Lots of Love for Small Towns

There’s something to be said about living in a small town.  It’s been more than a couple of years since I’ve lived in a ‘wave to your neighbors’ town.  The last town I lived in, if someone waved at you, it meant ‘are you a hooker’?  Lord love Las Vegas I guess.  Someone has to. 
I live in a bitty town, big enough for a bar, that also pumps gas, and serves as the general store.  Suffice to say, it’s a popular place.  We have no post office, bank, or our own telephone exchange.  Cellular phones do not work.  And we like it that way.  I can’t take a walk down the street to my mailbox (that’s over a half mile away) without every car that passes stopping to make sure I don’t need a lift.  This may seem pretty Green Acres, but I assure you, there are rules.  Or at least, one major one.

I haven’t actually met any of my neighbors, but if on any street in the ‘town’ (I think it’s technically more of a hamlet) that has let’s say six or less cars passing on the hour, you are required by neighborly law to give a courtesy wave.  I enjoy the courtesy wave myself, so I don’t mind.  It’s kind of nerve-wracking at times though.  Through most of the winter, my concentration tends to be on getting to the main road (more than six cars an hour travel on it.  Sometimes.) alive.  It can get pretty slippery, and slushy, and icy and all three of the aforementioned at once, on a ‘paved’ road, that’s more potholes than pavement.  All this, in a rear wheel drive SUV.  (again we explore the amount of blond hair coloring was added to the purchase of said vehicle). 

The short version is, it’s difficult to get in or out.  Especially when another car is coming.  But, hot damn, if you forget the courtesy wave, you’ll have neighbors coming out of the woodwork to stare at your house like ‘what are those dirty scoundrels going to do next’ yet, if the courtesy wave is given, even in times of visible duress, the same neighbors may just show up with fresh cinnamon rolls, instead of a scowl.  So, you see, it is pretty important. 

The Winter Rodeo

In Montana, there seems to be two seasons; Winter, and Rodeo.  I’ve never been much into the Rodeo, although, I’m pretty sure that comes from hating clowns.  Which really makes me wonder why, as really, a generally widespread hatred, that people still dress up as clowns for Halloween.  Usually, it’s a parent, like their kids are going to protect them from being stupid.  They are genuinely surprised when they say “trick or …” and before they get ‘treat’ out, their treat is getting punched in the nose.

Anyway, I don’t know too much about the Rodeo, but I’m getting reacquainted with Winter.  Winter, to me, means a lot of things, but this time of year, it means dog sledding.  I’ll admit; I’m an Iditarod junkie.  Now mind you, I didn’t say expert, I said junkie.  Which I like to mean, ‘is very interested, if not so knowledgeable’.

I’ll start by saying that I’m allergic to dogs.  I would have no idea what to do if I were put on a dogsled and told to mush.  What I do know, is that Jeff King is equated as a god of the sport, Lance Mackey is the defending champion, many women run the race every year, and even a handful of them have won.  One, three times over.  I know that the great race was begun in 1973, and has gained popularity in the intervening years.  I know that three musher’s from my neighboring town of Seeley Lake, have qualified and are registered to compete.  And I know, that I couldn’t be more proud of them.

Dog sledding, you see, is a hugely demanding sport.  Anyone, can work out, and train, and play basketball, or baseball or football.  I consider those to be relatively coddled sports.  Sports, where you get a break to go to the locker room, get patched up, and get an inspiring pep talk to go out there in your cozy gymnasium or stadium, and play for nearly an hour.

If you are a musher, you are the one giving the pep talks.  You are the one that takes care of your team during blizzards, ice storms, and across snowmelts that can kill you before you can scream for help.  The only one that can save you, is you.  Well, and your dogs.  There isn’t a locker room, a trainer to patch you up, or an hour of play.  The record holding Iditarod time is 8 days, 22 hours, 46 minutes and 2 seconds, held by Mr. Martin Buser, in his 1992 win.  For nearly nine days, he fought the Alaskan wild, it’s weather, and came out with bragging rights for a year. 

That, my friends, is a sport.  It is the race.  It is more challenging than the Iron man, the tour de France, and most certainly, more exciting than the Rodeo.  In 33 days, it begins.

On The Menu Tonight

My favorite time of Winter is when seed catalogs begin pouring in.  Usually in late January, and early February, is the best time to curl up on the couch and dogear multiple pages of what the Spring will bring you.

I’ll admit, I’m the biggest garden junkie that doesn’t have a garden that exists.  Every year, I plan it out, fill out order forms, and never send them.  I always end up having to go back to work, meaning anything I plant would wither and die before I got home.  So, instead of luscious gardens, I have notebooks about them.  And what wonderful successes they will become on that one lucky Spring, when I get to stay at home.

Just thinking about it makes me a bit antsy, I’ll admit.  My seed catalogs haven’t yet found me at my new address, but I have faith that they are indeed coming.  It really makes me want to walk downstairs to my frigid kitchen, and warm it with dessert in the oven, and dinner in the crock-pot.

I tend to get really excited when the cooking urge hits me.  It’s something I really enjoy doing, and do in fact do every day.  It’s just different somehow, when I really feel the need to be mixing things together and making something that has the potential to be wonderful. 

Like my mother, I don’t usually measure anything or use recipes, I just make things up according to what I have in my cupboards at the time.  (I recently grew a window herb garden which vastly improves the meals in our home.  Everything’s better with a little taste of freshness to it.)  What I’m really getting at though, is when I explain what exactly I’m doing, it won’t be very conventional.  A handful of this, or a pinch of that, or what I think is a cup of something else in a pan.  Sorry I’m not more helpful, but, really, what’s life without a little variety. 

I like to start with dessert.  Really, who doesn’t?  I’m going to make a peach and huckleberry cobbler.  Which will be really easy, and gives me an excuse to turn the oven on.

Filling:

One Quart Jar of Peaches (That I hope you remembered to can last fall tsk tsk..)

Two handfuls of Huckleberries

¼ c. ish of sugar

1 teaspoon lemon juice
Topping:

3 Tablespoons Brown Sugar

2 Tablespoons softened butter (or margarine.  I’m old school, I like butter)

1 Tablespoon Cinnimon

1 teaspoon Cardamom (you don’t really need this, I just like it)

1 c. rolled oats
I prefer to heap the filling into an 8×8 greased baking pan (or any pan that is clean and at hand.  I just add or decrease filling size to match the pan). Mix up the topping in a separate bowl until the butter isn’t in chunks, more like the size of small peas, and put it on top of the filling.  I like to bake it at 350 degrees and I take it out when the fruit is bubbling a bit, and the topping is slightly brown and crispy.  Usually about 30 minutes, give or take quite a bit.  I live in a high elevation zone… it tends to wreak havoc on some people. 
For dinner I am going to slow cook a pork loin in the crock-pot, seeing as how the oven will be busy.   I tend to buy pork loins in bulk at Costco, so before I freeze it, I cut it into crock-pot size chunks.  Which obviously, will vary according to your slow cooker.  The real trick though, is what you cook it with.  I slice mine down the middle, and line it with a thin layer of apple butter.  I chop up an average size onion, and put half of it in the slit, and save half for the juices.  Use a few drops of lemon juice down the center, and then slice an apple (skinned or not, depends on your preference) and line the center as well.  I like to then, mince two cloves of garlic, and sauté it in a bit of butter, adding, about a tablespoon of basil and a few pinches of time and rosemary to the mixture.  Pour it over what is already in your split pork, and tie the whole thing up with kitchen string.  I like to use vegetable broth, or a bit of chicken broth (about a cup, or enough to fill an inch of your slow cooker) for the base.  You can just as easily use water, I just like chicken broth. [Editor's note: Apple cider maybe??]  Add the rest of the onion to it, and if you have it, a few sprigs of mint.  Fresh grind pepper over the entire mixture, put the lid on and cook.  How long, depends on how much meat you put in.  I usually cook until the apples and onions are tender, and make a test cut in the meat to make sure there isn’t any pink left.  (I haven’t died of E.coli yet).

      So, in a nutshell, there you have it, dinner with Kevin and Jess.  I’ll let you know how it turns out.
P.S.- don’t forget to make mashed potatoes, and your favorite vegetable.  Then you’ve got all the food groups in one fell swoop.