The Jedi Knight and The Idiot

I have two dogs. They love the country, as you might guess, and spend as much time outside as possible. Their personalities are almost opposite. Elvis, who I believe spent his last life as a Sherpa or a Jedi knight, often sits in the winter rye that is growing in the garden and contemplates nature.

Nelson, on the other hand, is sort of an idiot. This week he spent half an hour snapping at bees as they flew out of the hive to stretch their wings after a long, hard winter. Every few minutes he would get stung in the face.

After about a dozen stings he gave up. He walked to a little muddy stream that was plump from winter run-off and stuck his entire face in the mud to relieve the effects of the bee venom.

This all happened as I placed onion sets in the garden. The onions can stand the cooler spring and need extra time to get going.

Planting onions helps me relieve the sting of anticipation for real spring to finally happen by letting me get my hands in the muddy spring earth. It also gives me a few quiet moments to contemplate nature.

People take after their dogs, they say.

Spring Time Sha-Boom

The Daffodils: "Step into my office; let's do some spring."

Me: "Finally, Motherfu*#er!"

When Love Ends By Blizzard Wave - OR - winter poem #2

This picture won't do it justice

This letter won't let you hear

The thunder of the wave

As it tumbles and tears

In moments it will crash

Into the house

And destroy the shed

It will drown the chickens

We'll all be dead, but you stayed in the frosty city

Shook fist after as I left

You scowled and cursed

Arms crossed under breast

"Go drink your whiskey"

You screamed as I drove away

I did

It's empty

That how you got this letter today, floating

In the boozy bottle

Drifting by currents

All the way until you plucked it

From the rubble and the decay

But, here's the thing I think of

As I write my dying notes

I left the coast to join the foothills

Yet mine are the words that float in this ocean

That isn't salty, where there is no room for reefs

In this heart forever icy

In this conversation, brief

That winter was too heavy

It made the woods roll in

They turned over and onto themselves

Like suffering in sin

They kicked and ate and plundered

They bit and tore and raged

Their thoughts were only inward

And nothing could be saved

So now I float forever frozen

And you're alive with all your spunk

Only one thing keeps me warm inside

That whiskey made me drunk

Fitzy and the Grey Squirrels

This is what it looks like in June.

See that little lane to the left of the big black walnut tree? That little lane leads to the road that in turn leads to civilization. Notice how you can't see the road from where the picture was taken (the porch of the farmhouse)?

It's a long lane - just under a quarter mile.

Here's what it looked like last week: That's two feet of snow.

I found myself snowed in at the farm and I knew I wouldn't have enough food for the following three days, which is how long it took me to dig out with a shovel.

Well, I guess I could have eaten pasta and jarred tomatoes from last summer (and in the end I did, along with some... protein), but, come on now. The woods are crawling with squirrels.

And now that the New York Times is writing stories about eating beavers(!) (and squirrel and lots of other cute little buggers) it might be the right time to share a squirrel recipe with the public.

I realize that most of you think that squirrels are cute and cuddly, but you're wrong. They are nasty, evil little creatures!

CONNIVING!

MEAN AND NASTY!

VICIOUS!

DESTRUCTIVE AND HATEFUL!

OH JESUS!

There.

Feel better?

Good.

Let's get to the cooking part...

Here's a recipe from an old cookbook called Game Cooking by Theodora FitzGibbon.

I didn't use Fitzy's recipe. I just have it here to prove to you that I'm not some backwoods hillbilly. She's written, right there in the headnote, that squirrel is popular all over the United States.

So, there.

Here's my recipe:

Squirrel Ragu

1 grey squirrel, cut into pieces

1 tablespoon fat (bacon fat, evoo, butter, whatever)

1 onion, chopped

1 garlic clove, smashed

1 pint jarred tomatoes

1 Asian eggplant, cut in pieces

Salt and pepper

Pasta

Season the squirrel with salt and pepper, then brown it in the fat in a heavy pot. Remove the squirrel and add the onion and garlic to the pot, stirring, until the onion is browned. Add the tomatoes, eggplant, and the squirrel along with any squirrel juices, and 3/4 teaspoon each of salt pepper. Cover the pot and braise for 2 hours or until the squirrel is very tender. Shred the meat and add it back to the ragu.

Boil pasta and toss with the ragu. Season to taste.

(As an aside, this dish pairs perfectly with what are being called "natural" wines. These are wines that are manipulated as little as possible and end up tasting funky, earthy, and well, a little gamey. France has a group of cult winemakers, fermenting in this style. Les Chemins de Bassac ISA vin de pays 2007 is the bottle I drank with this dish. It was nothing short of amazing with the squirrel. Of course, vin de pays means, "country wine," so, that makes sense.)

Both the New York Times and FitzGibbon are right, too. Squirrel is much less gamey than you'd expect. But, still, it's game, so, it's a little gamey. Get over it.

By the way, Game Cooking is a great book and I'm sure it's out of print. It has recipes for any animal you can imagine - raccoon, sea gull, turtle, and so on. It's also full of helpful and disturbing tips. If you collect cookbooks, like I do, then you should try and find yourself a copy. You never know when you'll need to un-taint some venison!

ANOTHER DEPRESSING WINTER POEM COMING NEXT!!!! YES!!!!!!!

Orchard

I stood there watching them through my breath of now

The orchard of yearlings and the ancient apple trees

Somewhere in time between them

Is me the picker of their fruit; the planter of the future

When The Winter Gets Tough

Have you looked outside? It's winter out there, no matter where you happen to be. In Brooklyn, things are looking awfully yucky.

(The view from my Brooklyn apartment. Blech!)

The streets are a repulsive cocktail of slush made unpleasantly corrosive from salt, unpleasantly yellow from dog pee, and unpleasantly grey from God only knows what. Since I have the time, it seems like a no-brainer to hightail it to the country, where there is also a shit-ton of snow.

But, at least it's pretty snow.

(A pink sunrise over the wagon shed... ahhh...)

Still, things are feeling pretty bleak.

So, instead of bringing you my new favorite way to cook black bear (that's coming, soon) or my new obsession with squirrel liver (also, on the way, soon), I've decided to change things up a bit and bring you some short, depressing winter poems inspired by what I see in the snow-covered country.

If short, depressing winter poems aren't your thing, don't worry; this phase won't last long. And sooner than we know it Big City Country Boy will be reveling in the green, lovely spring. (ALSO!!! There is some un-official and exciting news about the likely expansion of this forum, so be happy that you found this place long before it blew up. I thank you.)

First short, depressing winter poem - tomorrow!

Turkey, In A Pickle

Let's talk, Turkey.

Turkey is indigenous to the Americas. In fact, Ben Franklin, an all-time glutton (the dude ate a lot of things, but probably not too much turkey) wanted to name the wild turkey as the national bird instead of the bald eagle. Turkeys, you see, are wiley creatures. They're hard to hunt and are as fast as arrows. If you're even lucky enough to see one in the wild, you probably won't catch it. (Turkeys can hear a human sneeze up to a mile away.)

But they taste like... well, not shit, but not good.

When turkey is cooked to the USDA recommended temperature of 165°F it is dry. So dry that to eat is without gravy is a completely unpleasant experience. (Hence the invention of gravy.) It begs the question: Why do we still eat it?

I suppose the reason we still eat turkey on Holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas is because it's a tradition and it looks great on the platter. Remember that classic Norman Rockwell painting from 1943 with Grandma presenting a perfect bird to the perfect family? I wish my life were like that painting, complete with a great-tasting turkey.

But my (and I'm guessing your) not-so-perfect life is not like that painting, and my not-so-perfect bird - it doesn't taste good.

This fact has been written about at extent on almost every medium. And so far, I guess this story is not news.

But that's about to change. Because this space is not for whining about why turkey isn't good. This space is about finding a solution.

I got an idea the last time I was hanging out in a really hip neighborhood with some writer friends. After drinks we wandered to a local pub-ish restaurant in Brooklyn called Prime Meats. There's been a lot of hype about this place. People like it. So, naturally, I was skeptical. But as it turns out, they know what they're doing.

One of their specialties is chicken. Chicken, also... not always great. But they make sure it will be great by brining it IN PICKLE JUICE!

Brining foul is common. In fact, the best turkeys you can buy (kosher turkeys) have been brined. Brine adds flavor to the meat, via salt and sugar, and it also makes the meat moister by a process called osmosis that allows the meat cells to hold onto water while it's cooked. So inherently, brined birds will taste better. Pickles are also brined. The vinegar solution they age in contains salt, sugar, vinegar, water, and spices.

Wait. Those are the same ingredients in turkey brine. Oh. Well, that makes sense.

Plus, pickle juice has the added flavor of pickles, which, of course, also taste great. But here's the thing - you'll need at least 3 quarts of pickle juice to brine a turkey, and, that can mean lots of pickle eating. Too much, actually.

Instead, I went to a place that sells pickles and asked them for about a gallon of pickle juice. There are a lot of places like this in New York City, but over Thanksgiving, I was in Pennsylvania. The farmers' market in Allentown has a pickle shop, where, they charged me a buck a cup for the juice. They don't get a lot of requests for pickle juice, so instead of the gallon I asked for, they could only give me 3 quarts. It ended up being enough.

If you decide to give this wonderful idea (and I really mean that - the turkey was awesome) a whirl, then you should call your pickle person ahead and request the juice.

Here's the other thing; I cut the bird in pieces. Turkey breasts and legs cook at different rates, so to make sure each piece has the right amount of time in the oven or on the grill, they should be separated. Just do it. You'll be happy.

After the bird was cut up, I soaked it, overnight, in the pickle juice, heh, flipping the bird occasionally. Then, I grilled it until both the legs and the breasts were 145°F. (They slowly rose in temperature to 165°F as they rested.) (The legs were done before the breasts.)

It was BY FAR the best turkey I've ever had; moist, juicy, flavorful, and a little pickle-y. You ask me? I'd say we make the pickle the national bird.

(Gosh. They make a T-shirt for every occasion, these days...)