good bye winter

   Dear Friends,   

       Wow, I apologize for the long hiatus.  It was quite the winter for me here in northern Minnesota!  Unfortunately the freezing cold days of winter turned me back on to the comforts of starches.  There was a lot of macaroni and cheese in my life this winter.  And the vegetable lasagna with pesto alfredo sauce at work was hard to resist some days. Needless to say, but I will, those new jeans I bought in the fall are certainly a bit snug right now.   Alas, spring never came and now it is summer,  so it goes in northern Minnesota !  It has actually been a trying month for me so far.  I moved even farther north to the Canadian border on Moose Lake for a seasonal chef job I applied for and got.  The idea of spending the summer in the wilderness canoeing(re: Boundary Water Canoe Area), hiking and detoxing rent free and food paid for was pretty hard to say no to.  Not to mention the fact that I love traveling, living new places and meeting new people.

I knew I would have some rough days up here, missing my friends and being so isolated but I was and still am, up for the challenge.  What I did not anticipate was how extremely different, culturally I would be from the rest of my co-workers and bosses.  .  When I arrived the kitchen was stocked with loaves of sliced white bread, slices of processed American cheese, ice burg lettuce and pretty much EVERYTHING had some kind of additive whether it be corn syrup, oils, colorings or lots of long scientific words I do not know.  If I'm going to eat a piece of cheese I want to look at the label and see "ingredients: milk"  .  There is also a love of Walmart and Ford vehicles and strong distaste towards vegetarians and Al Franken that follows me through my days.  I live and work with "All-Americans" in the most cliched sense of the term.   This was a wake up call for me to realize how fortunate I am/was to be raised in the communities I was.  Where along with generalizing and making fun of Asians, using the word "fag" followed by the comment "I don't understand why they have to get all upset about it.  Its just a word" and eating white bread are all considered extremely politically incorrect.  I don't want to come off to them as being too good for their food preferences, or a snob, or some CRAZY LIBERAL,  it really is all they know.  It is challenging to keep the faith surrounded by such ignorance and closed mindedness. The other night for dinner we "only" had brown rice and it was an issue. But I feel I have to stand by the standards of nutrition I have spent so long developing for myself.  

And so yesterday I buckled up and drove the twenty minutes into town, I stopped at the one grocery store and stocked up on kombuchas, goat cheese, quinoa, beets, tofu, hummus, blue corn chips and bubbly water, to name a few.  

The great part of the job is cooking for all of our guests who come from all over the world to canoe and fish and I give them both their last warm meal before they go out and their first warm meal when they get back.  I also have an entire summer to try out new recipes.  So here they come!

Sorry again for such a long break, I hope these recipes keep you coming back for more!

Peace,

nyks