PORT ANGELES — To fire up two days of cooking demonstrations at the Dungeness Crab & Seafood Festival this weekend, host and master chef Arran Stark is serving one simple food.
At the hands of this man, the potato becomes a delicacy — and of course a vehicle for the crab salad his audience will get to sample along with it.
Stark will step onto the stage at The Gateway pavilion, First and Lincoln streets, to cook causa, a Peruvian potato dish.
Causa — “sustenance” in the indigenous Quechua language — will set the tone for the festival’s 12 cooking demos with other chefs from across the region.
All of the demonstrations are free, and all integrate seafood and produce from around the North Olympic Peninsula.
The 11th annual festival starts today with the Community Crab Feed, sponsored by Peninsula Daily News, in the main tent in the Red Lion Hotel parking lot at 221 N. Lincoln St. from 4 p.m. until 8:30 p.m.
Then it spreads out Saturday and Sunday onto the adjacent City Pier and to The Gateway pavilion, with art, food and drink vendors and a full plate of live music.
Admission to the demos and to the rest of the fest is free from 10 a.m. until 8:30 p.m. Saturday and from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. Sunday.
Here’s the schedule of chefs’ demos at The Gateway:
Saturday
■ Noon: Arran Stark of Port Townsend cooks Peruvian potato causa and fresh crab salad.
■ 1 p.m.: Seattle’s Becky Selengut, author of Good Fish: Sustainable Seafood Recipes from the Pacific Coast, serves cucumber-coconut soup with Dungeness crab salad.
■ 2 p.m.: Jess Owen of Ocean Crest Resort in Moclips offers the resort’s Dungeness crab cakes and the “Culinary Madman’s” Dungeness crab cocktail with stone-fruit sauce.
■ 3 p.m.: Les Chan from Victoria’s Chinatown demonstrates dim sum with crab.
■ 4 p.m.: Mona Stone presents pan-seared Alaska Weathervane scallops on puff pastry with mushroom marsala sauce.
■ 5 p.m.: Steve McNabb, new owner of Port Angeles’ Wine on the Waterfront, cooks empanadas filled with crab, cheese and roasted vegetables.
Sunday
■ 11 a.m.: Arran Stark returns with a surprise dish.
■ Noon: Michael McQuay of Port Angeles’ Kokopelli Grill cooks fresh, local, whole fried rockfish with a cilantro garlic fusion gastrique.
■ 1 p.m.: Bella Italia chef Dave Senters serves a Northwest shellfish risotto.
■ 2 p.m.: Garrett Schack of Victoria cooks savory Dungeness crab and summer squash doughnuts with spicy bacon aioli.
■ 3 p.m.: Xinh Dwelley of Xinh’s Clam and Oyster House in Shelton dishes up a mussel curry with rice plus a geoduck seviche.
■ 4 p.m.: Craig Alexander, executive chef at Port Angeles’ Red Lion, cooks a fried tofu appetizer and a saffron and Dungeness crab risotto.
Live music
All of the live music is free, starting this evening with the Soulshakers’ dance-friendly rock, rhythm and blues from 5:30 p.m. until 8:30 p.m. during the Community Crab Feed beside the Red Lion.
“You can expect to hear such songs as James Brown’s ‘Cold Sweat,’ Aretha Franklin’s ‘Chain of Fools,’ Tommy Castro’s ‘Right as Rain,’ plus songs from Koko Taylor, Howlin’ Wolf and Etta James,” promised Soulshakers guitarist Mike Pace.
The rest of the music lineup goes like this:
■ Saturday — 11 a.m., bluegrass with Luck of the Draw; 12:15 p.m., Americana with Farmstrong, featuring Jim Faddis and Cort Armstrong; 1:30 p.m., gypsy jazz with Pearl Django from Seattle; 2:45 p.m., country blues with Blue Rooster; 4 p.m., Pearl Django’s second set; 5:15 p.m., country originals with Buck Ellard; 6:30 p.m., classic rock with All About Me.
■ Sunday — 11 a.m., traditional songs with Blackbird; 12:15 p.m., bluegrass and country with the Old Sidekicks; 1:30 p.m., country rock with Haywire; 2:45 p.m., Brazilian and Caribbean jazz with Tanga; 4 p.m., gospel and folk with Standing on Shoulders.
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Features Editor Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5062, or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.
