you do not always have to pay to pick or collect food in melbourne. the other day, 12 of ian's friends drove 160km to venus bay to collect the lala shellfish, which is called pipi by the local people. they came back with about 24 litres of the shellfish. venus bay is about 2 hours' drive from melbourne, heading south-east along the south gippsland highway.
a current recreational fishing licence is required by people taking or attempting to take pipis. you can apply for it on the spot, from a machine. each person is permitted to collect no more than 2 litres of pipi in the shell or half a litre without shells. harvesters have to use only their hands and feet. no form of digging implement is to be used. the pipis collected should be for personal use or consumption. some anglers use the pipi as bait.
owing to the increased levels of harvesting by recreational pipi collectors in the venus bay area, it was necessary to put in place a reduced limit. it used to be 5 litres until 2009; now, it is down to 2 litres per person.
i was told that in the past, some people would go as a group in a van and they would end up loading the van with as many as 5000 pipis or 100 litres (20 x 5l) of pipis.
lala (pipi) can be cooked in a number of ways. you can stir fry it with ginger and garlic or fry it with chilli and tomato sauce. ian's friends prepared it in a simple way - by making ginger soup.
it is advisable to soak the lala in water for sometime (say, about 15 minutes) before cooking them or you may end up eating some sediments (sand). this is especially so if you have collected the lala yourself from the surf beach.
this reminds me of the time - i think it was in the early 70s - when i visited my friend in penang and he took me to batu ferringhi beach to dig for 'siput' on the beach. i wonder if there are still 'siput' to be harvested.
