Vikings Win Despite Coach, I Eat Chili w/ Corn Fritters

It occurs to me that Coach Childress could not get a waitress from the dining room into the bar. Sad. Now we have to keep the coach.

A high point of game day was eating corn fritters as a side w/ chili. You can use your regular pancake recipe and add an extra egg and lots and lots of corn.

Sweet Potatoe Pancakes

When you have leftover squash or sweet potatoes, add them ( already mashed) to your pancake mixture. Adjust the consistency w/ the addition of some more milk, if necessary. You know how good butter and maple syrup are on pancakes? - they are even better on sweet potatoe pancakes.
Serve your leftover ham on the side, of course.

Naughty and Nice - Finnish Fish Soup

Another great cold weather soup is the Finnish version of fish soup - kala mojakka(sp) - that includes potatoes, carrots, onions, celery and fish in a milk broth, seasoned primarily w/ allspice. Gently boil the vegetables in water that becomes a wonderful broth until they are about done( 2o - 30 min), add milk or cream by 1 / 3 or 1 / 2, bring to simmer, and add fish portions ( 2 -3 inch)to poach for 5 minutes at the end. Ladle into bowls, strew fresh ground allspice over all, add a pat of butter to each, and serve w/ a rustic and/or whole grain bread. Fresh chopped parsley as garnish and flavor enhancer, too.

Simple, clean, healthy. An somewhat austere soup made auspicious and delicious by the generous addition of allspice.

My great Aunt Sofia would use whole black peppercorns and whole allspicecorns, which would sink to the bottom of the soup pot, and a whole northern pike including bones and head which produced a lusty barbaric flavor. She would suck on the tiny hard white inner eyeballs of the northern pike for hours, rolling them in her mouth like jaw breakers and her eyes would twinkle as she would tell stories, sometimes naughty.

Leftover Paella

I have an upcoming Christmas Dinner piece in the Compass Magazine ( of the Mille Lacs Messenger) about Paella - recipe, photos, etc... .

Leftover Pealla makes a rich and savory soup - simply add water/chicken broth and red pepper to taste and dunk w/ a rustic, crusty bread. Artisinal breads from Abbey Bakery or the New French Bakery are available locally - usually frozen if you are not in a bigger city - and are an excellent bake and serve product. Get some for the season - great for an appetizer base, too, sliced into rounds and toasted on a tray in the oven.

The ubiquitous cream of chicken wild rice soup is a bit more interesting w/ the addition of curry powder. Chef Glenn D'Amour of Izaty's a few yrs ago would do that. Best Chef they ever had there. Too bad Izaty's has gone the way it has.

A Great Date on the Coldest Day of The Year, with Snow

A bonus of frigid cold weather outside is frost patterns on the window. Snow drifts are like waves frozen in time. Beautiful.

Curried pork chops with peas and rice was a great supper during the blizzard last night. Hot and sweet, exotic. And simple. Season pork chops w/ salt, pepper, cayenne and garlic and brown in oil in frying pan, add heavy cream and a couple of teaspoons of curry powder ( or more to taste) and bake in the oven for about a half hour.

Have a date cake that you got at a church bake sale with plenty of softly whipped cream, for dessert.

Venison Chops Explained and a Simple Recipe

I made the many bean soup w/o meat, but when I eat it I garnish a bowl of it w/ a quarter inch dicing of liverwurst. Excellent.

Stay w/ the venison roast recipe( a couple of posts back) - it is great. When you make the marinade, shake it up in a jar or food processor it so it is all in one - an emulsion.I think the normally dry venison benefits greatly from the amount of oil in the recipe. Remember that you must keep the pan covered during roasting. Check it a couple of times to make sure that the liquid( marinade) is still liquid - add more marinade or water as necessary. Remember that you start the roast w/ a cup of the marinade. There should be liquid( au jus) in the pan to serve w/ the roast.

Venison chops - steaks from along and either side of the back bone correspond to ribeye( prime rib), t-bones, porterhouses, New York strips- and you should cook them accordingly. That means medium rare for me - venison steaks will definitely be dry if you over cook them. You can compensate somewhat for that by frying them in a pan( I use black cast iron) in vegetable oil and butter on medium heat - a little less heat than you would for beef steaks.

Definitely saute onions first till clear and soft( med low heat so they don't burn) and mushrooms( your choice, but recommended) half done and move the onions and mushrooms to the perimeter of your pan. Chops should be an inch to an inch and a half thick, seasoned w/ salt pepper and garlic. Turn heat up to medium. Add a little more oil and butter to the middle of the pan and place the chops in the middle of the pan, fry 3 or 4 minutes, turn over for about 3 more minutes - you can test for degree of doneness by cutting a small slit in the top of the steak - remember that they will keep cooking after you remove them from the heat to the serving platter so get them off the heat a little early.

A rule of thumb in professional kitchens is to remove steaks from heat when they are cooked a half step under how the steak was ordered. You can always cook a steak a little more if a guest requests it, but you can't cook it less.

Now for the good part. When you remove the steaks from the pan, turn up the heat to medium high, add( your choice here) a quarter cup of either cognac( brandy), red wine, or even water, and when it boils and reduces a little( 1 minute), add a couple pats of butter( cold preferably), swirl and stir and pour the sauce along w/ the onions and mushrooms over the steaks on the serving platter.

Have some good bread for dunking - you will all fight over the sauce on the platter.


Any decent red wine works - Cabernet( Bordeaux), Burgundy( Pinot Noir), Merlot, Shiraz, etc -you don't have to pay more than 10 bucks a bottle - drink the same wine that you cook with - Sutter Home or Mondavi are widely available even in stores up North and are about 7 or 8 bucks a bottle. Wine is cheap these days.

If you cook chops like this it's like a rekindled or new love affair w/ venison. Good luck.

Bread, soup, cookies on a cold day

When the wind is blowing cold from the NW and the snow is horizontal and the temperature is dropping it is a good day to bake bread and cook soup.

The bread is a hearty peasant style w/ white and whole wheat and rye flour and it is a many bean soup.

A venison roast is thawing and will rest in a marinade to be roasted tomorrow.

Cookies too. It is a good day to bake cookies. Chocolate chip w/ half whole wheat flour and hazelnuts.

Deer Tenderloins

If I would've thrown my steel thermos at the early buck 20 yds from my stand on opening morning and stunned him and then shot him, I would have gotten my buck. But I didn't, of course, and I didn't get him.

Others did, tho', and got does, and I just ate the best deer tenderloins I have ever eaten.

Onions cooked till translucent, mushrooms till soft, spread to the perimeter of the pan, and the 1/ 4 inch sliced tenderloins seasoned w/ salt, pepper, and garlic and sauteed to med rare, splashed w/ cognac, tossed, and finished w/ butter and served w/ a baguette and a cheap Pinot Noir( Mondavi or Sutter Home @ $6 or $7 a bottle ) can't be beat.

I will talk more of deer tenderloins tomorrow.

More Pre-eating - Cookies, this time

Cookies for the hunt.

Use the "vanishing oatmeal raisin cookie" recipe under the lid on the Quakers" Old Fashioned Oatmeal"lid, but add a cup of walnuts and a cup of dark chocolate chips. Use half whole wheat flour and replace sugar w/ honey and tablespoon or so of molasses to taste( it is ok to taste the cookie dough) if you want them really healthy and good tasting.

These cookies are like a meal in the woods/stand, as well as a real sweet treat. Stash enough for yourself so the other hunters don't short you. Of the many things I have learned while cooking on fishing and hunting trips is that your chums will not think of you while piling their plates full. Ya gotta keep enough for yourself. Some of those partners are bottomless when it comes to food and appetite.

The cookies will qualify as pre-eating too, because you will want to practise on a batch and then you will eat them. Start soon.

Pre- Eating for Deer Season

You know how "pre-fishing" before a fishing tournament makes sense and that scouting the woods and fields and fixing your deer stand before season and sighting in your rifle and stuff(pre-hunting) also makes sense, well then wouldn't it also make sense to pre-eat some deer season food before season?

Like scrambled eggs with chili and cheese on top and toast. Just had it and thought what a great breakfast or brunch on deer openers. Many of us plan on chili at camp anyways. This makes it a two-fer - another great chili meal that ain't just chili.

Pre-eat the last of your venison from last season too, and you'll be tuned up for this one.

Pre-fishing. Pre-hunting. Pre-eating. They all make sense.

On The Sunny Side of The Street

Wild Alaskan Kings have intruded in a good way like an unexpected yesterday( sunny, 60 degrees). Slow roasted in a cast iron pan, seasoned w/ dill and parsley and sage and butter and cooked to medium, this salmon ( a gift from School Principal Dennis of Onamia, caught by his own hand) was clean tasting, deep red, luscious with therapeutic oils that have apparently healed a recently aching hip joint, redolent of swift water, fresh, and the salty sea.

Overnight, no less. Will I walk as the King swims? Perhaps. What I do know is that I will eat more. Dennis?

If you are lucky enough to have leftover salmon, stir some maple syrup into mustard, douse your salmon, and eat it on rye krisp for breakfast, along w/ cottage cheese and a glass of apple juice. There is a little curry flavor in yellow mustard due to the turmeric, which is what gives it the yellow color. I used Plochman's mustard. $ 1.09 at the store.

I will be doing some deer tenderloin recipes for Outdoor News, which is traditionally the first eaten meat of the deer at deer camp. Onions, mushrooms, and the valuable medallions simply sauteed w/ salt, pepper and garlic and finished off w/ a splash of brandy. Done medium rare and served on toast. Or a stroganoff( medium rare, also) served over noodles. Others, too, I'll let you know.

And remember. You gotta get a deer to eat a deer.

Stir Fly

I taught an Asian Cooking class last night at Onamia High School on the behest of Onamia Community Education.

For starters I did a "mother sauce" for stir fry with chicken broth and plenty of garlic and ginger - thickened w/ cornstarch and water. It works for chow mein, too. It is called a mother sauce because it is adaptable to many different dishes - add crushed red pepper( and catsup!), and or Thai chili sauce to get a spicy Thai stir fry, more garlic to do garlic chicken and broccoli, fish or oyster sauce for others and so on.

We did a curry, too, w/ heavy cream and carmelized onions and chicken( and curry powder, of course), lime juice and cilantro that was excellent. A guest at the class said she made a similar curry utilizing grouse and coconut milk and it was great. Good idea. Pheasant would be exceptional.

In the past as an appetizer I have sautee'd bite sized pheasant portions and glazed/finished them off w/ a sweet hot Thai chili sauce. It is like eating candy it is so good.

Missed Again!

You can't eat a deer if you don't get him.

Thirty years ago or more I was sneaking and peeking for deer in a soft late season snow; heavy, wet flakes the size of miniature poodles adhered to every branch of the alders, dogwoods, and conifers. Visibility was about 10 feet.

It was a fairytail land of silence. I was approaching a stand of balsam and as I stepped into a bouquet of small ones a tree exploded with white. It was a doe busting loose just 10 feet from me, maybe 8. It was too close to shoulder my rifle( 30-30 lever action Winchester), so I negotiated a quick hip shot and in the blink of an eye the deer was past me and gone, though not before I fenced forward with the rifle barrel and stabbed her in the ribs w/ the muzzle.

I had been unable to lever out my spent shell because the rifle was down at hip level so I could not shoot my 2nd shot. All that remained was a few deer hairs stuck to the end of the barrel.

A short time later, after I had crossed the 40 acre field to the farmhouse, Clifford looked at me sideways as I told him the story.

It wasn't the only time over the years that I have missed a deer. When you miss one, you don't have one to eat. The photo is of a roast of another deer in another year.

Late Season Shore Lunch

I am going to keep writing about venison but today will be an interlude because yesterday while on the patio I saw sunnies and bass( largemouth) in the shallows.

There is only one reason that fish would be in the shallows this time of the year. They were feeding. Fishing it was, then, and we caught 4 northerns and 4 bass in 1 hr and had a great late season shore lunch for supper. Traditional in the sense of fried potatoes and baked beans, but we also had corn fritters with chives and jalapenos.

I floured and panfried the fish and finished it off with white wine, tarragon, parsley and butter.Exceptional.

Back to venison tomorrow.

Waxing and Waning

I did a venison roast recipe for Outdoor News which should be in this wk's issue. It involved a marinade w/ nearly equal amts of soy sauce and red wine and even more oil, plus the usual suspects of garlic and bay leaf and pepper and w/ the surprising addition( to me) of lemon juice. A 24 hr marinade.

I think the wine and lemon juice function as tenderizers. I found the recipe in the old farmhouse cupboard of my Great Aunt Sophia. She was a great cook. I got it shortly before dementia encouraged the removal of Clifford, her son and a mentor of mine, from his birthplace and lifelong home in Gowan near Floodwood.

A lifetime of fishing and hunting memories remain. Food too. Clifford had an easygoing facility in the kitchen and the smokehouse. He made the best venison I ever ate. His traditional first meals of the fresh shot deer were a neck roast and the ribs, which many of us discard as inedible because of the many inseparable layers of meat and tallow. He would chase the waxy ribs w/ real hot coffee to dissolve the wax and make it palatable. It works.

Ivan and Mule Deer

My daughter rides horse at Rolling Hills Arabians on the west side of Mille Lacs. Ruth does the horses. Ivan is the fishing guide( Ivan's Guide Service). He's quite a Ivan - if you fish w/ Ivan, you know that you've fished w/ Ivan. And you would have caught fish( walleyes) even in this tough season on Mille Lacs.

He just got back from Colorado and he fried up a snack of fresh ground mule deer seasoned simply w/ a seasoning salt. Excellent. Not a bit of wild taste.

We each got a bowl and sat at the table and ate the meat as we visited while the girls were riding horse. A beautiful late summer's eve.

If They Are So Smart, Why Were They So Dumb

I think more than a few have lost their appetite on Wall Street recently. Talk about choking on a donut.
Credit default swaps. You now own them( as a taxpayer), thanks to AIG. Do you know what they are?
If they were food on a plate you wouldn't eat them.

Bear Too

Why will a lot of rural America be voting for McCain/Palin? Moose stew.
Twice this wk while at work( bar and restaurant), I got to see a dead bear in a pickup truck, one shot by a 13 yr old boy, his first; the other by a 74 yr old guy, his 13th.

Rural America does this( hunts) and you don't have to punch out on a timeclock to check out a local trophy out front. We honor braggin rights. I know both people. That's rural America, which is probably half the country.

Bear stew, too. Could you see Biden eating bear stew?or Obama?

After a Long Day on The Trail

Like an independent voter, I changed my mind and added bacon to the moose stew( check yesterday's post). I also called it a ragout, a French word which derives from another French word which means, " to stimulate the appetite." A ragout is a "thick, rich, well seasoned stew of meat and sometimes vegetables" according to the Food Lover's Companion. That fits the bill.

And consider: moose( venison) stew just might end up on the new White House menu. Perfect after a long day on the ( campain) trail. Here's a photo of it served as a change-up over mashed potatoes.

An American Original

Moose meat stew and Sara Palin - each an American original.

I would like to get Sara's recipe, but in the absence of that, I would suggest that you make it like a beef stew w/ the substitution of any kind of venison for the beef.

Like Sara, we are shooting this game ourselves. Depending on where you get it, venison is likely to be somewhat to completely organic - it may be feeding in grain fields that are not organic - but those up north in Mn in the woods are certainly pure. That is a real plus these days.

Season the meat w/ salt, pepper and garlic(granulated), and brown in oil along w/ plenty of onions till those onions are carmelized( light brown and sweet), add flour( this will thicken the stew) and stir and scrape, deglaze the pan w/ red wine, cover w/ water, add bouillon or beef base, bayleaf and allspice, simmer for an hr or until meat is half tender, then add carrots and celery and simmer till they are tender. Add water throughout as necessary, stirring occasionally.

Serve over mashed potatoes.

Cooler Weather Food

This photo is of grilled sausages, beans w/ onions and jalapenos, and corn fritters on my table very close to the lake. Oh, and a beer( perhaps a Heineken).

The corn fritter recipe was adapted from Craig Clairborne's Book of Southern Cooking. If you are getting more sweet corn than you can eat, slice it off the cob, bag, and freeze so you can be making these corn fritters throughout the fall hunting season. A perfect accompaniment to all the gamebirds you will shoot or acquire from lucky and generous friends.

In the meantime keep the weber fired( w/ real wood) and keep the sausages grilling.

Tomatoes and Real Eggs

A lot, I mean a lot of tomatoes from the garden and they are so fresh and delicious that you don't have to do much with them.

So I tried them w/ real eggs, the farm fresh from a neighbor kind, and I cracked two shells and each were twins( wow, I'm a twin), and it has been years since I've had a real farm fresh egg and holy cow they are orange and firm and taste like eggs are supposed to taste like.

Jalapeno peppers from the garden sauteed till soft in olive oil, and tomatoes likewise just sauteed hot with the eggs stirred in ( garlic, too, of course, and salt and black pepper to taste) and wow that is a meal. Just add toast.

Never had black truffles from France but would love to have them w/ eggs, too.

Homemade v-8 juice coming up.

More Tomatoes

First I'd like to correct my misspelling of the Russian literary giant to Solzhenitsyn with the syn at the end. I did read a remembrance of him in the NYT which indicated that he ate only roasted onions and potatoes even as a Vermonter. Not too bad if they are seasoned properly w/ salt pepper and garlic, and herbs like sage and parsley, or herbs de Provence, along w/ the addition of carrots. Peasant food at it's best if you include butter and rustic bread. Meat occasionally, too.

Ideas for fresh garden tomatoes:

Tomatoes simply sliced and salted and eaten with cottage cheese on the side are exquisite. Bruschetta is another w/ the tomatoes lightly salted w/ garlic and basil. Cut the fresh tomatoes gently with a very sharp knife.
A slice of tomato w/some good artisinal blue cheese on top.
Any variety of salsas.
Guacomole w/ extra tomatoes incorporated.
Tomato basil pizza.
Sliced tomatoes peppered and drizzled w/ olive oil.
Tomato and fresh fruit salsa.
Tomato and watermelon together w/ fresh mint.
The world's best BLT. Along w/ a rootbeer float.
Grilled.

Tomatoes

It is good to be eating ripe red tomatoes directly from the garden.

A Voice in the Wilderness

I read today that Alexander Solzhenitzen( sp) has died at 89 yrs of age. Yrs ago I read most of his books. I remember when he was exiled from Russia and lived in Vermont. He was pretty much dismissed as irrelevent from those yrs forward as he expressed his Christian faith and his disdain for the west and it's moral and spiritual decay. The West had looked upon him as a great writer( honored him w/ the Nobel) and as one of great personal courage, a hero throughout his yrs in the Soviet Union. But then he got here and he did not say what we wanted and expected him to say, you know, laud the west, criticise the east. He retained a great love for his native Russia, and did return and live there for his remaining 10 or 15 yrs.
When one becomes a voice in the wilderness, as he did, I think we should listen. His food writing was limited to the bread and soup that kept him alive in yrs of imprisonment in the Gulag. The struggle and triumph of the human spirit, individually and collectively, was his terrain.

Garden's Harvest Begins

This was the first year in a few that I have put in a garden. Three tomato plants, early variety and an heirloom German of some sort. About a hundred green ones now and three that are showing red. Hurrah. Eight bell and hot pepper( jalapeno and habenero)plants that I am harvesting already. I will freeze the hot peppers whole and dice the bells and freeze, and I will make some salsa either to can or freeze, and can whole tomatoes. I have never canned, so it will be interesting.

I don't like paying pepper prices thru fall/winter/spring and no longer want to risk being poisoned by mass produced and distributed fresh off season produce. Keeping it local. Planning also to take advantage of the late summer harvest of others' gardens to lay in alot for the winter. Potatoes, onions, carrots, squashes.

If all goes as planned I will have plenty of local healthgiving food for the winter. Fish too, and game this fall to harvest and store. I will be providing recipes and ideas as I proceed.

Anybody else doing more of this kind of stuff this yr?

Summer Grilling

A great marinade/basting sauce for almost everything grilled but beef is balsamic vinegar, orange marmalade( or orange juice concentrate), jalapeno peppers, and plenty of garlic. You could add cilantro and lime juice as well. Make it as sweet and hot as you wish. I used some very hot whole pickled jalapenos - La Morena brand from Mexico( spiced and pickled).

Imagine it on chicken or shrimp or pork cooked on a wood fired weber and have a beer like a Blue Moon Belgian Style Ale w/ it. A little bitter, a little sweet, along w/ the heat.

The St Croix Open

Just back from the exceptional Lake St Croix in NW Wisconsin - headwaters of the Brule and the St Croix Rivers.
Exceptional eating was involved as well. Pizzas and Porterhouses off the grill, a cuban style paella w/ black beans and rice, onions, bell and jalapeno peppers, grape tomatoes cut in half ( sweet and luscious), cilantro, plenty of garlic, and lime juice( v-8 juice, too) - w/ largemouth bass, a crappie, and a walleye poached in the bouillabaisse like liquid. We served the rice on the side, so it wasn't really a paella.

I picked a quart of wild blueberries up there too, and today made a galette( a rustic free form tart - a lazy cook's fast pie) which was sweet and tart w/ lime juice and sugar and cinnamon. It's almost gone and it's just me.

Sink your putts.

Better Not Bigger

Bigger is not always better when it comes to fish and game. The young and the small of the species are usually the best eating.

It's a twofer when it comes to fishing. You get to catch your trophy fish and let them go, and you get to catch and keep the little ones to eat.

Not so with hunting big game. You have to decide, usually ahead of time, if you are meat hunting or trophy hunting. Ten points or bigger, though, and ego wins out. It's the hunter /warrior part of our past.

A rainy day after a few perfect sunny summer days is a good day to make soup. I got a 16 bean soup mix, just the legumes - don't buy the kind w/ the seasonings included because they cost more than twice as much - and added chicken base, garlic, bay leaf, crushed red pepper, gently boiled for an hour and a half , and added tomatoes, carrots, onions, and celery and cooked for another hour. Add bratwurst or Italian sausage or chicken( already cooked - we are using leftovers from supper for this) for the last 15 minutes. Just before serving add fresh herbs like parsley( for sure)and thyme or sage or basil. and probably more garlic. It has great depth of flavor and nutrition which is to say it tastes good and is good for you. Love those legumes. Most soup bases generally have a lot of salt, so don't add salt of your own.

A Small Matter of Life and Death

It's green to be green and to buy local and it doesn't get any more local than your own garden. It is also politically correct, which usually turns me off. But, beyond that, in light of the recent and ongoing poison tomato/pepper scare, the previous spinach one, and the numerous ground beef recalls , it has become a matter of life and death.

Grow your own or get it from local growers - friends, neighbors, farmer's markets, co-operatives. Those of us in rural Mn do have a real advantage. Turns out that bigger isn't better, huh, just like the hippies were proclaiming back in their day. Off season will be the challenge. My new small garden of this yr will certainly be bigger next yr.

Catching, shooting and growing works for me. How about you?

Shore Lunch Continued - The French Way

This is more of the shore lunch - sweet corn, spinach sauteed in olive oil w/ plenty of garlic, and baked beans w/ jalapeno peppers.

My kids just love the sauce of the fish - scatter fresh ( or dried as necessary)herbs( chopped parsley and tarragon) over fish for the last minute of cooking. Remove fully cooked and browned fillets from your frying pan and plate. Pour excess oil out of pan - don't scrape, as all the stuff( debris) left and stuck in the pan impart flavor to your sauce. Add a cup of white wine( chablis, sauvignon blanc, pinot blanc, chardonnay - any dry white) to the pan, strew lots more fresh herbs, reduce by half, and stir in 3 or 4 pats of cold butter. Remove pan from heat and swirl pan until butter is melted, and then pour over fish.

Shore Lunch

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Not always, but I am going to start including photos in this blog.

This is pan fried largemouth bass that had been simply floured and fried in olive or vegetable oil, which was then finished off w/white wine, parsley, tarragon and butter. Do not shy away from bass - wonderful eating even in walleye country - it has a clean depth and a just this side of mild mushroom flavor - try it also w/ wine and sage and garlic. Not fishy at all as walleye can sometimes be. I think that the bad rap on bass came from muddy lakes in the south. They are exceptional when prepared fresh from our clean and cold Mn waters.

Buffalo, Dark Chocolate, and a Gathering of Loons

Buffalo,... dark chocolate are laden w/ umami, I think.

There was a gathering of loons on Platte this morning - 8 or so in the center of the lake and then they all flew off in pairs in separate directions, singing. Now that the little ones are nearly half size and are adept at swimming and diving, did the mom and dads get together for a little party, to catch up on news, to just hang out? It was brief and then back home I think for each of them.

The single loon family that I've watched this summer includes 2 little ones. Mom and dad are feeding them minnows out front this morning. Mom is a little smaller and seems to be the better minnow catcher.

Science Catches up With What We Already Knew

For a hundred years we/ve been told by food scientists that we taste only sweet, sour, salty and bitter. For thousands of years before that we knew that we tasted more than just those those four. How do you fit an herb into one of those categories? Or bacon, or coffee? Or a pork roast ( Boston Butt) on a cold winter's eve after you've been out in it ? Or ripe real tomatoes simmering on the stovetop? A good cognac,or a complex red wine, or various teas? Eggplant? Almost anything fried in butter, like fish finished off with wine, parsley and tarragon?

Maybe it is partly semantics. Smell and taste combined make flavor. We have known that forever. We sniff and breathe deeply thru our nose, taking it all in. We swoon to aroma. The Japanese have long added a fifth taste - that called umami, which is a savory meaty taste, that adds richness and depth and completeness to taste. Msg is the artificial version of it. That works. It really works.

Food scientists, acording to an article in this month's Gourmet Magazine, have recently discovered, as a spinoff of the human genome project, that we have about 40 taste receptors located everywhere in the mouth. Yes, finally. Also that we have about 300 olfactory( smelling) receptors. If you do the math you will now discover almost limitless combinations of taste and smell, hence flavors. Chefs, of course, and grandma, and many more of us have already known that.

It's like, duh.

New York City

Apparently an elderberry liquer is all the rage at swanky hotel bars in NYC. It is icluded in specialty drinks( tinis, etc) at $16 a pop. Beers are $12. That's ok, says a writer for the NYT, just pretend that you got two. If you're from Mille Lacs & area, you'd have to pretend that you got four, which is a stretch. Happy 5th. Have a good picnic.

Homemade Schnapps

I've recently made schnapps from Tina Nordstrom's recipe. A teaspoon and a half of sugar for a fifth of vodka( Absolut, of course, as I'm still working a Swedish theme - Midsommarsdag), and a half dozen long sprigs of fresh garden mint - mine is a chocolate mint - got it at the farmers mkt in Brainerd- a chocolate and mint aroma, but no chocolate taste. Add the sugar and mint to the vodka and put it in the fridge for a day. It is so good and mellow that you can sip it instead of doing it as a shot.
It is really good as a side w/ the Summit Summer Sampler 12 pack. Especially good on the patio on the lake on a hot summer day( finally). Salud.

Inside Outdoor Food

Periodically I remind readers that tho' I have a special focus on what is usually thought of as "outdoor food" - fish and game - all food is really outdoor food. Or used to be. You rarely see a chicken or a pig outdoors these days - a golden plump chicken barn holds fifty thousand or more indoors. I don't know how many hogs a hog barn holds, but I do know that I smell them and never see them as I drive down farm country roads.

Which is why I write about any food that I want to write about. Also, every food or recipe has a history and/or a story that goes w/ it. Food in the context of life lived, so to speak. Tina Nordstrom, for example, whom I have recently written about, in her New Scandinavian Cooking series on PBS, does all of her cooking outdoors - she has a nifty portable cooking range unit that she sets up outdoors at each unique location in Sweden. And then she goes to work. Even in winter. A Svenska Flicka indeed. Gotta love her.

Tip the cook.

You Get What You Give

Hey - If you ever get to a restaurant after their posted closing time, and if the cook(s) via the waitress says yes we will serve you -( it is the kitchen/cooks decision even if it is a few minutes after closing time), for cooks sake, tip the cook(s). Ask how many are on the "line" and send them at least 5 bucks a piece - a pack of smokes or a beer after work means a lot to a cook. And guess what? - duh - the food will arrive faster and it will be better. Send beers to the kitchen too, if the restaurant allows it. Wouldn't you like that towards the end of a long hot hard shift at work? Generally, also, they don't make a living wage.
In other words, honor the cook's generosity with a generosity of your own. Tip the waitress accordingly, too, at least 15%, probably 20% or 25% if it is after hours.

Ale and Maple Butter Redux

Favorite foods at Midsommarsdag on Upper St Croix Lake in NW Wisconsin included some Tina Nordstrom( of the PBS cooking series) recipes, one for gravlax, which included concentrated elderberry juice as well as the usual salt, pepper, sugar, and plenty of dill with a 2 - 4 hr marinating time which is much shorter than the usual 24 - 48 hr cure. It is like Swedish sushi. Tina's recipes are available online - google her.

Strawberry cake was another if you like your sweets. A layered cake w/ custard and cumulus clouds of whipped cream, and strawberries, of course. Wonnerful, wonnerful as Ed Sullivan( remember?) would say.

Tina's Swedish meatballs were plain Jane w/ nary a spice - we watched a few videos of her series - but hostess and cousin Beth used the Ingebritsons( sp) meatball mixture, which includes allspice. Browned in butter is traditional and that may account for the satisfyingly richness of the famous round ones. I am going to check out Beatrice Ojakangas' recipe. Texture is most important in a meatball of any type. Beth's were dead on.

Maple butter by a Duluth area maple syrup maker friend of Beth's was exceptional on pancakes doubled up w/ pure maple syrup. Maple butter is an in between stage just after maple honey and before maple sugar. If you could ever buy it, it would be very expensive but worth it. I have never seen it in a store. Thank God for friends, huh.

Nils Oscar craft ales from Sweden are everything an ale should be - deep, rich, nutty, balanced, clean (and expensive) at $4.85 a bottle( found in Mpls in Burnsville?), but worth it for once a year. Lake Superior Ale is in the same league and is affordable, but not widely available outside of the Duluth area.Perfect ale, really.

High Noon w/ Loons and an Eagle

Ale and maple butter has been trumped by a wild life drama on the lake today. There was a raucous calling of loons and as I looked up to see what was the matter an eagle hit the water with talons outstretched and rose up and flew off to the island. Mom and dad loon were calling wildly. Neither of the 2 baby loons were visible. It all happened so fast. As we came to the realization of what had occurred, my daughter and I were both saying oh no oh no he got a baby loon and my daughter was beginning to cry. We had been watching and enjoying the loons for a couple of weeks, first w/ one baby, then a week later w/ two. We were heartbroken and expressing outrage at the eagle, when suddenly 2 baby loons popped up like rubber duckies in a tub. Hurray we both shouted, they made it they made it. Mom and dad had had them dive( how?) and had swam away from them in a decoy maneuver. It had worked. We were amazed. The eagle returned, circling on high over the loons. Raucous calling resumed, but after a couple of circles the eagle gave up and left. Wow. A perfectly scripted drama w/ a happy ending. Gotta love it.

I will get back to the food.

Ale and Maple Butter and More

This one wouldn't publish, so I will do it later.

Midsommarsdag Fest

I will be in NW Wisconsin this wk end for a Midsommarsdag Fest. There will be lots of great food of Scandinavian origin. I look forward mostly to breads and crackers and cheeses and gravlax and Swedish meatballs and fresh berries and rice pudding. Allspice, nutmeg, caraway, and dill will be the predominant flavorings.
Various cookies like almond and a delicate little lavender one are favorites.
I hope my black lab pup( 9 mo's) doesn't cause a ruckus. She will eat well, too.
And thank God there will not be lutefisk. This is fresh fish time of the year.
I will report back on favorites and include a couple of recipes.

Nice to See Your Back, Depending on Who You Are

It could appropriately be said that I have been gone fishing for the last two wks. I'll leave it at that.
Being w/o internet service or email for 2 wks is like being up so and so creek w/o a paddle. Or like being lost in the woods w/o a compass or a match. Almost. I ate well. I'll tell you about it over time.

In the downtime you could have read some of my stuff in the Mille Lacs Messenger and Compass magazine and in Outdoor News.

There is nothing like fishing way up North in Canada w/ your lifelong buddies - you knew their Moms and Dads and dead brothers. You know why one washes his feet in an icy Canadian Lake at 7 in the morning( it has to do w/ his mom), why another walks on tiptoes, and another drinks and is sad, while another drinks and is happy and so on. Why some are fat and some are not( it has to do w/ what they eat) and I love them all just as they are. There is plenty of joy and laughter and plenty of good food and so much more.

It is good to be back, too.

He Didn't Hunt( or Fish) But He Shore Could Cook - Claiborne

If the "sides" are really good it doesn't really matter if you catch any bass. As long as someone else does.

Craig Clairborne, legendary New York Times food critic( 50's and 60's mostly) and food writer wrote a hilarious piece about foxhunting for Gourmet Magazine in 1955. He was a city boy, and believed that hunting, as Oscar Wilde said, was "the unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable." Though he may have felt the same about fishing, he knew what to do with the game after the kill. Many of us( outdoorsman and women) feel the same way, that " no hunger on earth is so keen or so long in being satisfied as that which follows are hard hunt( or fish), 'on a cold day, when the 4 winds of heaven have whipped color and health into every fiber of one's being'."

Pork and beans or baked beans are usual accompaniments to the fried potatoes in a traditional shore lunch. Add onions and jalapenos to the beans( saute' the onions first, add peppers, then beans) for a sweet and hot treat. Add onions, bell peppers and mushrooms( any) to the potatoes.

Red or black or pinto beans and rice are less traditional, but a great side to your fried fish. Spicy, of course. Use one of the mixes that are commonly available at the supermarket, if you want to make it easy and save time. I always add more cayenne and garlic and any fresh herbs that I have growing this time of the year, like chives, parsley, or cilantro. ( Do that w/ the potatoes, too, sage if you have it).

Corn fritters add a whole new dimension to the meal. They are really simple to make - kind of like a corn pancake. Make them from scratch w/ 2 cups of corn, 2 eggs, 1 /3 cup milk, 6 tablespoons flour, salt and pepper, according to Claiborne in his book Southern Cooking. I added corn meal, (3 tablespoons), and a tablespoon of baking soda, and a little more milk to the recipe. Drop by large spoonfuls into oil in a frying pan - a little more oil than you would use for pancakes. Serve on the side w/ honey. They are excellent, and really complete a shore lunch. Some may like them better than the fish.

Bass Opener

Bass opener today.

The really great thing about largemouth bass ( after the plan, the strategy, the ambush, the strike, the fight, the landing) is that in Mn most of these bass are coming out of clean ( not muddy) lakes and they taste accordingly.

The flavor is redolent of a mild white mushroom, with a depth and richness that is more than walleye. Walleye, of course, gets all the hype, and yes they are excellent. Bass has more of an ocean fish flavor ( think mahi), and it can stand up to a much greater variety of preparations. Nor does it have the tendency towards fishyness that walleye does.

I will make some recommendations later for preparation later because right now I am going fishing. Will I climb the ladder on bass like the other day? I doubt it - that is rare - but I do look forward to truly fresh fish.

A Simple Recipe and a Not So Simple Recipe

You can believe me when I say I climbed the ladder on fish last night at dusk - 1 lb, 2 lb, 3 lb, 4 lb caught sequentially on a little shad rap. Did we eat them floured and sauteed and finished off w/ wine and tarragon and butter?

Nope. They were bass. Largemouth. The biggest fought like a young lab. I was hoping I had found walleye.

Speaking of walleye. And Mille Lacs. And the netting controversy. And Steve Fellegy writing his final column because he disagees w/ The Mille Lacs Messenger's reportage and editorial stance on the "gathering rights" issue. Steve claims that our government has granted the Indians "unequal rights based on skin color and ethnic origin" alone. The decision was not based only on skin color and ethnic origin. The mirror that Steve writes of also reflects history,and treaty, and law, and politics and money, and fish,and mammals,and trees,lakes, prairie, and lawyers and lives and deaths, and so much more. If it were only that simple.... If it were only that simple.....well, then.... Iraq would be that simple too. Nothing ever is. Except for some food recipes. Thank God for that.

Roast Buffalo and Rhubarb Pie

Rarely has there been a better marriage than that of last night with a buffalo chuck roast and roasted onions and potatoes and carrots. I got the buffalo from a Pequot Lakes area grower while at the Growers Mkt in Brainerd. Leaner and sweeter than beef and surprisingly(?) tender. I seasoned the 2 lb roast w/ only salt, pepper and garlic( and water) and cooked it for 3 hours.

I hadn't eaten buffalo for many years ( late 70's), not since as the chef at a restaurant just outside of Spearfish SD( The Sluice), where we served buffalo prime rib, T bones and inside round roasts. Excellent meat w/ a richness and depth of flavor beyond beef. It's as if it has more naturally occurring msg than beef does.

Also, the first garden produce of the year ( first pick rhubarb from my yard ) as a rhubarb galette - a rustic open faced tart or pie - which I did w/ sugar, cinnamon, and lemon juice and a dough made with oil( healthy) and water and salt and sugar. Hot, with vanilla ice cream. Sometimes I use oil when I make cookies, too, so I can eat a lot of them w/o dying or feeling guilty.

Save Money on Shore Lunch

" Shore Lunch" breading and batter mixes that are sold in super markets and at Reed's on Mille Lacs are merely seasoned flour with the addition of paprika( for color - so your fish gets golden), and salt, pepper, garlic, onion powder and a couple of chemicals that are probably unnecessary.

Do the math.

The Mr Walleye brand at Reed's yesterday was priced at $2.29 for a 9 oz package. Flour is about $3.00 for a 5 lb bag. Therefore it costs nearly 10 times as much to use one of those shore lunch mixes.

Reed's Sports on Mille Lacs

So I went to the new Reed's Family Outdoor Outfitters store today on Mille Lacs, and since they have everything you would ever need to do anything outdoors, especially fish, I could not resist a parting question regarding fly rods. " Do you have any?" I asked. "Nope." I got em on that one.

I know it's not trout country around here, but it sure is a great and efficient way to catch panfish in any of our area lakes. Bass too. You get right in there w/ the fish and you don't have to keep baiting your hook. Dock, boat, or shore. If you haven't done it, it's a whole new way of fishing and it will really get you thinking.

Fly fishing is really a primitive cave man style of fishing. A stick and a line with an imitation bug on the end. You cast the line rather than the lure or the bait. A real bug works, too.

Re-invented Shore Lunch

Insead of the usual shore lunch of fried fish and fried potatoes and Campbells pork and beans, try it w/ beans and rice. First saute' onions and bell peppers in oil w/ lots of garlic and cilantro and either a jalapeno pepper or cayenne pepper( half tspoon for a can of beans), simmer till the onions are caramelized and peppers are soft, then add red or pinto beans( chili beans in sauce) and get hot.

Do rice in a separate pan - if you can find it, use Basmati rice - aged rice from India. It looks like regular white rice until you cook it, and then it transforms into long curly rice that has full rice flavor with a little tang to it. The beans will be quite spicy - serve them on the side so your guests can add appropriate amounts to the rice. Spoon the bean sauce onto the fried fish,too, and by God you know you are eating when you are eating this. Good for you too the garlic and peppers and beans.

It was a good idea to reserve some frozen fish from last fall, so we could feast accordingly on opener.

Fishing Opener

When the poet Charles Simic was asked what advice he would give to people who wanted to be happy, he said," for starters, learn how to cook." Well said.

On this "day before the day"( Fishing Openers Eve), learning how to fish would not be a bad idea, either.

(Have you ever attempted to teach an adult who has never fished how to fish? Have you ever seen such awkward handling of a rod and reel? All the more reason to teach them as kids.)

" With a buddy in his rain rain gear and me in my boat, we'd just settled in for a long day's float..."

The Family Cookbook

Lois' daughter, Marilyn Hayes put together a 566 page archival family cookbook not so long ago and I have a copy. It also includes a family history/tree, tho' 426 pages are of food and recipes, and often the story that goes along w/ the recipe.

Beatrice Ojakangas, the James Beard cookbook award winning Mn cookbook writer( The Great Scandinavian Baking Book; The Cooking of Finland, and 23 or more others), recommends that we all compile a family cookbook. It of course should include all the food recipes, but also the family histories and stories that accompany our daily bread.And photos. A great legacy and treasure for any family and future generations.

A three ring binder is sufficient. Copies can be made for all family members. The recipes do not have to be your own - but ones the family and friends have used.

It does not have to be 566 pages long, either.

"Well Done Good and Faithful Servant"

Good hard work and great faith and a very big heart - a lover and a giver in Jesus' name - Lois Hayes died yesterday after a lifetime of service in His name. Service to family,to friends, and to church.

She was so angry with me once during tough times( not so long ago, either) when we had no food, and we had not told her. " Don't you ever do that again " she said, angry, and pointing her finger in my face. " If you are hungry you tell me. I want you to promise that," she said, and then she filled our cupboards to overflowing, the fridge and freezer too, and it was enough food for a month.

She did not do anything halfway, and she did it all. Courage, strength, faith, and the will to live life to it's fullest and to encourage others to as well. Full with life and joy.

Words from scripture come to mind - "Well done good and faithful servant." She is now at the greatest reunion of all - with her Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, her husband Rex, those in her family who died in faith, and the rest of the great family of believers.

I have stumbled upon an ethnological field study by anthropologist Ruth Landes entitled The Ojibwe Woman, published by The Norton Library in 1971. The narrative of the book is comprised of and from"life stories" from the early 1930's of a Cree/Ojibwe woman in southern Ontario.

On page #132, the narrative continues ".... In Minnesota, men fish with nets during July and August, as women do also.Undoubtedly fishing with nets was stimulated by the market which the United States government has created for fish, for a greater haul can be made by net than by lance. The requirements of the Minnesota market have also caused these Ojibwa to cease extensive fishing during fall, winter and spring to permit replenishment of the lakes by summer." It says also that the... "characteristic style... was to fish with the lance."

Interesting.

Seems like a lot of folks were just waiting to pounce on tribal netters.

What of the winter and summer trash introduced to the Lake by fisherman and recreationalists? Gas and oil too from boat motors, a lot of it.

Lake shore environmental degradation too, with manicured fertilized suburban lawns.

Fishing launches that for years years dumped their toilets into the lake.

And, yes, rampant and abusive catch and kill( release).

Walleyes historically used in spiritual ceremony by Native Americans? Probably not unlike many of us saying grace, a prayer of gratitude, before a meal.

These things are never simple.

With the late cold spring, I do know that there are a lot of cold wet walleyes out there. Hopefully, enough for all of us.

Prepare them accordingly. Bon appetit'.

All the World's a Stage

Odets with one t. Sorry( previous post). Son Johnny was amazing according to his Dad and others. A nicely economized script transformed a historically unsuccessful play into a taut, well paced tragic tale of a famous Hollywood star w/ personal and professional problems. Classic noir genre' lines like " easy now, life is not a Russian novel."

Pre-performance we ate at D B Searles Bar and Restaurant in downtown St Cloud and had some pretty good chicken and shrimp and pasta. It is in a great old historic bldg on 5th ave. It appears to cater to college age kids, has a nice selection of beers and promotions and all that stuff, but has 3rd floor white table cloth dining. The burgers( handmade) and steaks are their strong point, I think.

Next door at Pioneer Place is a theater and a wine and Scotch bar. The Veranda. Lots of wines. Lots of single malts, if that is your cup of tea.

Fathers and Sons

A dad has braggin' rights, right?

A quick heads up.

Son Johnny plays the lead role in St Cloud State University's production of The Big Knife by Clifford Odetts. An astonishing performance from Dad's point of view. Where did this depth and range of emotion come from? Did he learn it within his own family? How am I involved?

It shows at 8 pm Friday and Saturday, and 2 pm Sunday at the Performing Arts Center on campus.

Pretty good theater. I'll write more about it, later.

Not Just Leftovers, Anymore

A couple of things to do w/ leftover spagetti noodles.

Wet the noodles w/ veg oil, add lots of granulated garlic( or fresh), lots of dried whole sweet basil( or fresh chopped), lots of grated parmesan cheese( even the cheap product in a can works), and fresh ground black pepper. Toss. Eat. Chives or green onions, and parsley too, as you wish. The secret is plenty of garlic, basil, and parmesan cheese.

This is the spaghetti salad recipe from the old Headquarters Lodge salad bar. A serendipitious discovery one day when we were short on salads and time. Far and away everyone's favorite.

A recent discovery for leftover spaghetti noodles simply involves stewed tomatoes, garlic, basil and bleu cheese tossed w/ the noodles. A little olive oil too, if you need to make it wetter. Served and eaten cold. I found a great buttermilk bleu at Cub in Brainerd - from raw milk - and made in Wisconsin. Creamy, sweet, not too pungent. Also good on a cracker.

Be Sure of Your Target

Be sure of your target. If you hunt, be sure of your target.

The death of an 8 yr old Belle Plaine boy by a shotgun blast of his dad's makes all of us, especially hunters, pause, ponder, and perhaps reconsider our hunting practises. It rips a hearts out, leaves it bleeding in an empty field. Emptier than it has ever been. Unbelief, heart pounding shock revisited again and again for days and weeks, and each time you awake for a long time that feels like forever. You can't change it. You can't change it.

Be sure of your target. If you hunt, be sure of your target. My prayers are with that Dad and his family. Be with them, Dear Lord, and help them as only You can.

Aw Baloney

It is not true that in Pierz you can eat baloney in a bar every day of the week.

But you can get it on Wednesdays at the Red Rooster( actually in Genola), and on Thursdays at Patricks. It is served from 11AM till 1PM as the lunch special. At the Rooster it is served help yourself buffet style. Which means it is an all you can eat deal. There is baloney, homemade white bread, butter, horseradish and mustard. I think that the horseradish is homemade too.

At Patrick's it is served to you in a basket. The entire ring of baloney I believe -sliced into 5 generous 4 inch hunks -along w/ 4 slices of homemade white bread( the soft variety), butter, and homemade(?) horseradish. It is indeed a "ring of fire" if you use enough horseradish. In Pierz, a bottle of tabasco will last for years, but horseradish is consumed like a cold beer on a hot summer day.

Is it a midwest thing this eating butter on a meat sandwich? Pastrimi on rye at a Deli in New York City? Nope.

Where does all of this baloney come from? Thielen's Meat Market right in town. Thielen's has been written up in the New York Times, rightly so, for their bacon. Try the black pepper variety, or garlic. Also get their jalapeno cheddar summer sausage. Or smoked hams. Or marinated pork chops and chicken breasts, smoked whole chickens, all the usual steaks, and much more. They have a professional and attentive staff, and the place is immaculate.

It is worth it to adjust your trip up North to include a stop in Pierz. Make it a golf date, in fact, at the mature 9 hole golf course, and be sure to do it on baloney day.

$4.95 for all you can eat. That is no baloney. And it sure ain't New York City.

The Accidental Pureeist

I have been drinking green tea daily since about 1990. Tea juice too: add two or 3 bags green tea to a jug of water along w/ a 3rd or 4th of grape juice or any juice or any combination of juices. It is especially great during the summer. Add ice if you like it cold.

Recently, after being the recipient of a large bag of dried mango slices, I have been adding the dried mango slices to the water along w/ the tea bags. The flavor develops throughout the day as the mango slices reconstitute and plump up. I keep the jug refrigerated at work. The mango becomes the consistency of canned peaches.When I get home I put the remaining tea juice water, along w/ the softened mango slices in the food processor, and add yoghurt, and ice and process until smooth. It is a green tea mango smoothie not unlike the one you get at Dunn Bros Coffee in Elk River. Add other fresh fruits or berries if you wish.

Dang it is good, and good for you too. It is a "two-fer" if there ever was one. Great on land and in the boat.

Chicks and Garlic, a Natural

Hummus, pronounced HOOM-uhs, is a Middle Eastern incorporation of garbonzo beans ( chick peas ), olive or sesame oil, garlic, and lemon juice. It is a dip that is traditionally served w/ pita bread.It has a depth and richness of flavor and is really good for you. A satisfying and complete( round) taste. Any rustic bread will work.

I adapted the recipe last night because of a lack of the traditional oil and lemon juice, with veg oil( soybean), and lime juice.

Drain the liquid from a can of beans, add 1/4 cup oil, a teaspoon of garlic( fresh or granulated), a shake or two of sea salt( or other), and a teaspoon of lemon juice( or lime ). Blend or food process till smooth. You can adjust any of the ingredients for consistency and taste. I like a garlic "burn"and not much salt, for example.It was great w/ rye crisp. You could add tabasco if you wish.

Terve' tuloa ( come again).

The Birthing of Walleye Fingers

OK. Wine batter recipe.

1 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup cold water
1/2 cup white wine

Start w/ the dry ingredients in a bowl( add a teaspoon of salt if you wish), mix, add wet ingredients and whisk till smooth.A very simple recipe. You could add cajun seasoning to the batter, as well, as you wish.

You will be dredging the fish fingers in plain flour, first, and then dipping them in the batter.A medium high setting on your range for the oil - you don't want the oil to smoke, of course - adjust temp as necessary.As I mentioned yesterday, I prefer flour and batter unseasoned as it produces a clean pure fish flavor that is then enraptured by the dipping( tartar) sauce of your choice.

How did Mn's "original walleye fingers" come about?

In the early days of Headquarters Lodge on Lake Mille Lacs( late 70's, early 80's), we closed and worked in Florida at a dockside fish cafe', where fresh caught fish were bought from the crew of sport fishing charter boats. They( crew) filleted them dockside just off the boat. We portioned them in the kitchen. Remaining portions of fish( grouper, cobia, wahoo) were cut into strips and sold on the menu as the beer battered daily fish fingers. It was a way to not waste good fresh fish that was too small for a broiling portion.

It did not require much intellectual effort to decide to do this with walleye back in Mn at HQ Lodge. It was an immediate thought. At first, customers would make jokes and laugh about walleye having fingers, and so on, but soon they were famous.

Simple math conservatively indicates that we served 1,085,ooo individual walleye fingers over the 19 yrs that we owned HQ.

The wine instead of beer batter idea came via a chef named "Heavy" that used to work at Breezy Point. One of our cooks, Mike Mosimann, had worked with him.It gives a sourdough flavor.

Can you get a good walleye finger on Mille Lacs these days? Don't know. The secret , as with most recipes, is that there is no secret. Use fresh fish and fresh batter, and fresh oil and don't under or over cook them. Serve them cooked to order and hot. Make sure the batter has become golden and crispy. Serve a variety of tartar sauces along w/ the fingers.

Minnesota Walleye Fingers

Minnesota's original Walleye fingers include long finger sized portions of the fish that have been floured and immersed in a wine batter and deep fried in vegetable oil. Golden and crispy on the outside, moist and tender on the inside. A finger food too, that you can dip in your favorite tartar type sauce, which could be traditional style, or a mayonnaise w/ salsa stirred in, or mayo incorporated w/ pesto, or a stringer full of other concomitant ingredients.

A general rule of thumb is 7 minutes per inch of fish to cook till done. Oil should be 350 to 375 degrees. I generally use unseasoned flour and an unseasoned batter. Most, probably all, of the fish seasoning mixes include an excess of salt for taste and health considerations. The batter is 1 part dry white wine to five parts cold water and 1 teaspoon baking powder per quart of batter. Baking powder makes it airy and crisp. Enough flour to make a batter just thin enough to coat the fish.I do the flour am't by touch and feel, but will do a batch tonight and measure the flour so I can pass it along.

I like unseasoned flour and batter becauseI like the contrast of pure fried fish dipped in a seasoned tartar sauce. Also because of differing salt tolerances of the eaters.

Oh Spring

Not yet. Snowed in. What to eat? Luckily I shopped yesterday in anticipation of the storm.

On average we in the US according to statistics spend about 17% of our income on food. Much of the third world spends 50% to 80% of their income on food. We are blessed and we are spoiled.

Food costs are rising even for us partially because of the corn based ethanol industry. Also because of increasing worldwide demand for meat, much of which is grain fed. China and India are involved in this.

Venison is being pulled from foodshelves in Mn and other states because of lead content in the meat. It remains to be discovered whether there is a health risk. Will more of us be arrowing our deer in the future? We could shoot deer in the head, too, to reduce risk, I suppose.

Snowed in and continuing, the world obscured by this chowder of snow, even the small island out front, the big one too, and the peninsula to the south. Delicious.

You can eat all day if you eat the right stuff. I will tell you about it later.

Aaah Spring

Simple early morning pleasures. Cinnamon toast. Tea. Camembert or brie on a light rye is also very good. A special memory for me. Camembert is better; depth and nuance. If brie is like a girlfriend, camembert is like a lover.

Yesterday was the warmest day since November 13th. Five months. Wow. An old fashioned winter.

Fast food, my favorite, will be returning fast in this late spring. Ducks, geese,herons, cranes, eagles, loons, swans, others, and all the small ones that sing. It is a good thing that we do not eat them all . We can appreciate them in different ways. A mourning dove sang yesterday. Something else will sing today.It is nice to have them back. I look forward to pelicans for a day or two, on their journey north.

And fish. I am a sucker for open water fishing. In the spring you can fish from shore or wade.It is simpler and it works for herons, too. I was dock fishing in Florida once on the Gulf coast and had caught some porgies and redfish( I think). I heared a small noise and turned to look and was startled by a heron as tall as I , sneaking up like in a cartoon and three feet away. I yelled and nearly jumped in the water. His/her intention was to steal my fish. Stalking. As w/ a scorned lover, you don't want to turn your back on them.

The Prodigal Food Writer

A month with the flu and I thought I was dying. Almost sixty and all that. Nice to be back.

Mr Rogers' said it many times over the years - " it's a beautiful day in the neighborhood." Even the twitter of the fax machine sounds like a spring bird's song.

Nice to be back, to have an appetite; an interest in food and other things again. I will be telling you about them.

Thanks for the comment, moondog. If I remember any more funny stories I will pass them along.

Busted at the Buffet

Upon hearing of the Elliot Spitzer escapade(s), my first question was I wonder what they ordered from room service.

Next thought, of course( I'm a guy), is boy, she sounds cute.

Are we not good at destroying ourselves? Gee, he was so good at destroying others.

Sounds also as if this was not his first time at the buffet.

I feel bad for his wife, and think that she has probably lost her appetite.

Gettin' Chunky

Remember the Chunky Candy Bar that went the way of the Mars Candy Bar before the Mars Bar went that way? If you fill a china coffee cup with equal amounts of semi sweet chocolate chips, raisins and walnuts you have a very close approximation of the original. Sprinkle with sea salt.

Sip espresso on the side if you want to get really fired up.

The Dynamic Duo

In an internet ad Jack Nicholson says gentlemen, there is nothing sexier than waking in the morning and saluting a woman. That would be Hillary he is referring to, as President and Commander in Chief.

If Hillary would be President and would dally w/ Jack in the Oval Office, how would the American public respond? I can see Jack now, sipping his morning coffee, pinky finger flayed, hair all over the place, and that grin on his face. His greatest and final Academy Award performance.

Hedgehogs

I heard on public radio this morning of 23 or so guys who were publicly executed for attempting or assisting escape from N Korea. I guess that's why they were trying to escape.

I wonder what they eat over there. Not much, whatever it is. Dead stuff, tho', like we do.

The NYT food writer, Frank Bruni ,has been eating at and reviewing 10 of his favorite picks of newer restaurants across this country. He ate hedgehog at one in California.

We had a pet hedgehog, once, that stayed curled up in a ball like a tiny porcupine for two years and then died. He looked the same dead as alive.

I s'pose we could have ate him.

All is Well

It is hard to believe that our lakes will have open water in a about a month.

I am a sucker for fast food. Can't help myself. Stuff like fish. They're fast. And deer, grouse, pheasants. All fast. Swift in the water, on the hoof, or the wing. Fairly natural depending on where you get them.

Slow food too, from the garden, to accompany the fast. The perfect balance. Fresh herbs growing close to the kitchen.

A daughter still at home, of course, at 10 yrs of age.

A young lab, too.

Living on the lake.

It is good.

Every Recipe Has A Story

Now that bread is about 3 bucks a loaf, and much more if you like the rustic artisanal variety, it is time to try baking your own. It costs only about 35 to 50 cents a loaf to bake your own and it is way better for you. Buy stone ground whole wheat flour , as it contains the wheat germ - natural vitamins and minerals. The heat generated by steel rollers in the milling process for non stone ground flours destroys the germ.

I've been doing it for about ten years - mostly using my Great Aunt Sophia's recipe for whole wheat loaves, which includes stone ground whole wheat flour, unbleached white flour, scalded milk, a little brown sugar and molasses, salt, vinegar, oil, wheat germ, and some oatmeal, and of course yeast. If you understand the chemistry of bread baking you could make it from that list of ingredients.

Last night I made rye with whole wheat and white flour loaves. Dang it's good. It is hearty, nutty, earthy, with a nice crunchy crust and a soft chewy crumb( interior). The more you chew the more flavor you get. That is called depth of flavor.I used water. It is cheaper than milk.It was the first time I ever made rye bread. Also, it was the first time I ever sprayed the loaves w/ water before baking and a couple of times during the baking process. That's how you get the artisanal crusty exterior. Do it. It works.

In the old logging days around Floodwood( Gowan), there was large Finnish woman who worked in the woods as a lumberjack. She was a close friend of my Great Aunt Sophia. She baked similar loaves of bread, but this story has little to do w/ bread except for the nourishment and strength that she gained from eating it. It allowed her to compete on a level playing field with the men.

Balsam sap was a well known balm or dressing for an axe wound in the woods. It had antiseptic and adhesive qualities. It would glue the wound together and help it to heal. You didn't have to lose work time in the woods. You could keep on cutting wood. Every lumber jack knew about it.

It was on a day not unlike many others that Mary entered the woods, except for on that day she was a little more inflamed than usual with her chronic condition. As the sun rose higher , so did the sap in the maple and the balsam; as did as the burning and the pain of her hemorrhoids. It finally became unbearable.

Initially,it worked, this balsam sap; it was cool and it relieved the pain. Though not the tallest tree in the woods, it was almost immediately that Mary experienced the other property of balsam sap, the adhesive quality, and realized that she had made a mistake. She had glued her butt hairs together.

It was much later than usual that evening that Mary paid a visit to Sophia and explained her recent situation, the dilemma, and her failed solution. " I couldn't walk," she explained," and I had to crawl out of the woods. Don't tell anyone," she said.

Eat, And Let The Games Begin

Just about everyone Up North is fat. I was reminded of this again on Sat while at a volley ball tourney for my youngest in Rogers, which is not too Up North.

It's from eating stuff like "taco in a bag", or "walking taco" - doritos and taco meat and cheese in the chip bag. It's a great imaginative concoction, tastes great, fulfills this craving for the "fried and the fat"that we seem to have. It is all the rage at school sporting events. It will kill you. Don't eat it, unless you are 10 with a ramped up metabolism and you are actually playing in the volleyball game. Remember, you are sitting down for about six hours.

My menu for the occasion? Rye crisp and camembert. Red grapes. Plain yoghurt sweetened w/ honey. Grape, orange/ tea juice( green). It was complete and satisfying.Well, summer sausage from Thielen's too, and muenster cheese, and a apple. Ate every hour. The sausage and muenster was mostly for my grandson( 6 yrs). When you are eating whole grain and fruits, you can have some fat, especially if it's from France, and it's called camembert. They are not fat over there. Just bald w/ big noses. The guys that is. I love the accent, as on the Academy Awards. I wonder if you can get an accent like that if you eat enough camembert? And drink red wine from there, too?

I will let you know.

And the Oscar Goes To.....

Oscars last night. I had seen none of the movies that were up for best picture. A good show. I enjoyed Jon Stewart. Sure glad the writers are back - I had also watched the atrocious Grammy Awards earlier. We all need writers. They all need writers.

On the menu for the show? Chocolate chip cookies and espresso. I was fired up. Used the recipe on the chocolate chip pkg, but did one half whole wheat flour and hazel nuts. Really good and you're eating half healthy and don't have to feel guilty.

In the mid to late seventies I lived on Fremont ave south in the Uptown neighborhood. Next to the townhouse where I lived a guy was moving out. He was ramping his VW into a Uhaul truck. I talked with him. He was from St LouisPark, was tall, had long curly hair and was Jewish looking. I asked him where he was moving to. He said that he and his brother were going to California to be movie producers. I thought he was a delusional hippie. To this day I believe it was Joel Cohen, brother of Ethan, both of whom won 3 Oscars last night.

Lights, Camera, Napkin, Action

After many many years of residence in the ugly concrete bldg a little N and on the west side of #371 N out of Brainerd, Morey's(nee Fish House) is now a little bit N of the old location in a new shopping center. The blue of the old bldg preceded a similar blue of the new Guthrie Theater by many yrs. It was definitely one of the ugliest retail bldgs in the Brainerd Lakes area on the outside, but Steve and Ellen did a lot with what they had to work with. I had developed a special affection for it as one does w/ a dog that is so ugly it is cute. Inside was a different story. It was like stepping into a different world with a smell of salt air and fresh fish as if you were in Seattle or New Orleans or another exotic and fishy locale.

Under their direction it had evolved into a bustling fish and seafood market that was surrounded by the window and wallside tables of a busy market cafe. It was like it had ADD in good way with so many things going on at once. There was always too much to look at - from the fresh and smoked fishes and shellfish to the variety of deli salads and fishy concoctions to a symphomic collection of domestic and imported cheeses, sauces and condiments and crackers, breads, cookware knick knack and bric-a-brac, cards, silly gifts, books, magazines( if Shinders had a fish mkt...)....with a staff that was for the most part knowledgeable and majoring in multi tasking. And always busy with customers - multi tasking too - grabbing a quick lunch, picking up something for dinner, making impulse purchases because you couldn't not....something for the wife, the grandchild, a friend..." look what I found at Morey's...".

It was like being at the theater and you were in the play and the playwrite was Tennessee Williams or Shakespeare...like being in a Robert Altman movie. And your cup was filled to it's brim.

The new place. Gone is the cafe, the deli, and more...it feels like you got there just after the performance...something is missing. I still spent an hour browsing and perusing and could have spent more...and left w/ crackers, the always very good signature smoked salmon,fresh and creamy and wonderful camembert from France, shared some in the truck w/ my pup...got great help, sampled everything I asked about...friendly knowledgeable staff, some of the old feel, now in a trendy and pretty bldg, but I kept waiting for something more, for the play to start, the performance to begin.

After yrs of being in business myself I could figure out only one reason why I was in business - to serve the customer and to give him what he wanted. I know that they could cram an eat in deli counter there. Let's all go there and demand it, to see if Steve and Ellen will respond, to give us what we want. More time and eat in food at Morey's.

Hog Heaven and Fish too

I've visited two of the best Markets in the lake country this week. Thielen's, of Pierz, and Morey's of Brainerd. One for meats, one for fish. Both have been around for ever, which means they've stood the test of time.

Thielen's bacon has been written up in the New York Times. I must re-read the article( posted on the wall behind the check out counter at the venerable mkt), but as I recall it was a rave review. The bacon is lean as far as bacon goes, and they've got the salt and smoke and smoking time just nailed. It is one of the few "secret recipes" that should be kept secret, as the balance of the flavors is perfect. The cracked black pepper version is my favorite. The garlic bacon is my daughter's choice of the heavenly slabs, and a double smoked variety is also available.

I do not know the ethnic heritage of the Thielens, but Pierz is a strong German and Polish community, and I just know that some of the expertise/recipes have come directly from that old world tradition of sausage making excellence. Try it all from weiners and ring bologna to Italian all beef salami and a jalapeno cheddar summer sausage. A large variety of steaks, roasts, chops, marinated meats, and more are all displayed beautifully, with none of the new "fake" steak names that are extant in the big box super mkt meat departments. A friendly, well trained, knowledgeable staff that is never short. Any and all questions are answered and one of the butchers or sausage makers will step out from the back if you have "insider" questions like mine. Thoroughly clean and professional, it is a delight to shop there and then you get to eat, too. I would do it if I was a vegetarian.

Next post will include Morey's.

Roasting at Twenty Below

Tastefully Simple's recommendation on the box is that this cremy wild rice soup is "covenient for college students, and great for camping trips." Not really, at 90 minutes cooking time. It was good though, when I added by half a completely home made chicken dumpling soup w lots of vegetables to it.

But, it is apparently quite a successfull company.

Great weather for an old fashioned pot roast w/ chuck ( 3 lbs) and plenty of carrots and onions. They glaze and carmelize so nicely. Three hours total. Add the vegetables at about half way. Keep everything covered. Brown the roast in a little oil after you have seasoned it w/ salt, pepper, and garlic. Add 1 cup water and 1 cup wine(red or white) just before you put it in the oven. You could add rosemary and potatoes ( @ 2 hrs) to the pot/pan/roaster, too, to make it even more interesting and complete, and special. It is comfort food at it's best. The kind of food a body craves/ yearns for this time of the year when it is 20 below and the wind continues from the northwest.

If you are using venison, add bacon,( 3 or 4 strips thick cut) as you put it in the oven. Or larding, as DeGroot recommends, which I spoke about but have not tried. I promise to try it, and will let you know if it is worth the work. Where to get a "larding needle"?

Not Tasteful, Not Simple, Just Stupid

I am looking at a box of Tastefully Simple Creamy Wild Rice Soup Mix - " the food you love, the time you deserve." Directions call for 60 to 90 minutes of cooking. Thirty seven ingredients are listed on the box. That is not simple or time saving.

I think that Tastefully Simple is a home party food company, perhaps a form of multi level marketing. You invite guests to a host's home and cook from an attractive box, and get people to join and buy their food products, and in turn sponsor a food party and get someone to join, who sponsors a food party and gets people to join and so on.

What I have learned about cooking from a box is that there is usually a lot of salt and fat in the ingredients, and some poison, but it is usually faster than this wild rice soup mix from Tastefully Simple. Why anyone would buy this product is beyond me.

I am cooking it now. It is sticking to the bottom of the pan, even tho' I have it set on very low. I count somewhat fewer than 37 grains of wild rice in total. What is this product. Gawd I hate cooking out of a box.

Cream of wild rice soup ( always with chicken) is way over done, anyway. Every where you go, especially up north. What about a hearty broth loaded w/ root vegetables and others and plenty of garlic, and lentils or beans( any kind) and chicken if you really want it ( or any wild bird - pheasant, grouse, duck) and of course the substantial and nutty wild rice. It wouldn't be an artery clogger either.

De Groot on Venison and Chocolate

De Groot also writes of venison with chocolate sauce, first involving a 3 day "proper marinade in aromatic wine." The whole or half leg of venison(about 10 lbs) is first larded w/ 10" x 3/8" salt pork which has been marinated in dark rum. Larding makes sense in a lean meat, tho' I have never done it - after all, what would ground meat(burger) be w/o the fat ground in?

At first reading the recipe appears extensive and labor intensive, but essentially de Groot is marinating the meat in red wine and in the classic French mirepoix which is with carrots, onions, celery and parsley w/ the addition of "aromatics" which include bay leaf, cloves, garlic, and sherry vinegar. You make the sauce w/ the marinade and fruits like raisins and currants, along w/ some rum and unsweetened chocolate and a half pound of butter. Wow. This is indeed a sauce, distinctly sweet and sour w/ chocolate. He roasts the venison to med rare( 130 degrees).

I will try this recipe and report back. De Groot was an absolute perfectionist; recipes being done and refined many times untill they were just right. That, along w/ his heightened sense of taste(smell) may assure success. We'll see.

Roy Andries de Groot

If there ever was a food snob, he is/was Roy Andries de Groot. You have got to be good to be a snob of his caliber. His name was also Baron de Groot, for a while, before he became a U. S. citizen and a brilliant and renowned food critic and writer in America. He became blind when he was about 50 yrs old( 1965) as a final result of injuries suffered in the London Blitz during WW2.

So how do you cook and write if you are blind? With an assistant, of course. Do this, do that. Get this, get that. I imagine the sense of taste( including smell) would be greatly heightened. I met a woman who was his assistant - writer, cook, go- getter, Girl Friday - near Hillman, Mn of all places,( about 15 mi west of Mille Lacs) at a mutual friend's home, recently. He was so demanding that she quit after spending some months w/ him during the 70's in Paris and the Far East.

He writes of turtle and provides a recipe for soup in his 1966 book, Feasts For All Seasons. A rich and aromatic soup including allspice, basil, bay leaf, fennel, and sage among other ingredients, that is topped off table side with sherry.

I will be adapting his recipe to mine and serving it at Porky Pine during this Lenten season. Call ahead to see if it is available,. 320-277-9505.

Roy Andries de Groot died, tragically, in front of his wife and daughter of a self inflicted gunshot wound, in 1983 when he was 73 yrs old. My heart goes out to his family. Food, like many things I have discovered over the years, brings out the best and the worst in many of us. I hope that his family remembers the best.

Turtle Time

Fat Tuesday is done and gone. It is turtle eating time. Turtle is ok to eat during Lent if you are a Catholic. It is ok for others to eat it too, even Lutherans, Baptists, and Christian Missionary Alliance members.

The Catholic Church in Ohio has an exclusion for muskrat, which means that if you live in Ohio it is ok to eat muskrat on Fridays, though I don't feel that it is ok for anyone to eat muskrat anytime, really. Unless you do.

We were serving turtle last year on Friday nights during Lent in a cafe that I worked in near Pierz. Even the kids around Pierz like turtle. When teenage girls like it, you know that there must be something to it. We would get the turtle from a local meat mkt. Portions w/ bone and meat the size of drummies, which we would boil for about 2 hours to get tender. The drummie like portions would be cooled, dipped in beer batter and deep fried until golden, and served with BBQ sauce for dunking. Very good.

A turtle has at least 3 kinds of meat which correspond in color and taste to pork, duck and chicken. It is rich, and the broth from the boiling should be reserved and strained in order to make a soup with carrots and celery, onions, and green split peas and/or lentils.. An excellent soup that is a tradition in some New Orleans restaurants like Commander's Palace, where both Paul Prudhomme and Emeril have worked.

The Fox's Teeth Are In The Bunny, and Nothing Can Remove Them, Honey

Ouch. That's just like real life. Some things you can't go back and change. Like the results of last night's Super Bowl. I don't think a one of us is not happy for Eli Manning. The title is from a poem on The Writer's Almanac(MPR) this morning.

" Hi, honey, you're home" is a part of another.

"Real Age" also writes of "honey" this AM in the form of buckwheat honey. Dark and rich and sweet and better for you than lighter ones, they say - more phenols. Too strong of a flavor for some baking apparently, but it sure would be great in some breads. I will look for it. It would be wonderful in tea, too, and oatmeal.

Didn't Judy Collins sing a song about cooking w/ honey? - " We aaaall cook with honey......"

As the sweet of a glaze for ham and gamebirds w/ mustard, allspice, and apricot jam. Hot peppers for the fowl, too.

" Make Me Something I Like"

I want to remind you that I work ( cook) at Porky Pine Bar and Grill on Wednesday evenings ( 4 PM - 8 PM), and Friday days( 8 Am to 4 PM). On either shift, I usually do something special, or you can ask me to "make me something I like." I will ask you a few questions, and then I will do it.

Porky Pine is about 10 mi west of Onamia on Highway # 27. It is casual. If you want a good bottle of wine w/ dinner, you will have to bring your own. The corking fee is cheap. No one has ever done that, to my knowledge. I think it is free. Yes, it is. We Have Sutter Home, which is ok table wine. A decent selection of beers.

You can bring your own fresh fish.

The kitchen is clean. The refrigeration is good.

As Bob Barker used to say, " Come on Down."

Creamed Onions, and A Whole Lot More

A friend and former business partner from the South( Alabama) used to say, " every night's a Saturday night and every day is a Sunday." I think he was expressing his view of heaven on earth. The two best days of the wk. The debauch on Sat night; church and redemption on Sunday?

Let me tell you about Sunday. There's always a great singing of old hymns and some new, and usually a great message( sermon) from Pastor and then the feast. A buffet style cornucopia of hot dishes and sides and breads, fruits, cakes, pies, bars, cookies and candy. It is different each week, according to the whim or plan of our inspired providers/cooks. They cook their fare at home and bring it to church. No sign up sheet, all volunteer.That is God at work. If you come and eat it you would know that.

Noodle casseroles, or rice, perhaps a stew( often venison) , or chili, spaghetti , sauer kraut and sausage, something with potatoes, and this last Sunday a heavenly dish of creamed onions.

Creamed onions. If you have not had them before and then had them, you will have them again. A little sweet and creamy, dreamy w/ cheese, two kinds, according to Lois. You must first boil the onions till tender, and pour off the water. If you don't they will be too strong. Then, saute' in butter, add flour to make a roux( butter and flour for thickening), and add milk, get hot and simmer for ten or fifteen minutes, then add a sharp cheese like cheddar ( a white cheddar would be great, but unnecessary), and parmesan cheese. It is really good. People were eating it like it was a main course, in big bowls, like it would nourish both the body and the soul.

Creamed onions forever is what I say. What a side on a day like this ( about a hundred and fifty below zero).

The Other White Meat

I write this as our President speaks to a surfeit of applause in his State of the Union address. No more pork, he says. He used to be the king of pork. He is giving pork a bad name. Nothing like pork this time of the year, as a roast w/ potatoes, carrots, and onions. A Boston Butt w/ plenty of fat and flavor is my recommendation. More pork is what I say.

It Doesn't get Any Better Than This

I baked, finally, my great Aunt Sophia's bread again yesterday. ( Halleluia!) It is whole wheat w/ scalded milk and water and oil and salt and vinegar, oatmeal, and my addition which is flaxseed. A little molasses and brown sugar, too.( half whole wheat, half unbleached white). A crunchy crust when it comes out of the oven. The first slices are exquisite w/ cold butter. Round loaves in the rustic way. Mine is softer than I would like - hers w/ more body and you sliced it w/ a hack or kitchen saw. She has been gone for years so I cannot ask or witness her exact method. Less kneeding, more kneeding, a pan of water in the oven? Anyways, a loaf like this has a depth of flavor that reveals itself as you chew, and an after taste that is like a great memory of something you shot or caught w/ a good dog at your side.

Dunk in a bean and lentil soup w/ plenty of carrots, celery , onions, garlic, thyme and bayleaf w/ polish sausage, not too much you don't need too much unless you want, from your favorite meat mkt. It is perhaps my favorite soup, rich, delicious, and good for you. I was in cooks heaven even before I cooked the next thing,...

Which was chocolate chip cookies, the recipe on the pkg of chips, but I did nearly half w/ whole wheat flour, and added hazel nuts. I love cookies, but in deference to health issues( because I know that I will be eating a lot of them), I attempt to make them more healthy. Chocolate is good for you, right, and nuts too, and whole grain. So my grandson and I ate them warm from the oven w/ vanilla ice cream, and no guilt. It is a rationale that works for me. Try it.

Try all these things. It will be a good day. Terve' tuloa( come again)!

" Break a Leg"

I want to remind you that I consider all food as outdoor food( except chickens and pigs and more these days) since it lives or grows outdoors, and that I consider the wild and the free( well, not quite free) to be the best of it along w/ what grows in your garden.

Good food is available in markets these days as well, and that has happened because we the consumer have demanded it. A good thing. Shop smart. Make wise food choices. Did you know that the chickens that are labeled"all natural" are raised in lots of 50,000 or more, indoors, and they grow from day old to a 5 lb market weight in just six weels? That their legs break under the strain of quick growth and weight gain?

All natural? Yeah, like Barry Bonds is all natural.

Not Quite the Way Mom Did It

I was certainly not the only teenage duck hunter who drew the short swampgrass straw and had to strip down to swim out and set the decoys. It was in a remote and secluded location at a beaver pond that had never been hunted before, according to the behavior of the ducks. We made blinds. Ducks arrived shortly before dusk.

We would not have needed decoys. The ducks had obviously been bedding down here on a nightly basis for years, through generations. We stood, we shot, all five of us. We dropped ducks, they left, returned, we shot, they left, and returned. This continued for an hour. We stood unhid on the beaver dam, laughing and shooting. The ducks kept coming.

In those days, some 4o yrs ago, our moms cooked those ducks in the traditional way. Each bird dressed w/ 2 bacon strips, and roasted forever in a dry pan. It worked. They tasted of dryness and burnt bacon. Not bad for wild game. It was our duty to eat them.

It would be years before I would discover that duck was my favorite wild game, when prepared in a learned and skillful way. But simply.

You can roast them whole. Add carrots, celery, onions and garlic to the roasting pan, along w/ salt, black pepper and thyme, a cup of water and a cup of red wine, cover and roast for about an hour. Do put the bacon strips on them, thick sliced. Uncover for the last ten minutes if you want them nice and browned. You could add potatoes also, at the beginning, and whole regular white mushrooms or any kind about half way thru the roasting. Check for moisture at that point, and add more water if necessary. The resultant broth could be thickened into a gravy or sauce, or leave it thin as jus, which is what I prefer. A wonderful one pot meal, simply and easily made. Vegetables are rich and carmelized and unsurpassed when you cook them this way.

Wish it was duck season.

It's Just Ducky

Duck soup. A Marx Brothers' film? Great slapstick as I recall.

Of all the wild game stocks that can be made, duck is hands down the best. Don't even try pheasant or grouse for stock - an off flavor that just doesn't work for me.

It's been a couple of years since duck, unfortunately. It is my favorite wild game to eat. You wll want to bone out the breasts and season w/ salt, pepper, garlic( shallots,too, if you have 'em) before you grill them med rare on the Weber or gas grill. I live in hardwood country and always fire the grill w/ oak or maple. I think it is stupid and expensive to use charcoal when hardwood is available on the cheap or free.

Cut the thighs and drumsticks off of the duck together w/ the bones to roast separately. Cover the remaining carcass w/ water in the stock pot, add carrots, celery and onions, salt, pepper, red wine( half cup), garlic and gently boil for a couple of hours. Taste it, adjust seasonings. If it is not rich enough, add a little chicken and/or beef base( quality) to it. The resultant broth can be used to make a gravy/sauce, or can be strained w/ a fine sieve or cheesecloth. If it is right it can be served as a consomme'( it does stand alone, it is that good).

Additional Notes:

One of the best natural flavors in the animal kingdom is duck fat. The French have known this for a long time.When you bone out the breasts, you may either remove the breast skin w/ the fat( just under it), or leave it on. When grilling then, the trick is to get that skin crispy w/o over cooking the breast, and believe me, you do not want that breast grilled past medium because it is a waste of exquisite texture and flavor.It melts in your mouth.

If you remove the skin, which I often do, you will either want to fry it ( the skin) on med low preferably in a black cast iron pan( or roast it in the oven) to get all the fat out of it so you can make a roux w/ flour to thicken your sauce. Duck fat is better than butter.Way better. A bonus is the skin "cracklins" that remain. You will want to save the fat that will be on the top of the stock pot too, either by skimming it w/ a spoon or ladle, or by cooling it. When you cool it, the fat congeals on top, and is then easy to gather.

Why so involved? It seems like a lot of work, time, and method. Because duck is worth it. It is that good. More about duck next time.

A Loaf of Bread, A Bowl of Stew

It was a pleasure to prepare and eat a simple stew of potatoes, carrots, onions and celery, seasoned w/ sea salt and black pepper, thyme( light), garlic( light) and bayleaf. A couple of bouillon(chicken) cubes, too.

It was the beginning of two different stews - broth based, unthickened - one of chicken for my 10 yr old daughter, and one of fish for me. I slow roasted a chicken breast to add to one, and poached some northern pike to add to the other - the meats are kept separate on plates to be added to the respective stew bowls. I added milk and a generous pat of butter to mine - which was modelled after the famous Finnish fish stew - and fresh ground allspice as a distinctive garnish and flavor.

Allspice is a spice/flavor usually associated w/ Middle Eastern and Indian cuisines( curries), and is quite exotic for a simple Nothern European( midwest) influenced stew. It is the perfect addition, adding intrigue and another level of flavor. Gosh it was good. Deeply satisfying in it's simplicity of broth and vegetables, and nice clean whitefish. Butter was the clincher, the winning fieldgoal.

So it was a great way to satisfy two tastes - mine and my daughter's.

Two cups 1 inch diced potatoes, 1 cup carrots, 1 cup onions, 1 cup celery( all in one half inch dice), just covered w/ water - gently boil w/ seasonings until vegetables are tender. Cook meat and fish ( seasoned or unseasoned) separately. So simple and good. Dunk w/ rustic whole wheat bread w/ butter. When you are eating this simple and healthy it is ok to eat butter. God bless you and your appetite.

That's All, Folks, Well, Not Quite

Chili in the morning, chili in the evening, chili at suppertime( sing it). Its been that way inside and outside recently at my home. Chili does go good w/ chili, but if you want to read more about chili you'll have to go to Outdoor News this wk, I think, and then next month to the Mille Lacs Messenger's Compass magazine.

In the mean time I am going to eat something white and I do not mean white chili, which is probably over rated. Why make it white, anyway, when it is so naturally colorful, hence flavorful and good for you.

Five colors, you might know,is a part of the Japanese" washoku" way of dealing with food.

White chili to me would be clam chowder, and that is good, or a great Finnish mojakkaa, which is a fish stew with potatoes and onions, and carrots, allspice, and of course fish. The old fashioned way is with the fish( northern pike is exceptional) enveloped in cheesecloth in the broth, and served separate from the stew. Using the entire fish except the guts and scales results in a great broth. You can roll the hard little white eyeballs around in your mouth, afterwards, like tiny jawbreakers, as my great aunt Sophia did.

How Do I love thee, Chili, Let me count the ways

There is Cincinnati chili, served over spaghetti noodles, which makes you wonder why you ever put spaghetti sauce on those noodles, or with penne noodles.

There is fish house chili, in which you simmer fresh filets of just caught fish( any) in a pot of already made chili. Add instant brown rice to the pot, too, and it's similar to a gumbo.

Eat chili w/ a side of butternut squash - an unbelievable combination.

Make a chili cheese omelette, or more simply, a frittata( easier).

Make hot dog chili. Or venison. Or pork chop chili, chicken chili, or chili with a wild and colorful bird( add cinnamon and some chocolate).

Compass Magazine; More Than Just Corn Meal Mush

I am working on a chili piece for the Compass, a quarterly publication of the Mille Lacs Messenger.

I"ll do chili in about 4 different ways -the Midwestern kind for our audience - w/ some additions and suggestions to make it more interesting. Chili is not unlike the taco, in that the additions, or condiments can really make it or break it. Of course you must start w/ a great foundational chili and then go from there.

Corn bread is a traditional accompaniment, but you can make a jalapeno cheddar corn bread, for example, which has heat and is more interesting. On the same theme, you can serve it w/ polenta( Italian style corn meal mush), which you can make according to the directions on the corn meal package, or you can add whatever you want like lots of garlic and cheese and green onions. Then you put it in a pie pan and let it cool. You can dump your chili on top of it and have a chili polenta pie, topped w/ sour cream, and black olives and greens( onions, cilantro), and reds too, like peppers. It would be striking in appearance and taste. You would take a photo of it before you eat it like I do.

Watch for the Compass piece. Subscribe to the Mille Lacs Messenger.

A Win Win Situation

Great sports yesterday and Tacos too.

Packers win with the amazing Brett Favre, and the Patriots with the amazing Tom Brady( 26 of 28 passes). Gopher Men's basketball too, with Hoffarber and Knowlen, the amazing freshmen.

Season your taco meat w/ salt, pepper, garlic, oregano, cumin, and cayenne. Use baby gourmet greens( organic), and diced tomatoes and green chilis( from a can) instead of fresh tomatoes, which are not fresh or real this time of the year in Mn. Great game watching fare. Sour cream and guacamole too, and green onions and olives, both kinds. A great taco is all in the sides or condiments, and your family and/or friends get to customize their own.

You satisfy everyone, even the young ones. The rest is up to the team, and it doesn't get any better than yesterday.