Mario Di Biase loves to cook from the land. And the Great Kills resident, who owns Sottovoce Restaurant in Park Slope, regularly fishes New York waters and forages Staten Island’s parks to harvest the goodness indigenous to the region. He then brings the fresh haul home to play with it.

This past spring, he began a hunt for pawpaws, tropical-like fruits that taste like a creamy mango and grow wild in the borough. These drop from wispy trees in the Greenbelt and other woodsy areas, food stuffs of early fall on which Lewis and Clark ate when exploring the Northeast.