use real butter

Recipe: apple huckleberry pie

**First, I would like to thank every person who bid on anything during the RezDawg Rescue Spring Silent Auction. All three of my donated photographic prints sold and RezDawg Rescue was able to meet and exceed their fundraising goal! This means more kittens and puppies rescued this spring as well as continued funding for RezDawg Rescue’s education and spay/neuter campaigns in the Four Corners region to help reduce the stray population. Thank you.**

I have one foot in a ski boot and one foot in a trail runner. Spring storms are hanging around Colorado the way you keep returning to the refrigerator to sneak a bite of leftover dessert. They deliver a foot of snow, then wander off as green spring tries to take hold. And just as you get used to not wearing a jacket, the white stuff returns. This is nothing new for us. After 14 years we have learned to go with the flow – or rather the whiplash of lurching forward and backward – of spring in the mountains.

uphill skiing in rocky mountain national park

yuki and neva patiently waiting to ski out (in our national forest)

the pups are anxious to run around in another new foot of snow

jeremy enjoying his earned backcountry turns

A couple of months ago, I posted a photo of a local mama moose and her yearling. About two weeks later we saw the yearling in our yard, but solo. His mother had run him off so she could focus her energies and attention on her new baby. Make that babies, because last week she brought two beautiful, fuzzy calves by our house to feed. One stuck close to mama, but the other really enjoyed chowing down on our wild currant bushes and was willing to let its family wander pretty far before leaving the snack station. I love that spring is full of new things.

new baby in the neighborhood

Speaking of new things, Erin and I were wandering about on the plains looking for one thing when we found a different thing – wild asparagus! Actually, it’s feral asparagus because it is the same species as the one you buy from markets and stores, but it got loose long ago and has been growing on its own. I found the first stalk by pure accident, and then the two of us quickly consolidated our knowledge from asparagus gardening (Erin), reading (both of us), and growing asparagus fern houseplants (me) to identify many other patches. So exciting! We came away with some nice hauls of super sweet asparagus stalks.

hello beautiful, i am in love

spring bounty

Since it feels as if we are bouncing between seasons here, I thought I’d share a pie that also encompasses more than one season. Even though apples are available year-round at the grocery store, they tend to peak in fall and winter. As for mountain huckleberries (my very favorite absolute best most delicious berry), they are a late summer treat that I can only get by hiking into my local mountains and spending hours picking them by hand. Luckily, they freeze well so that I can access them all year from my freezer. People can substitute its suitable cousin, the blueberry, which is in season now through the end of summer. The whole reason I make this pie is because a pure huckleberry pie represents 12 hours of non-stop berry picking (it’s backbreaking work here because our huck plants and berries are small). They are simply too precious for me to throw all of them into one pie. Apples make up the bulk of the filling while happily absorbing the flavor and color of the huckleberries.

huckleberries, apples, cornstarch, sugar, more sugar, cinnamon, salt, lemon

peel, core, and dice the apples

for the apples: diced apples, sugar, pinch of salt, cinnamon

combine in a medium saucepan

cook until soft and the liquid turns into a thick syrup

**Jump for more butter**

Recipe: shrimp tatsuta-age

April is a flirt, taunting us with peaceful warm days of spring and chasing those with wintry snowstorms. I enjoy experiencing both kinds of weather, but this interplay of seasons certainly keeps you on your toes. We took advantage of the sunshine and sent Neva and Yuki to a doggy daycare in Boulder last week. It was their trial day as we finally caved rather than holding out hope for a competent, responsible, and professional outfit to emerge in Nederland (that trio of requirements is a rare find in mountain towns).

I went about the day expecting a call to come get my dogs because they were causing a ruckus, but none came. Instead, when we went to pick them up, they were happy and excited to see us. We learned they were both on the shy side, warming up slowly to all of the regular pups. That’s not surprising for either one considering Neva has issues reading other dogs’ signals and Yuki puts her guard up in strange or new settings as part of her survival instinct. They both received baths once we were home and then proceeded to pass out. Mission accomplished.

yuki doesn’t like baths, but she’s good about tolerating them

so tired

The next day, Colorado received her second bomb cyclone in a month. Temperatures in the teens left us with a foot of fluffy powder reminiscent of proper winter. We skied it, then we skied it with the puppies, and then we skied it again. Yuki is getting the hang of this ski dog thing (see her video here). It appears we are slated for more snow through the end of April, and I’m all for it!

uphill skiing with the pups in our local wilderness

jeremy grabs some turns in the backcountry

Neva’s fur is fluffier lately. First the fur on her hind quarters had grown thicker and softer over the holidays. In the last month, her tail began filling in with more hair and looking like the signature otter tail of a Labrador Retriever instead of her usual thin whip-like tail. We suspect it has to do with her anti-anxiety medication. She started on it last fall and it takes some weeks to see results. The prescription doesn’t make her instantly good, but it helps Neva keep a more even keel during events that would normally send her into a frenzy. With less anxiety, she is able to focus on our commands. As she concentrates on what we tell her to do, we can train her to remain calm around wildlife on the trails, or the FedEx and UPS trucks driving past the house, or strangers, or riding in the car. Pre-medicated Neva would lose SO MUCH HAIR each time she got worked up. Pre-medicated Neva would never settle down long enough to cuddle. Now, she will offer up her belly for a rub or hop onto the bed for a scratch behind the ears in the mornings. Neva still requires an enormous amount of training and she’ll probably never be a normal dog, but she seems more relaxed, happy, and furry than this time last year. I’m fairly certain that’s not because of Yuki – ha!

And while we’ve noticed incremental improvement in Neva, the same could be said for our home. The replacement of some major appliances forced us to do a serious scrub down of the kitchen last fall. We have since been slowly and methodically cleaning up different parts of the house. Tackling it all at once would leave the household cranky (me), disoriented (us), feeling hopeless (Jeremy), and confused (the pups). Breaking this behemoth endeavor down into several smaller manageable tasks increases the likelihood of success. My process involves organizing everything into categories of keepers, donations, re-purposing, recycling, and as a last resort – trash. Jeremy is a reluctant participant to my madness. It’s a bit like pulling teeth at times, but we are getting there and I try to minimize his involvement to only when necessary. I don’t think of it as the konmari method so much as making my crap easy to live with while I’m alive and easier to deal with should I die. If you’ve ever had to clean out someone’s belongings after they’ve passed on, you will understand what I’m talking about.

Don’t worry, I don’t plan on dying anytime soon. I simply like to get things in order, including fixing recipes that weren’t quite right. While I loved my friend’s interpretation of dynamo shrimp, it wasn’t what I had in mind. I spent a little time researching, tapping into my taste memory, and studying some photos I had taken of the original “dynamo shrimp” from Lil’s Sushi Bar and Grill and came up with a very close version. It’s pretty straightforward to make if you are okay with frying (pan fry or deep fry – either works). Jeremy gushes over it so much that I practically have to eat in another room.

sriracha mayo, unagi sauce, thai sweet chili sauce, raw shrimp, ginger, soy sauce, mirin, potato starch

I learned in my research that karaage and tatsuta-age (or tatsutaage) both refer to fried foods, but technically tatsuta-age is marinated before frying. It seems most people play fast and loose with the terms and rarely make the distinction between the two. I decided to go the tatsuta-age route with these shrimp because I couldn’t resist the idea of shrimp flavored with ginger, mirin, and soy sauce. Gluten-free? Good news! You can easily convert this recipe to gluten-free by subbing tamari for soy sauce in the marinade as well as in the unagi sauce (which you will need to make from scratch – but it’s easy). The coating is already potato starch, which I prefer to wheat flour for a superior fry texture.

tail-on peeled shrimp, grated ginger, soy sauce, mirin

mix the soy sauce, mirin, and ginger together

gently toss the shrimp with the marinade and sit for 5 minutes

**Jump for more butter**

Recipe: almond cake with blood oranges (gluten-free)

Someone turned the dial to Spring this week. In winter, we used to wait for the temperatures to warm up before we could hit the Nordic trails. Now, we have to go as early as possible before the temperatures get too warm and the snow turns to slush. It smells like spring outside in the mountains – like melted snow and warmth and a barely perceptible hint of damp wood. Coyote tracks in the snow don’t get blown away or covered up so much as amplified by the sun’s rays. And Yuki gets her dog stink on after a few minutes on the deck. It’s lovely. All of it.

skate skiing with two happy pups

crested butte mountain towers above the fog

Wednesday was Neva’s fourth birthday and we had a little party for her with Yuki in attendance. We are settling into a nice routine with the pups and I think we have Neva to thank for making Free Range Yuki a reality. When we used to leave the house, Yuki would be nervous and would not play with her toys. She remained at Neva’s side until we returned. But Neva is very chill and good when we are not home. She mostly takes naps, sometimes looks out the window, and occasionally barks her head off at the UPS or FedEx trucks. She let Yuki know that everything was okay. Now, Yuki naps, checks the perimeter (she is many breeds of guard dogs), looks out the window, plays a little with Neva, and even grabs a toy for a few minutes.

happy birthday, neva!

beef, cheese, apples, carrots, and orange

As if on cue, our local mama moose and her yearling (you can see his antler nubs coming in) came by one morning to nibble away at the aspens and currant bushes like she does with each calf every spring. They hung out for a couple of hours in our and our neighbors’ yards. Everyone kept their dogs inside for as long as possible to avoid disturbing the pair until they wandered off to another part of the neighborhood. I managed a few photos from the safety of our deck. Such magnificent creatures.

touching noses

nuzzling with mama

so sweet and affectionate

Today’s recipe is good for spring, summer, fall, winter, because you top it with any seasonal fruit you like. I was looking for a reliable gluten-free cake since most of my gluten-free dessert repertoire consists of non-cake items. The problem with gluten-free baking is that I’m also dealing with high altitude baking. I spent two months working through some version and variation of this cake – sending moderate successes to my neighbors and trashing a couple of outright disasters. But I figured out the tweaks and now have a winner.

eggs, almond flour, sugar, coconut flour, more sugar, baking powder, salt, almond extract, vanilla extract

This cake is baked in an 8-inch springform pan, so smaller than your standard 9-inch cake. The original recipe calls for buttering the pan (or use melted coconut oil), but I line the bottom with parchment paper first and then butter the pan. I’ve become a huge fan of parchment paper for ease of release because I’ve had too many disappointing releases without parchment. I also suspect you could bake this in a standard round baking pan, but I haven’t actually tried it yet.

butter the pan

sprinkle some sugar over the base

**Jump for more butter**