eG Foodblog: Flocko - Dining in the Desert

[Susan in FL]

.......(A LDS friend from Salt Lake had a great t-shirt: "If you think our liquor laws are weird, you should see our underwear!")

.......

LOL!

I meant to mention before, but forgot, I was thinking the Zion Pizza and Noodle Co. was in Moab. My bad.

[Smithy]

Your backyard photos are so evocative that I can smell the greenery and the soil. There's nothing quite like that mountainy woodsy dry hills smell: somehow, it's dry and green all at the same, quite unlike the northern Minnesota woods that smell green and lush and willowy like a California river in the summer, and yet also not like high alpine western forests. Maybe it's the oak.

I take it you're high enough up the canyon that flash floods aren't an issue?

Oh, Fred!

How do you like to prepare mutton? I feel lucky to get lamb, and it's been so long since I've had mutton I'm not sure I'd recognize it. Does it have a stronger flavor than lamb? When I have pine nuts, I think of pesto, and sprinkling the nuts (toasted if possible) over salads. What other uses do you have for them?

Man, I miss the West.

[Flocko]

Thanks everyone for the nice comments

Is anyone up for some scenery before we go on to dinner?.......... Well, I was............so I left my office at 6:30 and drove a couple of miles down the Colorado River to Kane Creek Canyon and drove a couple of miles down it. It was a little hazy and partially cloudy but here goes:

Just entering Kane Creek Canyon:

Some Anasazi petroglyphs on a boulder along the way. These are circa 1,000 to 1,300 C.E. On the left is the birthing petroglyph...................perhaps the only petroglyph picturing this.

Bear prints and some big horn sheep.

Further up the canyon:

Heading back to the river:

So about 7:30 I went to the Moab Diner for dinner:

I had my favorite: The Sante Fe Platter..........2 boneless chicken breast pieces fried, smothered in green chile, with 2 tacitos, a stuffed jalapeno pepper, cheese, rice, and a salad.....................$7.45.............Yummmm

It's time for bed..............

[Pan]

Wow, those canyons are incredible! Thanks for the photos.

[mizducky]

Wow. Major Georgia O'Keefe moment. The sun and shadow on the rock formations. The petroglyphs--they heard the call and wrote it on the wall, alright. And then--wham! diner land, neon and green chile slathered goodness and all. Dayum.

[BarbaraY]

Beautiful, beautiful! I love desert.

I haven't been in Utah for 30 years but we passed close to Moab on that trip. Came down from SLC to pick up I-70. I remember we stopped for lunch at Price and then went on to spend the night in Grand Junction.

I had a Chef's Salad.

[Kim Shook]

In just about every foodblog, there is a moment where I am personally touched by a photo or a sentence. Sometimes it is about food, sometimes not. It's just when something reaches out and grabs me. Your pictures of the petroglyphs was that moment for me this time. Thanks so much for that and for the whole blog. I am an armchair traveler and this is one great trip!

[Flocko]

Your backyard photos are so evocative that I can smell the greenery and the soil.  There's nothing quite like that mountainy woodsy dry hills smell: somehow, it's dry and green all at the same, quite unlike the northern Minnesota woods that smell green and lush and willowy like a California river in the summer, and yet also not like high alpine western forests.  Maybe it's the oak.

I take it you're high enough up the canyon that flash floods aren't an issue?

Oh, Fred! 

How do you like to prepare mutton?  I feel lucky to get lamb, and it's been so long since I've had mutton I'm not sure I'd recognize it.  Does it have a stronger flavor than lamb?  When I have pine nuts, I think of pesto, and sprinkling the nuts (toasted if possible) over salads.  What other uses do you have for them?

Man, I miss the West.

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Hi Nancy:

My house is about 30 feet above the creek so it should be OK in floods. I've only been in this house for 6 months, so we'll see. I have seen this creek in flash flood and it can get that high. My former house was at the base of a cliff and during an August monsoon, my entire first floor flooded out.

With mutton I like to make stew or marinade it and slow barbeque........just like lamb. The mutton I get down in the Navajo Nation isn't that stong tasting. I remember my father telling me how horribly stong and bad mutton was during WWII..........this is great stuff. The only way I don't like it is one of the main ways it is served in the Nation..............called a Navajo Sandwich..................cold mutton on bread with lettuce. We had this served to us at our board meetings there once a month...............kinda stuck to the roof of your mouth

The pinon nuts we get here in the fall are stronger flavored than the ones I buy in the bag at the supermarket for pesto. The local pinons have more of a piney, resin taste..........kinda like retsina wine . They are sold by the roadside by Navajos all through the fall. I like them roasted in the shell and just munched as a snack. If they are not roasted they can cause G.I. distress

Thanks for your comments,

Bill

[Flocko]

Creek!     Fred       Three kindsa chicken salad

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What she said -- racheld is Occam's Razor. Five wubs for Fred, and the scenery is astounding. I really feel like a stranger in a strange land here, and I'm grateful for the tour. (A LDS friend from Salt Lake had a great t-shirt: "If you think our liquor laws are weird, you should see our underwear!")

Three kinds of chicken salad -- oh my!

(I loved the sketch and it reminded my of someone I've met: You're a more hirsute brother of Dave the Cook.)

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Hi Maggie:

Yeah, you're not the first person who has made the comparison to Dave the Cook. I've seen his photo and have to agree

Bill

[MarketStEl]

My little adobe abode will be featured as well in the coming day or days.  It's tiny, but oh so wonderful    

Bill

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Does the statement above also describe your fridge (hint, hint)?

Thank you for the trip into Kane Creek Canyon and the messages from the past.

[Flocko]

My little adobe abode will be featured as well in the coming day or days.  It's tiny, but oh so wonderful    

Bill

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Does the statement above also describe your fridge (hint, hint)?

Thank you for the trip into Kane Creek Canyon and the messages from the past.

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Yes..............and your very welcome

[Flocko]

No breakfast this morning............just a lot of iced lattes

A friend at my office asked me to go to lunch up the street at the local Chinese restaurant:

We browsed the buffet and ended up with these...........not great..........not what Ling or Henry or other of our members make , or the likes of what I've seen photo's of from Jason, but it was a decent lunch, and quick.

[Flocko]

Ok........now for the requisite fridge photo

Here are some shots of my new dream house, my adobe abode . It is contructed of earth bag adobe. It has an adobe floor with hot water pipes therein. The walls are about 26" thick. It is cool in the summer and warm in the winter.

It was built by a young woman, Alison Kennedy, who built it, by hand, herself. It is featured in two books and many magazine articles. One book is "The House That Jill Built" Another is "Earthbag Building" by a couple of Moab residents, Doni Kiffmeyer and Kaki Hunter

And here is inside. It is very small, just a cottage...........about 950 sq. ft. My last house was about 6,500 sq. ft. so I'm having trouble finding space for media of all kinds............but it is PERFECT just the same. What I don't have room for, I don't really need........plus I have two storage units and a shed behind the house

[Angela Alaimo]

Absolutely gorgeous. I get so excited when I get to see a house that not only doesn't look like ten million others, it's interesting, no, fascinating and beautiful instead of boring, and just the right size. Your outside is pretty much awfully wonderful, too. Thank you.

And so far you've got the tidiest refrigerator.

[esowchek]

Just beautiful, inside and out! How inspiring!

I am wondering, now that you have downsized in terms of square footage, whether you have changed your cooking style/preferences in any way to accomodate the smaller space?

Ellen

[Daddy-A]

Amazing house!

Are the countertops concrete?

A.

[MarketStEl]

Ok........now for the requisite fridge photo

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I see that we can count you among the bi-condimental. I congratulate you on your courage in coming out of the fridge and acknowledging your equal affection for mayonnaise and Miracle Whip publicly.

But do your neighbors know? And what do the Latter-Day Saints have to say on the subject anyway?

[Smithy]

What a wonderful house. I started by admiring the interesting roof, and then I noticed the paintings. Wow! Can you expand a bit on "earth bag adobe"? What does that mean?

Your fridge is indeed tidy, but it looks like a great lot of liquid food and condiments, and not much produce...unless some of those drawers on the bottom are not freezer doors? What are we seeing there?

I too would like to know whether and how downsizing has affected your cookery. Your kitchen looks spacious and nicely laid out. Your grill outside looks as though you could handle a lot of tasks there, too.

What do your friends make of your snapping photos of lunch this week?

[racheld]

Breathtaking canyons, Dawn-of-our-Time drawings, a charming handmade house with murals outside and in, sculptured walls (SPIDER ), and a do-it-all kitchen with a green counter I'm coveting clear over here.

I've seen construction of a "tossed" adobe, but bagged? Add me to the Tell All list.

And if you stare gently at the leftmost notch, the one shaped like a giant staple, you'll see the shadow of the Viking ship passing silently to port, the Maidenly figurehead leading the way.

[maggiethecat]

Bill: Thanks for taking us for a drive, as you must do for any visitor or houseguest. I'm awed -- no other word for it.

No hood/fan above your stovetop? Is adobe easy to refinish?

[Flocko]

Absolutely gorgeous.  I get so excited when I get to see a house that not only doesn't look like ten million others, it's interesting, no, fascinating and beautiful instead of boring, and just the right size.  Your outside is pretty much awfully wonderful, too.  Thank you. 

And so far you've got the tidiest refrigerator.

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OH MAN!! What a trip The quote about my tidy fridge

This is so funny because, about 15 years ago, another time when I was a batchelor, though living in a much larger house, my kitchen and fridge were so dirty, messy, abousolutely beyond redemption, that a friend offered to come over and clean it for me.

My friend, Stiles, whose paper I was writing a column for, and who bestowed upon me the moniker, Flocko, demanded as payment my black leather Eames Chair. I agreed. He arrived in a biohazard suit and a gas mask...............and took pictures........which made the next issue of The Zephyr Thank goodness they are not still up online

Anyway, I am a neater, tidier, cleaner Flocko these days in fridge, kitchen, body, mind and spirit .....................and I have a maid

The Eames Chair continues to occupy a place of honor and comfort.........at Stiles house. I occasionally get to sit in it

Edited September 15, 2006 by Flocko (log)

[Flocko]

Bill: Thanks for taking us for a drive, as you must do for any visitor or houseguest. I'm awed -- no other word for it.

No hood/fan above your stovetop? Is adobe easy to refinish?

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Maggie, Hi:

The adobe is periodically repainted...............using natural paints. The animals and trees need to be done soon, as they are fading a bit. The adobes of the pueblos of New Mexico, are traditionally whitewashed or remudded, inside and out, every year in a ceremony.

[srhcb]

When I have pine nuts, I think of pesto, and sprinkling the nuts (toasted if possible) over salads.  What other uses do you have for them?

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Pine nuts go great with apples. I use them in apple/applesauce quickbreads and in place of other nuts in any baked goods featuring apples.

SB (from the lush and willowy North Woods?)

[Flocko]

What a wonderful house.  I started by admiring the interesting roof, and then I noticed the paintings.  Wow!    Can you expand a bit on "earth bag adobe"?  What does that mean?

Your fridge is indeed tidy, but it looks like a great lot of liquid food and condiments, and not much produce...unless some of those drawers on the bottom are not freezer doors?  What are we seeing there?

I too would like to know whether and how downsizing has affected your cookery.  Your kitchen looks spacious and nicely laid out.  Your grill outside looks as though you could handle a lot of tasks there, too.

What do your friends make of your snapping photos of lunch this week? 

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Nancy, Hi:

The drawers contain a couple of bell peppers, celery, scallions, and lemons. I really don't keep much in the fridge other than diet pepsi, coffee drinks and condiments. I love to shop for food and do so every day. Our two groceries, and the natural foods store are right in town, and it's fun to run into friends, look at the tourists, and see what looks good. It's a social function!................and the best is the Saturday Farmers Market. It's like a party every Saturday morning

I do need to get a separate freezer though. I save fish bones, and shellfish shells for stock; chicken bones likewise; ditto beef bones. I've run out of freezer space in the fridge. I also pick things up at Costco in SLC when I'm up there (always take a cooler in my car), and at the fish market, and ethnic markets, so I really do need the freezer space.

Downsizing hasn't affected my cooking at all..........except in perhaps increasing my enjoyment of it. Though this is the smallest house I have ever lived in, it has the largest and, to my taste, the nicest, kitchen...........large amounts of counter space, room for a big cutting block, nice gas range. Even in my largest house, the kitchen was a postage stamp, and no counters at all. It is a pleasure to cook here. I have two large BBQs as well, the gas one and a big Santa Maria style one for oak logs or charcoal; and a little Smokin' Joe by Weber...............so I'm set

No complaints from my friends about the photos, yet

[Flocko]

When I have pine nuts, I think of pesto, and sprinkling the nuts (toasted if possible) over salads.  What other uses do you have for them?

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Pine nuts go great with apples. I use them in apple/applesauce quickbreads and in place of other nuts in any baked goods featuring apples.

SB (from the lush and willowy North Woods?)

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Hi Steve:

I've never tried them with apple related things..................sounds good..........Thanks