My grandma, a vibrant 90-year-old, returns to the show! We chat about her love of gardening, her secret to longevity (staying active!), and the art of making delicious gravy.
We discuss harvesting and preserving food, the cultural importance of shared meals, and the magic of cooking on a wood stove. We'll also hear stories about hunting trips, the respect for where our food comes from, and the bonds built around the dinner table.
This episode celebrates the journey of our food, the strength of family, and the timeless wisdom passed down through generations.
Check out the new DECKED system and get free shipping.
My grandma, a vibrant 90-year-old, returns to the show! We chat about her love of gardening, her secret to longevity (staying active!), and the art of making delicious gravy.
We discuss harvesting and preserving food, the cultural importance of shared meals, and the magic of cooking on a wood stove. We'll also hear stories about hunting trips, the respect for where our food comes from, and the bonds built around the dinner table.
This episode celebrates the journey of our food, the strength of family, and the timeless wisdom passed down through generations.
Check out the new DECKED system and get free shipping.
Tell me about making gravy.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's easy. You just, you know, fry some meat or have a roast and leave all those bits in there and skim off any fat. You know, you don't have to skim it all off, but just sprinkle flour, get it off the hot stove because it's you know, just get it off of there, move it to the next burner and blend that flour in with the drippings and then slowly add either broth or milk. And that's tricky, because you want to. You can put it back on the stove, but don't, you know it's tricky. But then it starts to thicken and there you got it. And the easy way to make biscuits and gravy is just cook your sausage, break it all up, brown it, sprinkle flour over it and then start adding milk. And there again, don't put it on a real hot stove, but start it up slow and you got sausage gravy. It's real easy.
Speaker 1:These are stories of outdoor adventure and expert advice from folks with calloused hands. I'm James Nash and this is the Sixth Ranch Podcast. This episode of the Sixth Ranch Podcast is brought to you by DECT that's D-E-C-K-E-D If you don't know what that is. Dect is a drawer system that goes in the bed of a pickup truck or a van and it'll fit just about any American-made pickup truck or van. It's a flat surface on top and then underneath there are two drawers that slide out that you can put your gear in, and it's going to be completely weatherproof, so I've never had snow or rain or anything get in there.
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Speaker 2:Grandma, what would you say is a typical March, typical March in Wallowa County? Yeah Well, unpredictable. In what ways? Well, it can start out like a lamb and get everybody excited about spring. You know, be a balmy day. It could be like 70 degrees down at Sheep Creek, at my cabin, and in a couple hours it can be snowing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's kind of what it's been doing. Hours it can be snowing. Yeah, that's kind of what it's been doing. It's sort of nice to have, uh have weather that is acting the way that everybody sort of remembers it, you know right like this is what march should be. It's like right, it's nice for a day, nice for an hour, and then it snows, and then it rains, and then it's nice, and then it blows 80 miles an hour.
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, the old timer said you never want to go far from your jacket in any month of the year in Wallowa County, and that's true.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's pretty good. Yeah. What should, uh, what should people be doing in March?
Speaker 2:What should people be doing in March? Well, it depends on your occupation. But what should they be doing? Well, if you want to garden, you should be thinking about that and maybe starting some plants. What kind of garden plants do you like to start? Tomatoes generally, that's about it Get the tomatoes started.
Speaker 1:Have you done that yet?
Speaker 2:Going to yeah.
Speaker 1:How many gardens will you have this year?
Speaker 2:Oh, it's hard telling, I don't know. It depends on you know, when you're going on 91, you're kind of in your mind you think you can have all that you've had in the past, but you have to. It's reality check time when you get out there with the cultivator and the stooping over and stuff. Well, you are rototilling by hand still right. Well, yeah, when I I maintain the weeds, initially the garden plot is tilled by a rototiller, but to control the weeds and keep the soil friable, I prefer the little old-fashioned uh push tiller that thing is like a torture device.
Speaker 2:You know I've just been reading some accounts of early women in this county. Among them are your descendants, fannie Applegate, and the things that they went through and endured, and some of those women lived to be 95. So work doesn't hurt you and actually I think it prolongs your life. The hardships and the physical work yeah, the thing is from childhood. You just keep doing it because you can't really. I see a lot of older women at 60, it's too late. You have to just, you have to have built up that those muscles all through your life, hiking or however you do it. Hard work is just and those women proved it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they proved it now, at age 90. How do you look back at 60 year old women? Do they seem young, young to you?
Speaker 2:oh yeah. Well, no, some of them don't, though some of them don't. Um age wise 60 is a child to me now, but but I see 60 year old women that look 80. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, and and probably not in a good way either, right no and um, a lot of it's mental because, well, a lot of women think when they get 30 that their life is over. But I think this, for living, is a very important part. And you know your outlook on life. Yeah, how has your outlook changed as you've gotten older? How's it changed? Well, I just thank God every morning I'm alive and not in the obituaries. Yeah, I'm just can't wait to get up in the morning because every day is different and I think back on my life and how it's led to coming to this beautiful place and I have a lovely home and a good family and a sense of community. Been here 55 years, I guess.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's talk about gardens a little bit more, because I'm thinking about putting in a garden this year. Last year I got my orchard going. I was out there working in it yesterday and one of my apple trees had blown over in one of these big windstorms year old apple tree, but I wiggled the limbs. They feel like they're still alive. It's growing little buds and it hadn't fallen all the way over, it just tipped over. So I I've got it tied up right now and I'm going to give it a chance. I think I've got room for three more trees in there, so I'll probably plant another apple tree, maybe another cherry tree. I've got a pear, I've got a plum, I've got a peach tree. You have any recommendations? What should my third tree be?
Speaker 2:You have a peach plum apple.
Speaker 1:Peach plum. I've got a couple apples. I've got a pear.
Speaker 2:I've got one cherry tree right now. Oh, one cherry tree, I was gonna say pie cherries do really well. Um, we're kind of restricted up here at this altitude and, like you say, the wind and and deer. But um, kind of look around the neighborhood to see what survived. Apples are a mainstay and the variety makes a big difference. But as far as a new tree, we'll be brave. You know, just kind of down at the nursery, nathan can tell you what's good better than I can, because, um, I know the canyons are totally different. But kind of look around at some of these old orchards and maybe get a slip of theirs and is there something you'd like to plant that you aren't sure about?
Speaker 1:I mean I, I look at some of the stuff that they say is rated for this zone. That's a little bit exotic for here. Like my peach tree, you know that's a risk and it started to grow some little peaches last year but then we got that frost at the end of June and it killed them. Yeah, Um, my potatoes came back after that frost a little bit. They didn't do great but they did come back. But maybe another cherry tree it's great but they did come back. But maybe another cherry tree it's nice to have, it's nice to have that, that early season fruit. You know the cherries are on before anything else do you like apricots?
Speaker 1:I do like apricots well, there's an apricot.
Speaker 2:Is it a manchurian apricot? Anyway, it's kind of a colder climate. Uh, nathan could help you on that, but um, that might work yeah, yeah, that's a good idea it's good to be brave because, uh, down at the creek where it's lower elevation, you know I'm originally from california and, um, we can't have persimmons up here yeah and so I planted it.
Speaker 2:And we can't have quinces, so I planted a quince tree, or the people that have the magic garden at my place put one in at my request, and that thing is bearing like crazy every year now, and I think to date I may have the only persimmon tree alive in the whole county down there. And it's had setbacks.
Speaker 2:You know, the elk and deer have eaten it um I'm sure the bears get in there and the bears get in there, but it it persists, it's still, it's still alive. So yeah, and then soil makes a big difference too. You kind of need to know, um, the acidity of the soil for different things too, just little things like that. But it's tough surviving up here where you know where the winds and the winter and stuff get through those first years.
Speaker 1:Okay, all right. So now we're getting back to the garden. I was thinking about going just to the east of my house over here. Now we're getting back to the garden. I was thinking about going just to the east of my house over here and I was going to go ahead and build a nice tall fence around it, because there are deer and elk and every other thing around Probably the same kind of fence that I put around the orchard. That worked well last year. I feel pretty confident in that height. Eight feet seems to be good enough. How big should a garden be?
Speaker 2:As big as you have the ability to care for it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, how do you know that when you're just getting started?
Speaker 2:Well, I don't. I always put too big of a garden in, because I love to garden, and when I go to buy the seed I can just see the pictures on the packet growing in my garden, and so I end up filling it completely full and then planting stuff too close together. You know, it's a disease, it just gets out of hand.
Speaker 1:Especially the squash.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it just gets out of hand, and so especially the squash. Yeah, yeah, this man, um, this man that read one of my columns, sent me a packet of seed with this tremendous story about the seed that was found in an earthenware pot in arizona and carbon dated to be some thousands of years old, and cracked it open in the seed. So anyway, um, this man, uh, native american, stub mini goats. Have you heard this story before?
Speaker 1:I've not heard about stubbed minigoats.
Speaker 2:Well stubbed minigoats planted it and you have to be careful where you plant it, because I mean he had all these testimonials with pictures and everything. So anyway I couldn't wait to plant it and I planted it up here in Alderslope, which my place, has deep dark loam that I've never hit the bottom of. There's an alluvial plane of it and and you can make all kinds of mistakes there and still have a garden. But anyway, back to many goats and the seed. Um, I planted this squash and it squarsh squash anyway, um usually say squash yeah, yeah and um, so it comes up.
Speaker 2:It's very prolific, almost every seed comes up, so you thin it and um, on one occasion, uh, on alder slope, I planted it and it uh started, started heading toward the cherry tree and so I encouraged it and then it started climbing the tree and I encouraged it and it went up and it had, you know, five babies and you have to be careful because it climbs the fence and heads out in different directions. But the original seed were different colors and then through the years, you know, it kind of got a life of its own and people bought it. I gave it to people and they all had stories and it kind of reverted to a light green. And it kind of reverted to a light green. But the meat is just sweet and makes better pumpkin pie than pumpkin. And anyway, I wanted to get back to the man that gave me this, because this is over a 20-year period. I'm still growing it, but it's an adventure. Yeah, okay so.
Speaker 1:So what was your question?
Speaker 2:we're trying to figure out how big my garden's going to be okay, just um you up here, where you are, you have a lot of rocks yeah, they're the the spot that I have picked out.
Speaker 1:I've got about two feet of really nice topsoil and then it gets into some a little layer of clay and then it gets down into some rock. But the topsoil that's there is pretty nice. It's also never been tilled, it's never been farmed, it's never been sprayed. It's as virgin as soil gets anywhere yeah and it the stuff that's on top. It is that same loam that we've got on your part of the slope.
Speaker 2:Good, good, yeah, you want to keep like, in the fall, put leaves there um straw. Just keep building that um humus up you know, to hold the moisture because the nutrients in the soil will be good. Yeah, chicken manure yeah, okay.
Speaker 1:So what kinds of things should a novice gardener plant?
Speaker 2:well, you get instant gratification from radishes. Um, I don't care for them all that much, but they just hardly ever fail. But um, just you know. But don't plant most things until after june 1st, I don't care how great the weather is. They say, when the leaves come out on the trees you can plant your potatoes, and that is true okay the old timers say that.
Speaker 2:But um, don't get excited about it, ted Juvie and I talk about it. He's a master gardener, ted is, and some of the best gardens we've planted have been as late as June 10th, because the soil has to be warm and the nights have to be warm, because initially you could get that maybe in a couple days and say may, but then it's going to come up and you're going to get a frost and it's going to kill them. So just kind of wait till all danger of frost is passed and um but um, corn, you know, just give it your best shot, because you never know what kind of year you're going to have.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:But you have to be an optimist and not get discouraged.
Speaker 1:Okay, good to know. So squash radishes, corn potatoes.
Speaker 2:What are your likes? What do you like?
Speaker 1:I really like those purple potatoes that they grow out there on Prairie Creek.
Speaker 2:Oh well, that should be easy to grow.
Speaker 1:Those things are delicious. I think they're actually a sweet potato.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think so too.
Speaker 1:I love those things and I planted some of them last year in my orchard and they got you know about twice the size of a golf ball, I guess, before all the tops kind of came down. And that's when I dug them up. But again they got that late frost and I thought they were all just dead. But they did come back. Potatoes seemed to be pretty tough.
Speaker 2:When did they get the frost? In the fall or in the spring it?
Speaker 1:was like June 24th or 25th of last year. You remember that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, they did yeah. Where'd you get your seed?
Speaker 1:I got it from grain growers.
Speaker 2:That should be good.
Speaker 1:Certified seed yeah because that's a big deal. Uh, to talk me through, like what what people should use for potato seed and what they shouldn't, and why you should never plant like uh, potatoes that have gone to seed that you bought at the grocery store.
Speaker 2:You should insist that it be certified, because things like hollow heart and all kinds of diseases can come with with seed that's not certified. It's really important. Grain growers has good seed and nathan has good seed down there, but that's not certified is really important. Grangors has good seed and Nathan has good seed down there. But, that's very important, and yeah.
Speaker 1:Because those diseases stay in the ground, right? Oh yeah, so once you've got it, there's no getting away from it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you've got virgin soil up here, so you want to keep it that way. Sure, you've got virgin soil up here, so you want to keep it that way. Sure, there again, you need to build up the humus in the soil.
Speaker 1:Over in.
Speaker 2:Hermiston, they raise great potatoes because it's sandy, almost you don't want to overwater them. Water them, um, yeah, it's there's, there's you? You get to be a good gardener by making mistakes and learning. You know on your own, but, um, but be an optimist tomatoes give people a lot of trouble.
Speaker 1:People struggle to grow tomatoes.
Speaker 2:It seems like yeah, there's all kinds of things related to that too. Of course you need full sun for anything like that and they are susceptible to frost. But if you get a short-season tomato, like early girl, they're 70-day, they usually work. But I like, I like now to use the heirloom varieties and, uh, sometimes some of these young gardeners will come out with a plant that has it's just gets great big, juicy slicing tomatoes that that we save the seeds. I have a friend and we save the seeds and plant them year after year and, oh gosh, they're good yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:When we were planting a a tree in in your orchard and garden down there at sheep creek a couple years ago, you were telling me that you didn't understand why women went to the gym when they could just garden.
Speaker 2:That's right. It uses every muscle you have, and then you eat the fruit of your labors.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Sort of like the saying about the man who cuts firewood warms himself twice. Right Gardens keep you healthy in more ways than just the good food that comes out of it oh yeah, yeah, you're out there breathing everything that's good in and uh, yeah, and it's.
Speaker 2:It's a wonderful thing, even though sometimes it's kind of hard. You're. There's just so much satisfaction and watching what you plant, grow and then um and weeding. I love every part of it. Yeah, I've had a garden for years and years and years, since I was a teenager first married I think you've had at least two, if not three, gardens for decades yeah, I used to help bill george, the old fellow that lived on the slope.
Speaker 2:When he got older I took over his garden. Then I had the one at the slope and the one on Prairie Creek. Yeah, I love gardens. You know my grandma that lived to be 101 or something. She was so sad when she couldn't bend over and pick a weed. That was the saddest thing in her life and I think she was close to 100 when that happened.
Speaker 1:Well, if that happens to you, we'll build you some garden boxes so that you can do it without having to bend over.
Speaker 2:Oh, raised beds, yeah, raised beds are nice, but I love the soil. But it's a lot of work. You don't want to let the weeds get ahead of you, because then they win um it's pretty nice just to get down and stick your hands in the dirt oh yeah I think that that people miss out on that a lot of times.
Speaker 1:They don't they don't realize just how good that feels.
Speaker 1:I was burning some piles out here the other day and had a fire almost get away from me and, uh, you know, we ended up getting it caught but, uh, but I still had a bunch of wood that was burning in the middle of it and the wind was blowing and I didn't want the sparks to get in the grass.
Speaker 1:So I went around and kind of put it out the way I put out fires when I was fighting fire back in the day and I remembered one of my favorite things about fighting fire was digging a hole next to some logs that were on fire and then scooping that wet, cool dirt out of that hole and then rubbing those logs down, um, and kind of how it sizzles and just how pretty that charcoal is and it's just, you know, perfectly black and shimmering and, uh, you know, you feel the the cool of the earth and the warmth of that wood and it's just pretty special and you don't realize it when you're, you know, fighting fire as a, as a young guy. But but now I I kind of appreciate just sticking my hands in the dirt and and playing with it feels good oh yeah, it does.
Speaker 2:And even that dirt is so full of minerals, you know, and good dirt like like we have up here, yeah, it's all good for you. The little kids that were, I've been reading about these early day pioneers and, um, yeah, they just, they're like growing things, like vegetables and things in the garden. They were because they were outside so much right and that's, I think, was one of the secrets to their longevity what are some other secrets to longevity?
Speaker 2:I mean the the women, especially in our family, live for a very long time yeah, we have the genetic factor both of on both sides of yours and mine, but um, but attitude, you know. You, um, thankfulness and attitude and simple pleasures. Like you know, the world's kind of going mad, but I don't dwell on that. There's not a thing I can do about it, except bloom where I'm planted, you know, but, um, just appreciating everything, and and that includes humanity, because, in spite of what you hear, there's a lot of good people out there that have desires and want to live a good life and do, and I have faith in our youth. They say the world's going to pieces, but I said, my gosh, our young people. They have to deal with all the hardships that we did. I just think that it's in good hands. I'm real optimistic about that.
Speaker 1:Some hardships. If you come through them, you know it makes you a lot stronger.
Speaker 2:Yep hardships.
Speaker 1:If you come through them, you know it makes you a lot stronger, and others seems like it's just a weight that you carry around forever yeah what? What's the real difference? Do you think it's the hardship itself, or is it how we go about dealing with it, or is it the support from the people around us?
Speaker 2:well, there's so many, so many factors and every individual case is different and you know, some things like you've been through and other people have. It's just tough. You know it's really tough. But I think that if you're just thankful, you know, just concentrate on being thankful that you know that you were spared and can be alive and not let things weigh on your conscience. You know, but um, does that help answer your question?
Speaker 2:I think so yeah, you have to let a lot of things go. You know we've had a lot of sadness in our family and just recently lost a great-grandchild, but but that great-grandchild left a mark and. Yeah, I know it's a good place and we just can't dwell on that because life is for the living. Life is for the living.
Speaker 1:Something that people often get confused about, I think, especially folks who live in town is that they think that they can live a life without animals dying to support them. They think that they can live a life without animals dying to support them, and you know that's out here. We're very closely connected with the reality of that, like we know that every day there's animals that are dying so that we can live, and that's just part of the deal. Life eats life. How do you think or how do you go about talking to to folks who who only live in cities, that that feel uncomfortable about animal agriculture or feel uncomfortable about hunting and maybe don't like it?
Speaker 2:Well, I think that you have to put yourself in their shoes and they were brought up so different than we were and they're subjected to outside stimuli that is influencing, has influenced them when they were young. But I think the more we educate like your I think your podcast does a wonderful job of that. Also, when I would shoot a cow, elk or a deer or a grouse or something, I always did it with a thankful heart. And, you know, other predators eat, eat their own kind. Some of the male species you know eat their own, their own offspring, and so it's just a normal part of who we are and who the world is.
Speaker 2:And, um, I think social media has not done that justice. I think that, um, I don't know, I think you just have to live by example, and I have really dear friends that don't eat meat and, um, that doesn't mean I don't like them or anything, but you know, lots of times I'll cook a pot roast or something and they go. I just can't resist that and they end up saying that was the best food they ever ate.
Speaker 2:And they change, you know, and so. But if they some of them don't, that's okay. But if some of them don't, that's okay. But I think you just have to let it be and go on your way. But you can be an example of good health. You know amino acids, I mean oh gosh, your hair everything. You know. I used to raise cattle and sheep. They looked like what I fed them. I fed them a good diet. It just made them glow. We're the same way. We have to have Pills can't do it. Good, fresh, wholesome, not packaged food, but real, down-to-earth food is pretty hard to beat.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. What's your favorite? What are some of your favorite foods?
Speaker 2:Oh man, Well, I love a pot roast. I like steak I have to have meat once or twice a day, I'm sorry and my fresh eggs, but my favorite food. I love food. I like the fresh garden vegetables. I love seafood. I love shrimp you know if it's really good shrimp, I don't know. I don't have a favorite food Whole milk, Everything that's supposed to be bad for you. I love homemade bread.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I watched a documentary on julia child when I was uh flying to hawaii the other day. I didn't realize just what a treasure she was did. Did her style of cooking, um, did that have any influence on you?
Speaker 2:um, no, because, see, I grew up without television. Yeah and um, but I did read julia, julia, and uh, she just substantiated everything. I agreed with her completely Butter, there's nothing like butter to cook with. And she was. And look, she lived a long time. And there again it's attitude.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:She loved life.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you know a lot of the foods that people will occasionally point at and say that's unhealthy. That's what she cooked with the most. Yeah, that is flavor.
Speaker 2:But she also. You know, there's a wonderful thing about getting together at a table with friends and having good food. Our Sheep Creek Word Herders, word herders, my writers group there were 20 there last month and it was just a feast and um, and meat is usually showcased because I supplied, but um, there's just something good about take sitting down and eating a meal with people and that goes, it's primal, it goes way back.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, I'm going to give you a great big piece of this fat yellowfin tuna and then maybe you can share that with somebody or hoard it all to yourself. The thing is they're in big blocks. They're like four or five pound blocks. These fish were just enormous, and once you thaw it out, you're want to, you're gonna want to eat it, oh sure yeah yeah, well, how big would would it be the piece?
Speaker 1:oh, probably four or five pounds oh good, well, I'll share it yeah yeah, yeah, but uh that's a food that I've found is really satisfying uh you know, salmon is a food that I've found is really satisfying.
Speaker 1:You know salmon is a food, that food. It's an animal more than anything, but salmon as a meat is something that is just really really satisfying. It never makes me feel bad to eat it. A little bit will fill you up pretty quickly. You get a lot of good energy, you sleep well and I found that tuna is a lot the same and, okay, the first pieces I cut off this thing. You know I was cutting it off in sizes like what I normally eat and I was like man, I'm full by the time. I'm two-thirds of the way through this and I think it's just better food yeah, it's rich, it's really rich and and nutritious.
Speaker 1:I think that that's a that's an important thing for people to to consider these days is if you're eating a large quantity of something, then your, your body, is telling you that you need a lot of it to to get anything out of it, and the foods that that fill you up really quickly. You need less of it, right? So the density of that quality is something that folks just don't consider very much.
Speaker 1:But we find that with elk, we find that with good grass-fed beef, with these wild fish, all that stuff, you just don't end up eating as much of it as you would of something that's a lot lower quality.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're satisfied. I remember, excuse me, the basque ladies. Um, I'd say when you're, you know they worked hard and they walked miles behind those sheep. But they'd say in the morning, if you just take a little bit of meat and eat that, eat a little bit of meat and eat that, eat a little bit of meat, it'll last till noon. And I always remembered that. You know, so lots of times if I'm really busy and have gardening and chores and stuff, I'll just take a little piece of leftover roast or something for breakfast and it will. And, just like you said, you don't have to fill your body up with a lot of fattening things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So after your garden is planted and grown and you start to harvest stuff, you've got more food there than what you can eat right away and I know you like to go around and give a lot of that produce away to people, but you also like to preserve a lot of that food. What are some of the methods you use for preserving what comes out of your garden?
Speaker 2:Well, I make sauerkraut out of the cabbage. Cabbages do very well here, and sauerkraut can be canned or frozen and it's wonderful. It's good for you, the probiotics, it's just good. And then I make pickles, all kinds of pickles, pickle beets, pickled cucumbers, and then I can.
Speaker 1:Pickled green beans. I love your pickled green beans.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I didn't get any last year, but yeah, I love. I mean, right now that's what I live on is a jar of peaches or pears and little yogurt, and just it's just wonderful to have. You know I don't go to the grocery store too often.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then I love to give even my canned stuff away, and I know you do too.
Speaker 1:You preserve a lot of food, but um, I can more meat than anything else, though I mean I don't have a garden yet, but I I'm gonna at least build the fence around it this year and maybe, you know, start with something that I feel like I can manage put put some potatoes in there and some rows, and it would be fantastic, fantastic to try to grow some corn. It's such a gamble here.
Speaker 2:Well, it seems like I had corn clear till October last year. I even had a long-season corn. It depends on the year, so it's kind of a gamble, but boy, it's worth it. It's so sweet and good. I just froze a lot of my ears. I took the silk out and just wrapped the husk around and didn't blanch it or anything, just froze it. But it's kind of tricky when you go to eat it you want to let it thaw out or cook it. Let it thaw out and so that moisture is out and then cook it. But it's. It's really amazing how that will keep do you can much meat you know I canned chicken.
Speaker 2:I canned um, what else did? I can venison. When I had the family I did a lot more of that, but, um, not a lot of meat no I have the pressure cooker though, yeah, I really like canned elk oh man it's so good, you know, I'll eat a jar of that once a week, if not twice a week.
Speaker 1:Wow, good for you. Uh, it's, you know. Throw a little mayonnaise in there with in some salt and pepper, and I don't ever season it. Uh, when I can it, because I can make it taste like whatever I want once I pull it out but if you, if you get your mix wrong when you're canning it, you can ruin the whole great big batch, right, yeah, right.
Speaker 2:And you just press the meat in there and it makes its own juices too, or do? You put a little broth in.
Speaker 1:You know, I've gone both ways. I've added just like a tablespoon or two of broth. I usually put a pinch of kosher salt in it, but that's it. Yeah, that's it. I don't know that the broth makes that much difference.
Speaker 2:No, because you want the flavor of the natural flavor of the meat.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, and if you're making your own broth it's tough to get the fat out of it, and I don't really want fat in this canned elk meat. You know there's a little bit that skims up on the top and I just scrape that off.
Speaker 2:But yeah that elk fat doesn't taste very good no, no, the gamey fat is hard and it just doesn't have the flavor.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah yeah, but uh, coming up on on bear season, bear season starts on, oh gosh, just here in a couple days, on Monday, I think Wow, yeah, I'll have two bear tags this spring, so hopefully I can get you some. If I get an early one, I might have some good fat on it for you.
Speaker 2:Okay, like pie crust yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. What other wild game requests?
Speaker 2:do you have for this year? Gosh, I'll take anything I can get, because I don't hunt anymore. Yeah, I, I just I love any kind of wild would you like to hunt again? Oh, I don't know, probably not. Yeah, probably not how come?
Speaker 2:well, um, it's physical. You know the way I like to hunt. I don't like to road hunt in a pickup. Yeah, and I, I remember all those times I scrunched down and crawled on my hands and knees or my belly to get a good shot. You know, and it's just physical, and I like to help with a lot of the work too, and just that was a time in my life. But, now I'll just take yours.
Speaker 1:Well, that's perfectly fine. Well, that's perfectly fine, that's perfectly fine. Well, if you do decide that you want to hunt again, even if you just want to go hunting for an old white-tailed doe or something like that, you let me know and we'll figure out a way for you to do it and you can do as much or as little of the work as you would like to okay, okay.
Speaker 2:Thank you, james.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So I'll remember that, because I used to take you hunting when you were pretend hunting, when you were about two or three years old.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, people ask me all the time. You know when I'm being interviewed for stuff. You know when did you get into hunting? It's like, like, like you're saying before I could talk yeah, we pretended and you were really into it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we pretend we were gutting them out.
Speaker 1:You know that was fun, had a tent in the living room and then all the times that you took me fishing out in the irrigation ditches and stuff and it was incredible, teaching me how to trap. Uh, that was a really, really important education I'm I'm grateful for, for everything you taught me when I was a little kid and, more than anything, it just it. It sparked an interest that I've carried my whole life and and have turned into a profession now yeah, I'm so happy for you because, um, yeah, your podcast just reflects that.
Speaker 1:Um, you have a huge following what, uh, what's the most memorable hunt you were ever on?
Speaker 2:the most memorable hunt. Oh, I probably told you this before, but uh, doug and I hadn't been married too long and we had mule deer buck tags for amnaha snake river and he had the doug bar ranch then, and so the mule deer used to be just thick down there. Bucks were really plentiful. They came to the alfalfa field on the flat and so we went to fill my tag and we were horseback and we were riding up a real steep canyon trail, cow trail, on um horses, and I had my 243 and um.
Speaker 2:Anyway, out of this brush patch, thorn brush stick it um, exploded this buck and he went straight uphill and I started to get off. I got off my horse and I just stood up and was gonna shoot and Doug said no, you can't do that. I said but he's leaving, I gotta do, I don't have time. He said you have to get a rest and you have to do something with your horse. And I was just going crazy.
Speaker 2:So anyway, I completely disregarded everything he said, stood up and waved my gun and he had just hit the skyline and I shot right in front of him and got him, as it turned out, right through the heart. It was a pure accident and he came tumbling down and landed just below us in this cactus patch and, oh, my husband was mad. Oh, he was so mad because it shouldn't have happened and he disobeyed me. I mean, I disobeyed him. And then here was all these thorns where he had to cut to, you know, to gut it, and from the beginning to the end it was just horrible. I was laughing, I couldn't laugh, but I was laughing and laughing on the inside yeah, and then we got it on this side hill on to this.
Speaker 1:Um well, I think he had to lead his horse because he put it on there, but I was just so thrilled that was well, I think that's a great grandma, oh dear for, for those out there listening, we don't necessarily want to shoot stuff that's on the skyline. Um, that's kind of a no-no, but uh, it turned out okay in this case and we'll just call it a win when I'm hunting in Texas with my friend Brandon.
Speaker 1:All of those deer are covered in cactus. You know they just live in it and they've got quite a bit of scar tissue on their front legs especially and on their chest a little bit. But they're just going through that cactus all the time and you definitely got to pay attention when you're skinning them and not just grab hold of everything because there's some pokey stuff in there. Yeah well, that's pretty great. Uh, what's your favorite wild game animal to eat?
Speaker 1:well, elk backstrap is pretty hard to beat yeah, yeah, how do you like to cook it?
Speaker 2:rare. I get a cast iron frying pan hot with a little butter maybe, and then I just sear it on either side. I I want to know the meat and who killed it first, but uh, oh, I love yeah.
Speaker 1:Cast iron has gotten really popular again in the past few years, which is great, you know, I think it's a tremendous tool in the kitchen and when you're camping. But yeah, it's been interesting to sort of see people looking at old cast iron again. And then there's also some companies that are making some new cast iron. That's really really nice as well.
Speaker 2:It doesn't have the seasoning as the old ones, though.
Speaker 1:No, it doesn't.
Speaker 2:You have to kind of use it and know how to do it and it imparts kind of a flavor. But you know, real old cast iron. I think there's something not medicinal but nutritious in the iron. I really do, because that's practically all I cook with and, um, just yeah, I really like it yeah, how do you take care of cast iron?
Speaker 2:well, they say you shouldn't wash it with soap. But, um, you know, I give it a good cleaning once in a while. It depends on what I've cooked, but I always keep it seasoned, you know, always keep the grease in it, maybe a little bacon grease to rub in it afterwards.
Speaker 2:But if it's seasoned really well, you can, you know, wash it with hot water and soap and it'll still be good. But it's not good to boil water in it or something acidic. But you'd have to re-season it then. But it should be so that you could almost, without putting any grease in it, sear something yeah, yeah, yeah, like if you cook a, a chili or something that's got some tomato in it. That can be pretty hard on it. Yeah, tomato is hard on.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's it but uh, the other thing I found is just, you got to use it.
Speaker 2:Yes, the more you use them, the happier they are yeah, it's like sourdough, you got to use them and um and I do that most of the time yeah, have you been making any pies lately?
Speaker 2:oh yeah yeah, I kind of got in trouble. Not in trouble, but kind of got out of hand. They asked me for the healthy futures dinner to to bake a pie, donate a pie. Um no, not a pie, it was a, it was a sourdough breakfast. Anyway, it sold for $2,900. And I still have to do it down at the creek. I have to cook it on a wood cook stove you're gonna make sourdough pancakes yeah, while huckleberry sourdough pancakes cooked on my old monarch.
Speaker 1:But but pies let let's get into that a little bit more. I don't want to gloss up, gloss over this. So your old monarch, but but pies, let's get into that a little bit more. I don't want to gloss up, gloss over this.
Speaker 2:So your old monarch is a wood cook stove yeah, it came up on a boat from lewiston on the snake river when jidge chippet owned it so that probably would have been a steamboat I don't know yeah, yeah, I don't know what year would that have been? I don't know. Yeah, yeah, I don't know what year would that have been?
Speaker 1:I don't know that either, but it was a long time ago, yeah, yeah, do you know? A decade maybe.
Speaker 2:I know I saw a monarch like this on Facebook and it's one of the first made. It's a beautiful stove.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so how do you cook with a wood cookstove? What is that? Most people have never seen that, don't know what it is.
Speaker 2:Well, it's something you don't just learn immediately. The main thing is you have to have the right kind of wood, the right length and the wood that'll hold coals.
Speaker 2:So it's got like a firebox on one side. Yeah, the left side has a firebox and you fill it. You know below. But you regulate the heat by. Of course your hottest part is going to be right where it goes up the stovepipe, but for on high you put it there and then you just move it to the right over the top of the oven for simmer and everything for simmer and everything, and it's kind of tricky, but there's nothing like that for pancakes or baking bread. The oven also is regulated the same way. You might have to go in and turn your cake around or something to brown it next to the firebox. But the kind of wood you use, the heat of the fire, it all depends on what you're cooking and it's an art and it just comes naturally the more you do it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so for somebody to come and have some sourdough huckleberry pancakes with you costs $2,900.
Speaker 2:Well, this was a high bid. It got out of hand Oh,900. Well, this was a high bid. It got out of hand oh dear. And I'm supposed to have pretty soon supposed to do this because in the spring because it heats the kitchen up too much to do it in the summer.
Speaker 1:What's the most one of your pies has ever sold for at auction.
Speaker 2:Oh, I can't remember. I think hundred dollars or something like that oh, more than that.
Speaker 1:I've seen most of them go for over a thousand grandma well, I can't.
Speaker 2:I have one man who will just pay um whatever it takes for a mincemeat, because I make it from elk neck and he just comes there to buy the pie and last year I didn't have enough mincemeat so I didn't make one and he was really disappointed.
Speaker 1:Oh, shame on me, I didn't get you enough elk neck last year.
Speaker 2:I ran out of mincemeat. Yeah, oh, no, yeah.
Speaker 1:I failed you, grandma, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2:That's okay. I put out a plea to my family. But now I think next year I'll get one.
Speaker 1:You're going to be swimming in elk neck this year.
Speaker 2:Going to have to get a freezer dedicated for it. I don't want too much because that's work. The best way to cook an elk neck is to put it on in a big canner and put it on the wood cook stove and just leave it there all day till all the meat falls off the neck bones, and then the next day you grind it up you know like a pressure canner well, I just have an old pressure canner bottom okay, I use.
Speaker 1:So it's not like you're putting the top.
Speaker 2:No, you don't, you don't use your pressure canner. No, I guess you could, but I've always done it like this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I got a new pressure canner this year because we went through so much elk last year. I got a new one this year. That is huge. It's like two and a half feet tall. Wow, it's the biggest American-made canner that I could find.
Speaker 1:And you know those, those batches just take forever. You know it takes a long time to get everything cut up and put it in your cans and your lids put on and then it's got to come up to temperature and you've got to let it steam and evacuate all the air out of there. And then you're cooking for 90 minutes and you've got to let it steam and evacuate all the air out of there and then you're cooking for 90 minutes, then you've got to let it naturally come back down in temperature. So for people who are going to get into canning meat especially, I really recommend that you get just the biggest canner you possibly can. If you have a glass cooktop, you don't want to do that because you can break it. It's too much weight. But if you've got, you know I don't really see the old coil electric ones anymore. But propane, you know, is really ideal for it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, that's quite an art and you appreciate the old timers, because Mary Marks told me they would take they did it outside and had a fire or have a wood cook stove. They'd have a summer kitchen because it would get hot down there and they would do wash tubs with two layers of things. They they had to pressure cook and like meat and it would just go for hours, you know, yeah, until it was done.
Speaker 1:But can you imagine those women now, all that work, oh, who are some of the the pioneer women around this area that you really admire.
Speaker 2:Well, mary Marks was one of them, but in the lower valley they're all gone now but there were so many. Ruth Barrymore, her husband was killed in a mill accident and she raised those little boys and kept the whole ranch together. She was amazing and kept the whole ranch together. She was amazing. The Carmins they were just. The whole county was just full of them. There's so many I couldn't even begin to. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Do any stories stick out?
Speaker 2:Gosh. Well, mary, she used to spend a lot of time up in cow camp where there was no electricity and she'd feed. Well, she never knew if she was going to have five or ten people, you know, depending when it was fall right or whatever. But she could just make a meal so fast, because she would put canned goods on a pack horse and take them from down on the river up there, open up like a can of meat or something like that. But there were a lot of stories. There was one time, though, that the writers came in and they hadn't cut her any wood and she wasn't about to do it. So they came in. The cowboys came in for their supper, and here was a crude table, and here was the axe stuck in the middle of the table. They had to go out and cut wood.
Speaker 1:That's a pretty stern message.
Speaker 2:And then in my book there was the one about the polliwog gravy. Did you read that?
Speaker 2:no well I mean I've read it, but yeah yeah, anyway, so she, she made this gravy and then a whole bunch of other people showed up to eat and so she said she had to water down the gravy and she sent one of the kids younger boys out to the spring to get some some water, and and a bunch of pollywogs got in it and so they just, you know, they didn't say anything, they just left him there and she poured it in, and here we're. Oh, she could have killed those boys, but they were. Just she cooked them in the gravy and everybody ate them and the boys giggled all over. She called it the Pollywog gravy.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, why not? Especially if you don't know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, future frog legs.
Speaker 1:But also, who's going to complain about the food from a gal that's sticking an axe in the middle of the table? You know, not me yeah.
Speaker 2:And another time she, um, she was helping, they put fence material. Well, roll a wire on a mule and rode clear up under the rims to start you know where those people built fences was incredible. And um, just straight up and down and kid her husband. Kid said she said you can't take that wire up there, like that's going to roll to the bottom. And he said no, it's not. She said yes, it is so sure enough. They got up there and they unloaded it and it rolled to the bottom and she just rode off and left him. She said I'm not bringing the wire back either. So that's what those women did and they told those stories. Of course, through the years the stories get a little different, but basically they're the same.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they get better better.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the meaning is still there tell me about making gravy oh, that's easy.
Speaker 2:You just, you know, fry some meat or have a roast and and leave all those bits in there and skim off any fat. You know, you don't have to skim it all off, but just sprinkle flour, get, get it off the hot stove because it's you know, just get it off of there, move it to the next burner and blend that flour in with the drippings and then slowly add either broth or milk and and that's tricky because you want to you can put it back on the stove, but don't, you know it's tricky. But then it starts to thicken and there you got it. And the easy way to make biscuits and gravy is just cook your sausage, break it all up, brown it, sprinkle flour over it and then start adding milk in there again. Don't put it on a real hot stove, but start it up slow and you got sausage gravy.
Speaker 1:It's real easy I was in new orleans last month a couple times, in and out of that tuna, tuna fishing trip. And the food in new orleans is absolutely incredible, grandma, if you've never been there. Uh, that, that french cajun cooking, creole cooking. It is so tasty and I don't like spicy food. I never have, but that's the first time in my life that I've really enjoyed spicy food and they make a lot, lot of roux, which to me feels like a gravy in a lot of ways. You know it's not, but it's similar.
Speaker 1:I think it's just got a little bit more oil in it, probably, but it's really interesting to me how many different cultures have picked this up in various culinary forms, like you're browning your meat, searing your meat, whatever, and then, rather than just cleaning that pan out, you're going to use that as the base to create a sauce that's going to accompany the dish later. And gosh, it was good, it was so good. That's where all the flavor is, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so what did they use for liquid in the roux, just water?
Speaker 1:You know, I'm not 100% sure. I haven't learned how to do that style of cooking, but I think that they're using a lot of oil and then they're being really careful not to burn it in the same way that you're talking about with gravy. They'll take it to different colors based off of whatever gumbo or jambalaya or whatever they're going to be making later. Wow, yeah, the gumbo. I've only had imitations of gumbo that I never thought were good and then having it down there, it's like, oh, this is incredible.
Speaker 2:Oh, it must have been good. Yeah, what else did they put in the gumbo besides shrimp?
Speaker 1:I don't know, it's a bit of a mystery stew for me, you know, I don't know a lot about it. I wish I knew more about how to, how to cook that stuff. But they also like to spend all day cooking at something, and I think that that's. That's different from the traditional pioneer style cooking around here, because, uh, you know, folks are are definitely expected to, to be working outside of the kitchen here, and for them it felt like, you know, somebody's going to be dedicated to watching this thing all day long.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. There's nothing like long slow cooking for anything. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I love it with meat. You know I like smoking meat for really long periods of time and what takes a lot of people eight hours or 12 hours. I'll spend 24 hours or 30 hours working on. Yeah, some of that is probably excessive, but I do like spending time with it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, do you grow many herbs.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I grow almost all my herbs and dry them. Yeah.
Speaker 1:When you dry them, do you just hang them upside down from a string?
Speaker 2:I just lay them on paper towels in my kitchen in the sun until they're really dry and then store them in jars or plastic bags.
Speaker 1:Okay, all right, they're, you know, really dry and then store them in jars or plastic bags. Yeah, all right. Well, uh, we're going to close it up with with one last question what piece of advice would you offer to to our audience? I get more more requests to have you on the show than anybody else. Um, you know, I, I get, I get fan mail uh, every day, uh, and a lot of it is uh, when are you gonna have grandma janie back on the show?
Speaker 1:so there's a lot of folks all over the world that have been, you know, eager to, to have you return oh, that's funny.
Speaker 2:Um so what was your question?
Speaker 1:what? What piece of advice would you offer to our audience?
Speaker 2:in what line I mean anything? Advice for what?
Speaker 1:I mean you're, you know, coming up on 91 years old, you've got a lot of wisdom and experience. What, what do you wish you knew when you were younger?
Speaker 2:oh gosh, I do the same mistakes all over again. I really would, because it it makes you who you are. You know it, like you say, it hones you and um, I just I'm a great believer and um, I have a strong faith and I think our lives are all planned and just sweat. Don't sweat the um, the big stuff or the small stuff. Just get up and go with the flow, but always be open to the positive side. You know, and have a dream and follow it. You know what the heck yeah, why not?
Speaker 2:And smile, yeah, and eat good.
Speaker 1:Cook with butter and be happy about it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, sure have a cold beer. Nothing better than a frosty good beer, you know. Stop and smell the wildflowers, just little things.
Speaker 1:Awesome, okay. Well, I need to get you some tuna right now, okay, and I'm going to get you some elk neck this fall.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you, James.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I'm so ashamed that I let you down on that.
Speaker 2:Oh no, You're okay. You make me proud. All of my grandchildren and great-grandchildren make me proud.
Speaker 1:We're very proud of you, love you very much.
Speaker 2:They're the flowers in my bonnet.
Speaker 1:All right, thanks, grandma. I just want to take a second and thank everyone who's written a review, who has sent mail, who's sent emails, who's sent messages. Your support is incredible, and I also love running into you at trade shows and events and just out on the hillside when we're hunting. I think that that's fantastic. I hope you guys keep adventuring as hard and as often as you can. Art for the Six Ranch Podcast was created by John Chatelain and was digitized by Celia Harlander. Was created by John Chatelain and was digitized by Celia Harlander. Original music was written and performed by Justin Hay, and the Six Ranch podcast is now produced by Six Ranch Media. Thank you all so much for your continued support of the show and I look forward to next week when we can bring you a brand new episode.