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Recipe: turkey cranberry green chile sandwich

Hey, it’s Elastic Waistband Day Thanksgiving! Happy Thanksgiving, good people of the interwebs! Our day is going to be filled with non-Thanksgiving activities like hitting the backcountry, eating miso black cod, cleaning the house, playing with Kaweah. Despite the voluntary lack of the turkey feast, this holiday – for me – is ALL about giving thanks.

thankful for sunsets (and sunrises)

I’m in a different place than where I used to be on Thanksgivings past. It used to be that we’d contemplate what we were thankful for as the holiday neared. We’d write lists in school and bring them home for our parents to read. Now, my life’s experiences have put me in a mindset that is ever-grateful for being alive, for having my health, for my loved ones, for my community, for this community, for the beautiful world around me. And even though Grandma and Kris are no longer here, I’m am so very very thankful that they were such important parts of my life. It doesn’t matter if it is Thanksgiving or the first day of Spring – I give thanks daily. It’s kind of like Thanksgiving every day without the feasting.

thankful for this little goofball

my pup romping in the snow

So yeah, I dissed Thanksgiving dinner again this year. The only thing I made that is remotely Thanksgiving is the cranberry sauce, because it goes with everything. While people at the store were picking up a whole turkey, I was the only one getting sliced turkey for sandwiches. That’s right… just because I didn’t roast a bird this year doesn’t mean I have to go without the sandwich. You know of what I speak.

turkey, bread, cheese, green chiles, cranberry sauce (hells yeah!)

slice some good bread

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Recipe: paseo cuban roast pork sandwich

I have this thing for sandwiches… but you already knew that! Last year when I was in Seattle for my friends’ wedding, my other friends took me to stand in line at Paseo, home of the best sandwich in the world. With a title like that, it’s only a matter of time before my grubby little hands get a hold of said sandwich.

the cuban roast pork from paseo

That was some sandwich. A juicy, drippy, savory, heady, tangy, spicy mess nestled between toasted bread. It’s one of those deals where you eat it and you have to continue eating it lest you wind up wearing it. Best sandwich in the world? I’m not sure about that. Damn good sandwich? YES. HELL YES. Obviously, the next step was to try to reproduce it myself… I searched online and took a chance on some random recipe because I honestly had little clue where to start.

orange juice, rum, olive oil, salt, pepper, limes, garlic, oregano, pork shoulder

mince the garlic and oregano; juice the lime

The recipe called for mango juice and orange juice, but I live in the sticks. There was no mango juice to be had, so I doubled the orange juice and called it good. The magical pork shoulder is then marinated for at least 3 hours, although overnight is recommended. I went for 24 hours. Why not?

mix the marinade together

place the pork and marinade in the baggy together

When the pork was done soaking, I gave it a pan-sear on each side to brown up some flavor before placing it in a baking dish with the marinade and baked it for a couple of hours. Actually, the recipe has a total baking time of 2+ hours, but I let mine bake for four because the connective tissue just wasn’t breaking down to my liking. I’m picky like that.

pan-seared goodness

braise it

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Recipe: chicken fried steak with cream gravy

Wow, thank you for all of the warm and kind birthday wishes! I hope you had your own happy birthdays as well. It was one heck of a long weekend, but in the best way possible. The recon trip turned into a shooting trip because the leaves flipped like a switch. They are really good this year (I know this because they were pretty crappy last year). The colors are coming in rich and vibrant in the higher elevations because of our late and wet spring (big snowpack) and also due to the current hot days and cold nights that snap those leaves into the reds, golds, and oranges we love. There is plenty of green, but I’ve never seen it change so quickly.

we encountered a lot of road construction on the way out

and early colors off the highways in drive-by (photo) shootings

Our first stop was Crested Butte, a town with which we’ve pretty much fallen in love. My thinking was that it would be early and there wouldn’t be much to shoot. I planned to just take notes as to when peak colors would probably occur and then we would hike and mountain bike the rest of the time there. We did manage a few rides, but most of the time was spent hunting gold. Here are some snappies from the trip (I won’t be able to look at my real photos until later).

approaching storm behind a sunlit stand

rainbow from the storm reflected in an oxbow

enjoying the colors

pot of gold at the other end of the rainbow (it lasted over an hour!)

jeremy’s favorite place for coffee: camp 4

one view from the town of mount crested butte

After a few days in Crested Butte, we moseyed across to Aspen. The two towns are practically within spitting distance of one another, separated by the glorious Maroon Bells-Snowmass Wilderness. To get to one from the other by car requires a more circuitous route. Aspen is a completely different vibe from Crested Butte, but we weren’t there for the town – we were there for the surrounding mountains and they delivered with some great colors. Over Independence Pass to Mount Elbert were probably the best stands of aspen I’ve seen this season so far.

sad to see some leaves falling already

sampling an heirloom tomato salad at matsuhisa’s in aspen

excellent color on the slopes of mount elbert

Now it’s time to head home, regroup, and get ready for the next shoot. This was a long weekend birthday recon getaway, but the rest is work. There is no rule that says you can’t love your work though. I get to frolic with snakes, hawks, horses, sheep, foxes, countless chipmunks and squirrels, and cattle. Many of the roads leading to good aspen or views wind their way through Colorado ranch land. It’s not uncommon for me to be shooting in a stand and have a a cow wander past me. I don’t mind their company at all, but the other day my thoughts turned to… chicken fried steak.

steak, salt and pepper, buttermilk, eggs, flour

tenderize the steak

Do you ever think of something you want to make while you’re in the grocery store, but have no idea how to make it or what you need to buy, and then you whip out the smartphone and look up a recipe? I have been doing that more and more lately (well okay, ever since I switched to Verizon from AT&T). So that’s what happened a few weeks ago when I had a hankering, nay, a craving for chicken fried steak. I asked Jeremy to do a search and he began reading off the sources. When he said “Homesick Texan” I shouted from the dairy cases “THAT ONE!” We all know that girl knows her chicken fried steak.

mix salt and pepper with the flour

whisk the buttermilk and eggs together

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