Learning about the Ozarks of my childhood: Cabins, slavery, pawpaw & wineries

[gfron1]

9 hours ago, curls said:

Hope you get into your own restaurant space soon!

You and me both sistah!

[andiesenji]

On 9/18/2017 at 5:18 PM, Kerry Beal said:

I suspect if you dissolve it again in fresh water - run through the Brita - then evaporate again to get the clean salt it might just work.

 

Here is a good treatise on how to process the salt water into salt.  You should have it tested to make sure there are no other chemicals - some harmful - in the water.  

There was a big salt lick on my grandpa's farm in western Kentucky.  There were also a couple of mineral springs that arose from a limestone bluff and the area was fenced off because the springs contained a lot of arsenic and some other undesirable minerals.  

The salt lick was mined and the crushed salt mixed in one of the big galvanized stock tanks and left to evaporate in the sun and tarped when it rained.  The resulting salt was only used for the livestock.

 

 

[Thanks for the Crepes]

@andiesenji,

 

Thanks for the interesting story about the salt deposits on your family farm. Scary about the arsenic!

 

So do you know anything about these family plates that @gfron1's family owns?

 

 

Or these ones from @Shelby's family, which seem very similar, but with no provenance?

 

On 9/18/2017 at 7:09 PM, Shelby said:

My mom ran over to the house and took a picture...they are the same , but different, but the same.

 

My Grammy has passed away...I would LOVE to ask her about these.  My Grandpa is still with us but I dunno if he will know....Mom will ask him.

 

Now I'm even more curious.

 

 

Sorry if I'm derailing your thread.  We can take this to PM's if you want  

 

 

 

Here gfron1 speculates:

 

On 9/18/2017 at 5:35 PM, gfron1 said:

Interesting. I bet it was something like a common Better Homes project, but my mom specifically remembers her mom painting them.

 

A lot of us thought you might know why two different families would have such similar artifacts. If you don't know, that's okay, of course. I just wanted to make sure you had seen them. If you don't know, it will probably remain a great mystery, because you are the expert on old cookware, gadgets, dishes and such. We are all in awe of your knowledge and it's a delight to many of us when you make a new post. 

[gfron1]

So the dent in my car and the deer on the side of the road reminded me that I hadn't had time to go to the shooting range lately and pop a few rounds off. I'm not a gun nut, and I don't necessarily enjoy sitting on a hot range shooting at paper circles, but I like to keep my skills sharp. So I took a few hundred rounds and my .22 and had the range to myself.

Depending on what I hunt I generally use my 30-06 because in New Mexico I was typically stalk hunting elk, javelina or deer. I think that's too much firepower for Missouri, but I didn't bother with a tag this year because its just not the same here. Seems like most people do private land leases for hunting and sit in blinds waiting for an unexpecting deer to walk through. I don't know if I can handle that boredom. I definitely prefer stalking the animal. But then again, maybe that's why I didn't have much success back in New Mexico. This was the first time at the range when I needed to put a white background behind my hanging targets so I could see the target.

I have terrible eyes but corrected near perfectly with my contacts. But last year all of a sudden I needed readers. I'm 49 so I hear that happens. But it was so sudden and timed right with my move to St Louis. One theory I have is that before the move I was foraging 6 days a week in the vast wilderness so my eyes were in a constant state of exercise looking in all directions and all distances. You had to to survive and also because of the beauty of both the flower and the mountain vista. Once I moved to St Louis my foraging dropped to just a couple days a week and you can only see a few yards ahead because land is relatively flat and covered in forest. I think my eyes just stopped being exercised. I've noticed that the past month as I've gone out foraging more, that my eyes have improved slightly. All I know is that it's only going to get worse from here.

 

After shooting we decided to hit the wineries. You may not know this but Missouri has a major role in the world's wine scene. To my taste now they wines are mediocre on a good day focusing mostly on Nortons and Chamberlins, but there's 200 years of growing. THIS short essay gives you the history. The fact that the French wines were saved in part to Missouri wines in pretty interesting. We decided to hit all of the ones in the area in one fell swoop (and we did swoop at the very end). We started at Cave Vineyard which is named after its large cave on the property. They don't really use it and they make you buy a bottle of wine if you want to see it, but its a good start for our wine tour.

Next was the Crown Valley Brewery and Distillery. Very big, very corporate feeling but decent enough moonshine and beer. I liked their sour beer enough that I bought a 4-pack to enjoy with dinner. Crown Valley also has a vineyard which left us ready to move on, but there's some history I want to drop in. One of my aunts is an avid genealogist. And in our cabin you can find all sorts of interesting documents that she's brought down over the years. BTW, she has our family line traced back to the 1600s. One of the documents is a recording of all of the grave sites and cemeteries in the region. On one of the pages I found the line "old slave graveyard." Now I'm sure I learned about Missouri's role in slavery and the Civil War back in school, but I'll admit I'm rusty. As I started asking locals, it turned out that this area was filled with old confederate plantations, and in fact, the Crown Valley Vineyard was the largest plantation in the area. They only tore the plantation building down in modern times to put in the vineyard. And, that graveyard can be found on the property of the vineyard (but is not part of the public tour). Hearing all of this opened my eyes as I started reading names on old dirt roads a bit differently, looking at land plots, and thinking about modern Missouri rural politics. [Please remember everyone that we agree not to talk politics on this forum, so let's not and just note the history of this area.]

Starting to feel our cheerios, we headed off to Chaumette Vineyard. I kinda liked the wine here - not sure if it was the wine or the placement in our tour. But if you're ever in the area, this is probably the best food you'll find. We eventually sobered up and came back for a belated anniversary dinner and really enjoyed it.  Finally we we to Charleville Winery. These are the little guys and I think the best of all of them. Again, if you go and don't like it we'll just say I was sloshed at this point, but I do think its really good. The fun thing is that we could literally walk over the hill for 20 minutes and be at my cabin. By drive it was a bit further but these are neighbors and when I told the owner who I was it was clear that my family had been regulars over the years because she knew a bunch of them. Nice to know my family is keeping up with their indulging! Our grandmother from the area, who died about a decade ago, when we had her viewing we all knew what we had to do - everyone brought cocktails and placed them on her coffin and we had a party. The quote of hers that we all retell the most is when someone mentioned a fatty dessert at a restaurant she said, "Honey, at my age I save all of my calories for alcohol." That's Grandma Irma Okenfuss for you!

 

When I got back to the cabin that night I started looking over a topo map that someone had left which had some interesting markups. Persimmon field caught my eye!

Edited September 22, 2017 by gfron1 (log)

[andiesenji]

I don't know where you are located in Missouri but I have a cousin that has a farm near the southern border and they are plagued with feral hogs.

Some are very big. He doesn't let his kids wander around in the woods alone and when he goes out mushrooming or nutting,  he carries a rifle, he says a 30.30 because of the shorter barrel and it doesn't carry as far but at close range can stop a hog.  He shot a big boar last October while out gathering Hazelnuts and pecans. 

He says you can Google "feral hogs in Missouri" and get a map that shows locations. 

[andiesenji]

Regarding the family plates.  In the 1940s there were a couple of companies who toured the midwest teaching and providing supplies for china painting, cloth stenciling, gadgets for "quick knitting" and knot and braid gadgets - a generation later would morph into "macrame" ...

 

They would be in small towns for a week or so, long enough to give basic classes.  Rural people on farms would participate a lot because in many places, similar to where I was born and raised, there was no TV and visual hobbies could be done while listening to the radio.  I recall that it began soon after the war ended because my uncle Willard had just come home from the VA hospital with his new arm prosthesis and he accompanied my aunt to the first few classes and then joined himself because they also sold model-building supplies and he wanted to build model planes.

 

After the customers painted the china, the company would box them up and send them to the factory to be glazed and fired and then shipped back.  There were also little figurines - mostly elves - angels, butterflies and other creatures - one of my aunts painted an elephant sitting on a ball, remarkable only because the larger than normal eyes were crossed - which she did on purpose. 

My aunts were avid hobbyists and they went in for the more elaborate flower painting on china rather than the "family" portraits, mainly because there were way too many in my family.  They would have covered an entire wall.  

I never was allowed near the china painting but I was allowed to do some stenciling  on table linens, pillowcases, and even was allowed to use my own artwork on my pillowcase, (a portrait of my horse).  

Edited September 22, 2017 by andiesenji (log)

[Shelby]

20 minutes ago, andiesenji said:

Regarding the family plates.  In the 1940s there were a couple of companies who toured the midwest teaching and providing supplies for china painting, cloth stenciling, gadgets for "quick knitting" and knot and braid gadgets - a generation later would morph into "macrame" ...

 

They would be in small towns for a week or so, long enough to give basic classes.  Rural people on farms would participate a lot because in many places, similar to where I was born and raised, there was no TV and visual hobbies could be done while listening to the radio.  I recall that it began soon after the war ended because my uncle Willard had just come home from the VA hospital with his new arm prosthesis and he accompanied my aunt to the first few classes and then joined himself because they also sold model-building supplies and he wanted to build model planes.

 

After the customers painted the china, the company would box them up and send them to the factory to be glazed and fired and then shipped back.  There were also little figurines - mostly elves - angels, butterflies and other creatures - one of my aunts painted an elephant sitting on a ball, remarkable only because the larger than normal eyes were crossed - which she did on purpose. 

My aunts were avid hobbyists and they went in for the more elaborate flower painting on china rather than the "family" portraits, mainly because there were way too many in my family.  They would have covered an entire wall.  

I never was allowed near the china painting but I was allowed to do some stenciling  on table linens, pillowcases, and even was allowed to use my own artwork on my pillowcase, (a portrait of my horse).  

 

Thank you so much, Andie!

 

For us, I don't think we will never know any further info on ours.  They could have been done by my great gramma or my grammy.  There are no dates or other markings on the back.

 

  My grandpa doesn't remember anything about them.  Sigh.  One of the many things that come up that I wish I could have asked my grammy.

 

I will be interested to hear what Rob's family says about theirs.

[Toliver]

2 minutes ago, Shelby said:

 My grandpa doesn't remember anything about them.  Sigh.  One of the many things that come up that I wish I could have asked my grammy.

 

I will be interested to hear what Rob's family says about theirs.

@Shelby, can you ask any old folks around your area? Others might have painted plates, as well, and might remember better...

 

Thank you @andiesenji, for the enlightening information. The plates look very familiar to me, as well. Now I just have to figure out where I've seen them! 

[gfweb]

1 hour ago, andiesenji said:

I don't know where you are located in Missouri but I have a cousin that has a farm near the southern border and they are plagued with feral hogs.

Some are very big. He doesn't let his kids wander around in the woods alone and when he goes out mushrooming or nutting,  he carries a rifle, he says a 30.30 because of the shorter barrel and it doesn't carry as far but at close range can stop a hog.  He shot a big boar last October while out gathering Hazelnuts and pecans. 

He says you can Google "feral hogs in Missouri" and get a map that shows locations. 

 

Think I'd rather have a .44 magnum, which as Harry Callahan said, is the most powerful handgun in the world. 

 

I could get off more rounds with it, I think.

[rotuts]

Of course , the .44 M  might break your wrist.

 

you would mis the Pig  etc etc.

 

a short LongGun is much better :  it would just break your shoulder.

 

and stop that Pig.

 

Of course , if you Shoot 'em , do you get to Eat 'em ?

 

Id still go with 130.1 SV , but well past the Pasteurization point.

Edited September 22, 2017 by rotuts (log)

[lindag]

1 hour ago, andiesenji said:

I don't know where you are located in Missouri but I have a cousin that has a farm near the southern border and they are plagued with feral hogs.

Some are very big. He doesn't let his kids wander around in the woods alone and when he goes out mushrooming or nutting,  he carries a rifle, he says a 30.30 because of the shorter barrel and it doesn't carry as far but at close range can stop a hog.  He shot a big boar last October while out gathering Hazelnuts and pecans. 

He says you can Google "feral hogs in Missouri" and get a map that shows locations. 

 

YIKES!  That would be scary!

[gfron1]

3 hours ago, andiesenji said:

Regarding the family plates.  In the 1940s there were a couple of companies who toured the midwest teaching and providing supplies for china painting, cloth stenciling, gadgets for "quick knitting" and knot and braid gadgets - a generation later would morph into "macrame" ...

 

They would be in small towns for a week or so, long enough to give basic classes.  Rural people on farms would participate a lot because in many places, similar to where I was born and raised, there was no TV and visual hobbies could be done while listening to the radio.  I recall that it began soon after the war ended because my uncle Willard had just come home from the VA hospital with his new arm prosthesis and he accompanied my aunt to the first few classes and then joined himself because they also sold model-building supplies and he wanted to build model planes.

 

After the customers painted the china, the company would box them up and send them to the factory to be glazed and fired and then shipped back.  There were also little figurines - mostly elves - angels, butterflies and other creatures - one of my aunts painted an elephant sitting on a ball, remarkable only because the larger than normal eyes were crossed - which she did on purpose. 

My aunts were avid hobbyists and they went in for the more elaborate flower painting on china rather than the "family" portraits, mainly because there were way too many in my family.  They would have covered an entire wall.  

I never was allowed near the china painting but I was allowed to do some stenciling  on table linens, pillowcases, and even was allowed to use my own artwork on my pillowcase, (a portrait of my horse).  

 

Here's what my family said about our specific plates (with my notes for context):

Quote

Aunt Dorma had them in her kitchen with family names. When I was about 15 (1960) or
16, she helped me get the needed supplies and trace her plates and than paint them. I gave them to mom and dad for a Christmas gift. I did julie (first in-law in the sibling group) when I was a senior in HS and she and Dick were engaged.

 

[gfron1]

No feral pigs this far north yet, but armadillos are here so the pigs will make it soon enough.

[gfweb]

3 hours ago, rotuts said:

Of course , the .44 M  might break your wrist.

 

 

 

Nah.

[Toliver]

1 hour ago, gfron1 said:

No feral pigs this far north yet, but armadillos are here so the pigs will make it soon enough.

Steer clear of armadillos, dead or alive (click).

[gfron1]

The next morning I headed into town (Ste Gen) for the Farmers Market. I try to hit those up anywhere I go whether I need anything or not. This was a small one - four booths under a pavillion at the VFW or Odd Fellows or something like that.

What I know of the area I expected goat cheese, corn and jam. Well, they had jam at least   

I bought a few dozen eggs because they pricey ones were $1.65 a dz. In St Louis the going rate is $6/dz - highway robbery! I also got a loaf of zucchini bread (hoping to find pawpaw bread), a bag of some sort of pea like a black eyed pea but it wasn't, and  some heirloom tomatoes. Everything was so cheap. I felt bad not paying more...but I got over it. Heading out of town I stopped at a family tradition - Oberle Meats.

Oberle has been doing their thing since 1870 - that's a long friggin time. The proudly advertise 6 generations of the Oberle family have made sausage. For us, every trip to the cabin we would stock up wtih Oberle dog (think pork summer sausage), Oberle cheese (think velveta with garlic powder), and smoked pork loin (don't think, just eat). After getting out of the creek but before dinner we would slice up the Oberle dog and have it with cheese and crackers. Great snack for a family of growing boys (all we had were boys with all of the cousins) on a hot day. As we've all matured we've come to appreciate the loin even more.

For Tyler and I it became breakfast with the heirloom tomatoes and fresh eggs and zucchini bread.

One other site of interest is the Old Brick. From their site: 

Quote

 

The Old Brick House was erected in the year 1780 by John Price, local merchant and ferry boat operator between Ste. Genevieve and Kaskaskia.  It is the oldest brick building west of the the Mississippt River.  Tradtion has it that the bricks were brought from France in boats as ballast.  The bricks were plastered, and this is still evident today, even after the removal of several coats of paint. 

 

Our family knows it because Grandma Irma (remember her?) worked their in her retirement as the hostess. She wore gold head to toe every night sitting by the door greeting guests and chatting up the latest small town gossip. She did that for around 20 years and was an institution.

We didn't eat there on this visit - everything is fried so not really our thing. The one food origin related to the Old Brick is my family's infamous grey spaetzle. Pork liver, flour, salt; pressed through a colander into boiling water; served with brown gravy. Mmm...that's the good stuff (joking). Made at every family gathering. Never eaten. The original inspiration came from the Old Brick.

 

That pretty much wraps up the vacation. The next morning I had a Missouri Mycological Society foray at Charleville Winery which was a bust because its been so hot and dry, and then back home to civilization!

 

[ElsieD]

This has been wonderful.  Thank you so much!

[suzilightning]

my gosh... I've got so many things that I want to talk about but still have to think about stuff I'm reading......

friend was Miss Kansas City 1960 and was from Missouri......her family came from the area where you are and were German immigrants who had family down in the grape growing/winery area...

lived on an apple orchard years ago... we all had depredation permits.  I had a  .22 with a  round magazine and a scope for the ground hogs....need a 12 gage or 30.06 or 30.30 for the herds of deer...

 

grew up on the east end of Long Island.  If we killed it we ate it......... only thing I did NOT eat was the ground hog

[kayb]

6 hours ago, rotuts said:

Of course , the .44 M  might break your wrist.

 

you would mis the Pig  etc etc.

 

a short LongGun is much better :  it would just break your shoulder.

 

and stop that Pig.

 

Of course , if you Shoot 'em , do you get to Eat 'em ?

 

Id still go with 130.1 SV , but well past the Pasteurization point.

 

 

They've got those babies in South Arkansas (the original Razorbacks). They're ugly, big, and mean. They'll kill you in a heartbeat, and eat you; they're omnivores. If I were going to hunt one, or be in the woods where they ranged, I'd want a .300 magnum Model 70 Winchester with me. 

 

I have eaten wild hog. It ain't great. You need to soak it at least 24 hours in buttermilk, and then cook the living hell out of it for about a day and a half.

[andiesenji]

8 hours ago, rotuts said:

Of course , the .44 M  might break your wrist.

 

you would mis the Pig  etc etc.

 

a short LongGun is much better :  it would just break your shoulder.

 

and stop that Pig.

 

Of course , if you Shoot 'em , do you get to Eat 'em ?

 

Id still go with 130.1 SV , but well past the Pasteurization point.

 

The 30.30 Marlin has less kick than an '06 and very accurate close in.  I've shot both as well as a 12 ga shotgun with a slug and 300gr load which kicks like hell. I use to have a 10 ga, over and under double barrel that was a nice large bird gun with a light load of 190 gr and BB shot - we used copper instead of lead.  I had reloading equipment for the shotguns. The only time I was injured by a recoil was when I forgot to put the safety on the 10 guage, It had a "rocker" firing pin and when I pulled the trigger on the upper barrel, the pin recoiled and fired the bottom one.  I was wearing a heavy padded coat and the stock had a 3-inch pad but it still knocked me backwards in the boat (hunting geese).  I had a technicolor chest for a few weeks.

[andiesenji]

1 hour ago, kayb said:

 

They've got those babies in South Arkansas (the original Razorbacks). They're ugly, big, and mean. They'll kill you in a heartbeat, and eat you; they're omnivores. If I were going to hunt one, or be in the woods where they ranged, I'd want a .300 magnum Model 70 Winchester with me. 

 

I have eaten wild hog. It ain't great. You need to soak it at least 24 hours in buttermilk, and then cook the living hell out of it for about a day and a half.

The wild boar that are hunted in California have lovely meat.  I have had it many times. Back in 2004 I made carnitas from wild boar and took it to an eG potluck.  It was well received.  

This is a full-size sheet pan with some of the meat from the boar that I butchered and portioned for the hunter whose wife was not interested in learning how to fix it.  I prepped the "saddle" for him for a barbecue, cut and wrapped the rest for the freezer and got a hindquarter and the neck for my work. 

This is the way pork is supposed to look, definitely not "the other white meat."

[andiesenji]

My helpful cousin emailed me this map showing the 2016 feral hog "catch" in Missouri.  He lives in the light green patch at the bottom, right next to the black patch.  

He is in the process of putting up new fencing to protect his livestock, horribly expensive but necessary.  

[chileheadmike]

Cabela's used to do a series of barbecue competitions where wild game was a separate category.  I judged one and it happened to be wild boar ribs, so I got to sample six different cook's versions. Richer and darker than commercial pork ribs. I liked them. 

[sparrowgrass]

I am in the southeast section, and wild hogs are definitely a problem here.  I have eaten them--very lean, dark meat, NO fat at all.  Good cooked like andi said--long and slow.   

 

I am not much for those 'grey dumplings' either, but people drive to Ste. Gen just to eat them.  They would be fine if you left the liver out.

 

Oberle's sausage is great--Stonies in Perryville also has good sausages and other deli items.  

[andiesenji]

48 minutes ago, sparrowgrass said:

I am in the southeast section, and wild hogs are definitely a problem here.  I have eaten them--very lean, dark meat, NO fat at all.  Good cooked like andi said--long and slow.   

 

I am not much for those 'grey dumplings' either, but people drive to Ste. Gen just to eat them.  They would be fine if you left the liver out.

 

Oberle's sausage is great--Stonies in Perryville also has good sausages and other deli items.  

The boar meat I show above is from a huge boar killed in Mendocino County.  They get into the vineyards near the national forest and do a lot of damage so some winery owners invite a few hunters to their places and in some cases even host them with free rooms - if you know the right people to contact.  Usually the maximum size of the males is around 200 pounds with the occasional one getting a hundred pounds larger. However, there have been "sports" that get much larger  - like this one which was too heavy for the feed store scale in Ukiah - which had a max weight of 500 pounds and this was after the guts were removed.  The hunter was curious and about a year after the kill, he submitted part of the meat for DNA testing  and learned that this one was a cross with a domestic pig - the "Large Black" which is a massive hog.  There is a breeder of these hogs near Eureka, in Humboldt county, which is right next to Mendocino and in fact they had had a couple of hogs escape a few years earlier.  There had been stories of much larger than normal wild hogs in the area for some time.  

 

I have also had javelina, the much smaller Mexican wild pigs. They are even more dangerous because they run in packs and will attack anything, even horses or cows.  

In the fall they feed on pine nuts - a preferred food - and the meat is rather sweet when they are killed in early winter.  For years my next door neighbors would go back to the ranch they owned in Durango, Mexico and bring back javelina in 55 gallon drums filled with brine and have big barbecues where they would barbecue the whole pigs, for about 24 hours.  Delicious.