The Bucket List . . .

Top ten things all True Northerners MUST Eat Before They Die . . .

1. Fish Boil - a Great Lakes culinary tradition. The meal consists of whitefish (though lake trout can be used), with other ingredients.

2. Pasty WITH Rutabagas - while there are no completely standard pasty ingredients, the traditional recipe includes diced or sliced steak, finely sliced onion, and potato. Other common ingredients include rutabaga and sometimes parsley. The use of any carrot in a pasty is frowned upon by purists.

3. Raw Maple Sap - the Native Americans long recognized the sap of maple trees as a source of energy and nutrition.







4. Pickled Venison Heart - any hunter who dresses his own kill knows to never waste his kill. While flanks, steaks, and stew meat can be cut from the kill, and sausage can be made with seasonings and the intestinal track, one should not overlook the tasty snack of pickled deer hearts.





5. Morels - a glorious rite of spring! Stalking the great, elusive morel mushroom and then heading for the kitchen, grabbing the butter, heating up the skillet, or firing up the grill so you can prepare and devour them anyway you see fit!






6. Venison Sausage - put up nature's bounty and enjoy the taste of the outdoors

7. Whitefish Pate' - made from smoked whitefish and absolutely delicious with crackers and wine!





8. Fried Fish Roe (Yooper Caviar) - like caviar, but fried.


9. Fried Smelt - a tried and true way to cook smelt is to fry them.


 
 
 
   
10. Rhubarb Pie - classic and delicious rhubarb pie. The best way to finish any meal!
 
 
 
 
 

“The only time to eat diet food is while you're waiting for the steak to cook” - Julia Child

Poking Around . . .

“If all the lakes were chocolate cakes

And all the isles were great big cup cakes

Then how lucky I would be

For all the Lakes surround me!”

- Candis Wilds

I was 6, maybe 7 when I first penned those lines while attending elementary school in St. Ignace. We had been assigned the task of composing a poem about a place we longed to visit. It was my first introduction to creative writing – it was also my first introduction to the sting of rejection. I received an “F” along with a strong lecture about conforming to instructions. I sat quietly during the lecture, knowing full well that while Ms. Peterson was to be admired for her “flat lander” clothes and manners she still knew nothing about the magic of living in the U.P. or of the art of “poking around”. And she wasn’t willing to accept a “brilliant child” such as myself being enthralled with the idea of living out my life wandering the woods and waterways of the eastern Upper Peninsula. We spent the rest of that year at odds.

I was taught to poke around at a very young age by my Great-grandpa Wilds. Sundays were always reserved for our walks. We would stop at the shed and collect the burlap bag waiting silently in a corner and then head off in one direction or the other. Direction was never important. Poking around was – paying close attention, prying at stones with sticks, turning over rocks and lifting logs to look for snakes and other crawly things, kneeling close to search out the tiny bones mixed with fur in an animal’s scat, tracing tracks and telling tales associated with how they came to be, poking a cattail down some hole. “Poking around” as Grandpa put it.

People who poke around have burrs stuck to their shoelaces and rocks in their pockets. Their days are not divided into hours and minutes but by the passage of the sun across the sky – or the rude grumblings of a stomach reminding them of a meal missed while wandering. They appear – to those who walk with the purpose of exercise in mind – to ramble aimlessly. They spit into the water to make the fish rise. They randomly gather wildflowers to bestow on those they love. Often they stand still for a long time, listening, and then head off to follow some far away sound.

Unlike hiking, poking around has neither destination nor timetable. And while Thoreau insisted that you must think while you walk, poking around has no such noble aspirations. This is because poking around doesn’t take much sustained thought. Poking around simply leads to nourishing that inherent sense of wonder we are all born with but which few of us manage to sustain into adulthood – children are often the best at poking around.

A child’s world is fresh and new and beautiful, full of wonder and excitement. It is our misfortune, that as adults, most of us have lost this true instinct for what is beautiful and awe-inspiring. “If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder,” Rachael Carson wrote, “he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy excitement and mystery of the world we live in.” I was blessed to have the companionship of my Great-grandfather and later, after his death, the encouragement of my Great-grandmother to continue poking around on my own.

It is this indestructible sense of wonder, this unfailing love of woods and water inherited from my Great-grandparents – which managed to withstand Ms. Peterson’s early chastisements – that has often sustained me in adulthood.

And it is this same inborn sense of wonder I hope to help my grandchildren keep alive. A sense of the beautiful, the excitement of the new and unknown, exploring nature by becoming receptive to what lies all around them, inspired by long lazy meanderings through the woods and along the waterways of Drummond Island.

And so we poke around together as we roam about in the early mornings while the sun rises over Potagannissing Bay, trailing sticks in the clay along the shore, stacking stones to “mark our way” and gathering pockets full of rocks to be used in some yet unknown craft project – often carrying a burlap bag in which to gather our treasures. And we keep alive my Great-grandparents legacy while we chant the lines to some poem about the Great Lakes penned by the little girl who grew up to be their somewhat unconventional grandmother.


“All that is gold does not glitter; not all those that wander are lost.”
- J. R. R. Tolkien (1892 - 1973), The Fellowship of the Ring, 1954

Seed Catalog Gardening . . .

The fire pops, shooting embers against the screen, and I choose another seed catalog from the deepening drift nearby. It is winter, time for dreams of gardens to come.

It’s easy to fall for the descriptions in seed catalogs. They promise a cucumber that will produce more than any other cucumber, is resistant to all forms of disease and will grow in any situation.

You won’t read: this plant grows well under ideal backyard situations with experienced gardeners who have the time and energy to help it flourish. or: this plant will sprout, grow slowly, attract aphids, lose many leaves overnight to some unexplained bug and eventually produce one misshapen fruit that none of your family members will eat except you, because you cared for it over the last four months and, by golly, you are going to eat it!

I suspect seed catalogs have been lifting the winter-weary spirits of gardeners around the world since the first paper flyers rolled off the presses.

Indeed, it's no coincidence that seed catalogs are often mailed around the winter solstice, just as the darkness envelopes us. Like colorful, twinkling Christmas lights, the pictures of rich red tomatoes, bright orange carrots with their feathery green tops, and sunny sprials of red and yellow marigolds light up the dark corners of our homes and warm the chilly places in our hearts.

Is there anything more comforting than sitting with one's favorite seed catalog on a cold wintery day, poring over the latest new vegetables and planning next spring's garden? Between local garden businesses, organizations like Sound Food, Tilth, and the internet, the wealth of resources available to gardeners these days is almost endless. And, it's true: You can now peruse a seed catalog's entire inventory online.

But the anticipation, joy and wonder that comes with sitting by the fire on a cold winter evening, lost in this spring's seed catalog, is an experience I hope I'll never outgrow. I can almost taste the tomatoes now...

Here's to the delicious sunshine we have been experiencing as of late and the anticipation of things to come it brings with it!

Saps' Rising . . .

When daily temperatures start to rise above freezing - then drop several degrees below zero at night - the sap starts to rise. It's time to start tapping!

Sugaring time in the North. For those who love this time of year a tongue-tip taste of fresh maple syrup is a sacrament - maple communion at the end of a long winter. To ingest the distilled essence of the trees confers the spirit of the forest itself.

In the sugarhouses, however, discussions grow a bit more coarse then your typical mass as sugar-makers debate how long the season might last. "Ask me again in April" should be the standard reply because any attempt to forecast sugaring successes or failures are futile - the duration of sap runs and sugar content are entirely dependent on the weather and factors peculiar to individual trees. 

Sugaring requires hard WORK. 

Most producers can’t wait to tap by late winter. But once the sap starts “Runnin’ like Hank" and the low-quality late season sap supply exceeds that of the firewood required to boil it, many producers confess they can’t wait to wash up. An old-timer once told me: "When the Lord made men for maple sugaring, he first give ‘em a spine of steel… then took out half their brains!"

Anyway you look at it winter’s end is reason fair enough to celebrate! Why else would otherwise rational people boil tree sap all night long in backyard contraptions?

I can’t say if maple madness is a symptom of spring fever… or the ultimate antidote!

Ward Allen died at the peak of his fame and accomplishments in 1965. Ward played with Wilf Carter, appeared on the Grand Ole Oprey and had a radio show with Frank Ryan on CFRA in Ottawa Canada

He left behind an amazing legacy of fiddle music that is still being loved and performed to this day. Hope you enjoyed his rendition of Maple Sugar as much as I do!

Walking on Wide Feet . . .

When you live Up North the winters can be pretty long and very cold. It is easy to understand why some people count the days until they can go outside again without their bones freezing.

Not me - I embrace winter! Winter does not inhibit my desire to be outdoors doing things - anything! Boredom doesn't happen because there is nothing to do. Boredom happens because you choose to do nothing.

But sometimes the snow is just too deep for hiking and the slick groomed cross country trails just don't seem to be calling my name.

This is where snowshoeing comes in! There is nothing more peaceful than hiking through the woods on snowshoes. It is just you, the crisp air and the sound of the crunching snow beneath your feet. Breathing in the fresh cool air makes me feel so alive. And I am lucky to live where just out my door there are endless acres of woods ready to be trekked. I can literally walk out my door, throw on my snowshoes and head out for an adventure.

When I think back to some of my favorite memories over the past few years times spent snowshoeing always come to mind.

I started stomping the woods as a young girl on a pair of  Iverson's - the real deal! Iverson’s have been hand crafting the finest traditional wood snowshoes for over 50 years. They’re made in the USA, right here in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and you can trust them when they say they know snow.

It started back in 1959 when Clarence Iverson began building his snowshoes for the State of Michigan. His premise was simple; reduce expended energy by walking on top of the snow, not through it. His designs provided maximum weight distribution for optimum flotation. The news soon spread of the Iverson snowshoe and demand expanded the company into the consumer market.

These days I trek using Atlas shoes. There are alot of reasons for the switch - the greatest being more stability following a serious accident that required total reconstruction of my right leg. The lightweight aluminum frames with the addition of Spring-Loaded™ Suspension and tempered steel All-Trac™ toe crampons have made all the difference in my ability to safely traverse the ledges near our home given my physical limitations.

And while nothing is certain except change itself - somethings will never change. I still wear my Steger mukluks that were custom-made for me with pride in Ely, Minnesota. Where they also know a bit about snow!

Steger Moosehide Mukluks are twice as warm and less than half the weight of traditional winter boots. They are made in the Northern Cree Indian style and have durable, flexible, treaded rubber soles. The company uses the best moosehides available, which means that my mukluks have remained supple and flexible through many years of winter woods stomping!

When cabin fever starts to get to you this winter don't just sit inside and choose to do nothing. 
Get outside and as the Iverson motto states - Seek Wilderness!

Writer's Block . . .

See you tomorrow!

Talk about Hockey Night in Canada!

The Winter Olympics couldn't have asked for a better ending.

Everything that had happened — from Shaun White to Lindsey Vonn, from Kim Yu-na to Evan Lysacek and Joannie Rochette, from the Canadian curlers to the U.S. Nordic team — came down to one overtime.

It was as if the Olympics didn't want to end.

Hyped as the best hockey tournament ever, not an easy expectation to fulfill. In the end it was Sidney Crosby growing his legend and capping a stellar tournament with the gold-medal winning goal.

Photo curtesy of AP Wire Service

Congratulations to the Men's Canadian Hockey team

on earning Olympic Gold!