The goose barnacle was considered
excellent eating by the Nuu-chah-nulth people. Although very common in
many places along the exposed outer coast line, this species was only
harvested at certain specific locations. It was scraped from the rocks
with a prying stick. According to Luke Swan and David Ellis's treatise
Teachings of the Tides,
"They go to the same place every time, so that the next ones that
grow up will be better."
These barnacles were considered to be at their best during the winter months. Considered too salty to eat raw, they were, on occasion, roasted beside a fire over alderwood coals, as some people liked the "smoky taste" this gave them. Usually, they were steamed briefly in a pit. Today they are briefly steamed or boiled in a pot. When cooked, the leathery skin that covers the stalk is torn free of the capitulum with the fingers, and pulled away. The edible insides, still attached to the capitulum, are then bitten off and eaten.
There was said to have been a different name for the pelagic goose barnacle, Lepas anatifera Linnaeus, which was often observed far offshore attached to logs, etc. It was not eaten.
