour. They're underdogs, like the Cubs.

And so hope springs eternal. I sit back, the nuts are in the oven, and I know I'm nuts. "Some people never go crazy, what truly horrible lives they must lead." I think that was Charles Bukowski.

My thoughts turn to Wrigley Field, the diehards, the nuts, the store Nuts on Clark across the street. And I'm thinking, Peanuts! Get your peanuts! The vendors' call. It's as much a part of my DNA as piñón picking in the forest is among Northern New Mexico locals.

I say to myself, "¡Piñónes! Get your piñónes, here!"

If the Cubs don't make the World Series, I can still pine for it while eating a few of them here in Santa Fe. There's always next year—to see what the season and the spring rains bring.

Santa Fe Reporter