Thanksgiving is next week and for many of us the thought of the holiday brings back happy memories. Like the time Uncle Chuck staggered in, grinning, just as the amen’s floated heavenward after grace. Under his arm, scrawny neck thrust forward and beady eyes piercing inhabitants of the dining room, was a 23-pound live turkey named Waldo. True, Chuck had asked if he could bring his friend Waldo to dinner and even admitted “he’s a real turkey.” Still, everyone at the table was shocked that Waldo wasn’t wearing a tie.
Every Thanksgiving comes with its own memories, such as the time my daughter misread the directions and thought she was supposed to cook the turkey in a 160 degree oven until the bird reached a temperature of 350. It was almost Friday by the time we ate.
Many of my favorite memories revolve around Canada Thanksgivings, which are on Oct. 12. For years we have been on our annual waterfowl hunting trip in Nokomis, Saskatchewan, at that time so we join a group of local friends and outside hunters at a farm for a potluck dinner and trap shoot. It’s an experience.
Grungy hunters arrive after the morning’s duck shoot garbed in camo and carrying potholdered pans and pots. Still searching for birds, gundogs nose the ground in front of them. The main culinary contribution is meat garnered from Mother Nature: shish-kabobbed pheasant, venison, souped-up hun, and sharptail and goose fixed in all sorts of ways.
These men, who wouldn’t dream of turning a page in a Betty Crocker cookbook, glean cooking information from hunting buddies who are experienced wild game chefs and have the dirty aprons to prove it. Most recipes start out with the basics: “Pluck the duck. Hunk it up. Get yourself a can of mushroom soup…”
A big crock-pot is essential for most wild game chefs. No fuss. No muss. You just dump in your soup. Dump in your duck. Throw in an onion, some water and turn it on high. Before serving, skim off the feathers floating on top. The real advantage of a crock-pot is that the slow boiling action causes the shot to sink to the bottom, where it can easily be scooped up and dumped in the can on the reloading bench.
My husband’s prize recipe is for gourmet goose. The trick is in the orange pop. The original recipe came from a Tennessee fellow who not only saves feathers to make his own pillows but is a champion award-winning goose caller…one of the reasons, perhaps, why he is divorced.
I don’t really like wild game. Well, except for sheep, buffalo and pheasant. Men like the stuff because they bagged it and dragged it home. Kids like it because Dad shot it. Wives like it because it saves money.
Wild game is like fine French cuisine. I’m not a drinker but I think each category has an alcoholic beverage that compliments its particular flavor. Kind of like the way red wine goes with red meat and white with poultry.
Beer goes best with buffalo or moose burgers, the quantity of cans depending on two things: toughness and the proximity of the animal to the rutting season at the time of its demise. Wine, a nice blush, goes well with pheasant or grain-fed ducks and geese. If the birds are slough- or swamp-dwellers, it is advisable to move up to a more potent beverage such as sake or Jim Beam.
Venison definitely calls for a hearty glass, or perhaps a bottle, of Jack Daniels. Mutton, which isn’t really considered wild game except for its tendency to crawl out of the pan when it’s being cooked, requires liberal doses of Everclear, or, if the person isn’t a drinker, a few Valium tablets an hour before dinner.
Tequila goes well with wild meat that has any of the following flaws: an abundance of feather-wrapped shot; portions that are bloodshot; excessive hair that requires more than a plastic Bic razor for removal; liver flukes; and a roast with a head, foot, or tail still attached.
Actually, much wild game goes well with a bald lie, such as: “Gee, I really like leg of mountain lion but recently I acquired an enzyme/anachtroidal deficiency which makes it impossible for my digestive system to absorb the chromosomal qualities of some wild game. I’d try it but I can’t really afford the corrective surgery it would require right now.”
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Monday, November 2, 2009
Up or down: the never-ending saga of the toilet seat
Troy and I recently spent time on a goose/duck hunting trip at our place in Saskatchewan. Troy’s friend, John, was with us. I was outnumbered two to one. Since they were the hunters and I was the tag-along who had to do some badly-needed household chores after being away from the place for six years, I didn’t gripe about the toilet seat.
The Canada house only has one bathroom. In our normal lives we have two bathrooms that are basically his and hers. He always keeps the toilet seat down in mine but I rarely use his so I really don’t care if it is up or down or sideways. He can keep it up and use that toilet for a wading pool for all I care.
The toilet seat in the Canada house – which I fondly call House of the Whispering Floors because of the creaky old wood floors – seemed to always be up. My husband wasn’t being his normal chivalrous self. Maybe it was the hunting testosterone kicking in.
In the middle of one night, feeling the need to visit the john, I padded through the living room and made my way to the bathroom and sat down. Every woman who has done this knows the exquisite feel of a bed-warmed derriere plunged into a pool of ice water. First of all, the bowl is much larger than the seat so you are at least six inches deep in frigid water. Secondly, the bowl is quite a bit closer to the floor than the seat, which causes wrenching pain to the back and hip area.
After a bit of creative cursing and wiping myself dry with a towel, I grumbled back to bed. My first instinct was to shake him awake and ask if HE was the one who left the seat up. But I knew it wouldn’t be a meaningful conversation, just a series of huh? huhs? as he tried to come up from sleep fog to figure out what I was talking about.
Have you ever had fleeting fantasies that just send you into gales of laughter? I do that quite often, frequently in the middle of the night. In this case I was silently laughing so hard I was shaking the bed.
The fantasy was to just simply remove the toilet seat. Just unscrew the plastic bolts and retire it to the shed or the dump. And the next time he wanted to do the toilet ritual that involved sitting down he’d holler, “Where the heck’s the toilet seat?”
“Oh that?,” I’d yell back, “Since it’s always up and not used I figured it wasn’t needed so I hauled it away to the nuisance grounds (At our little town of Nokomis the dump is called the “nuisance grounds.”)
“What?!”
“I’ll tell you what,” I’d holler with great pleasure. “why don’t you just sit down there and do your business underwater, like you expect me to do.”
Until the end of time there will probably always be a war on whether the toilet seat should be up or down. Maybe we females should be like a woman I know who has her male-dominated family trained. Her guys all sit on the toilet instead of anointing it from a standing position.
It should, of course, be put down, and I’m not saying this from simply a female perspective. Men are taught to treat women with respect and courtesy and the toilet seat thing goes along with opening doors and being polite and chivalrous. It is simple good manners.
And if they can’t do that? Put a lock on the bathroom door and hide the key. There are a lot of trees out there.
The Canada house only has one bathroom. In our normal lives we have two bathrooms that are basically his and hers. He always keeps the toilet seat down in mine but I rarely use his so I really don’t care if it is up or down or sideways. He can keep it up and use that toilet for a wading pool for all I care.
The toilet seat in the Canada house – which I fondly call House of the Whispering Floors because of the creaky old wood floors – seemed to always be up. My husband wasn’t being his normal chivalrous self. Maybe it was the hunting testosterone kicking in.
In the middle of one night, feeling the need to visit the john, I padded through the living room and made my way to the bathroom and sat down. Every woman who has done this knows the exquisite feel of a bed-warmed derriere plunged into a pool of ice water. First of all, the bowl is much larger than the seat so you are at least six inches deep in frigid water. Secondly, the bowl is quite a bit closer to the floor than the seat, which causes wrenching pain to the back and hip area.
After a bit of creative cursing and wiping myself dry with a towel, I grumbled back to bed. My first instinct was to shake him awake and ask if HE was the one who left the seat up. But I knew it wouldn’t be a meaningful conversation, just a series of huh? huhs? as he tried to come up from sleep fog to figure out what I was talking about.
Have you ever had fleeting fantasies that just send you into gales of laughter? I do that quite often, frequently in the middle of the night. In this case I was silently laughing so hard I was shaking the bed.
The fantasy was to just simply remove the toilet seat. Just unscrew the plastic bolts and retire it to the shed or the dump. And the next time he wanted to do the toilet ritual that involved sitting down he’d holler, “Where the heck’s the toilet seat?”
“Oh that?,” I’d yell back, “Since it’s always up and not used I figured it wasn’t needed so I hauled it away to the nuisance grounds (At our little town of Nokomis the dump is called the “nuisance grounds.”)
“What?!”
“I’ll tell you what,” I’d holler with great pleasure. “why don’t you just sit down there and do your business underwater, like you expect me to do.”
Until the end of time there will probably always be a war on whether the toilet seat should be up or down. Maybe we females should be like a woman I know who has her male-dominated family trained. Her guys all sit on the toilet instead of anointing it from a standing position.
It should, of course, be put down, and I’m not saying this from simply a female perspective. Men are taught to treat women with respect and courtesy and the toilet seat thing goes along with opening doors and being polite and chivalrous. It is simple good manners.
And if they can’t do that? Put a lock on the bathroom door and hide the key. There are a lot of trees out there.
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