Snow in the Yard

Yesterday I woke up to another surprise overnight snow fall, and it was pretty substantial too.  This might be the most snow we have gotten all winter in my yard.  Of course by noon it was gone everywhere with sun exposure. But even this morning there is still snow in all the shady spots.

It was pretty beautiful and I walked around in the yard taking pictures because I knew it would not stick around for long.  It is mid April after all.

Patrick

Red alder catkins

salmonberry bushes

April Powder

 

This past weekend I was sick and it was warm and rainy.  We lost pretty much all our snow below 1200 feet.  It looked like we were past max snowpack, and I was a little depressed. And then Sunday night it cooled off and snowed.  I woke up to sunshine and snow in my yard. It changed my mood completely.

After work I climbed up the mountain with the dogs and found a powder stash in the North Bowl.  It was Heaven for me on skis but a little deep for the dogs - so I only did one run.

It stayed below freezing for most of the day, but I was amazed how quickly the sun still melted the snow.  There would be snow in the shadows and a sharp melt line where it met the sunshine.  At the pass looking south at the slopes facing north it looked all snowy, but looking towards the north and the south facing slopes it looked all brown.  It was kind of a cool optical effect.  

But up on high the sun did not melt the new snow! It is still winter up there.

Patrick

Garlic in the snow

 

Yesterday my garlic sprouts got frosted and snowed on.  I do not think the elements will hurt them much. Indeed as soon as the sun hit the snow it melted away.  A couple of years ago my garlic did not even sprout until May and I thought it had all died.  This year my garlic sprouts are all already a couple inches high, and it seems that practically every one of them sprouted. 

This morning I also noticed that last year's kale plants that the deer completely pruned earlier in the winter have sprouted new greenery.  After the deer ate all the kale greens I thought the plants were dead.  But no - it looks like I'll be harvesting more of last years kale soon.  And pretty soon I'll be planting this year's kale.

Patrick

Buskin beach at low tide

And some pictures from last Wednesday - the last day I skied all the way down to the road. I don't think we'll be doing that again this winter.

That's the road and some desperate snow

Deer Pot Pie

 

The other day I was picking out soup to buy at Safeway and noticed a recipe for beef pot pies on a can of Campbells soup.  I love pot pies and it seemed super easy.  I've always been intimidated by the pie crust aspect of making a pot pie, and did not know, as it said in the recipe, that you could get them pre made for pot pies. So I bought a couple pre made pie crusts, and some small 'pot pie-sized' glass dishes and went home.

At home I googled pot pie recipes and came up with one that I thought would work with my canned deer meat. Click here for my elaborate canned deer recipe.  This winter when I canned deer meat I simply browned the meat and added carrots and leeks to the jars with a little beef broth. In any case, I have a great many jars of canned deer and elk meat.  So I thought a pot pie recipe that used my canned meat would make for some easy tasty meals in the future.  

Unlike the recipe on the soup can I decided not to use the condensed soup as a base.  Instead I mixed a couple of table spoons of corn starch into cold water for a thickening agent.  I basically followed this recipe from the internet (click here), but adapted it to use canned deer. I made it once just for me (pictures in this post), and it was so good that I made it again a few days later for Stuey (no pictures).  The second time I made it I did a few tweeks - like adding my own garden carrots and a little bit of Campbells 'condensed golden mushroom soup' (click here for recipe from the Campbells soup can)

What's amazing is that from start to finish it took less than an hour to make and there is no need to de frost anything from the freezer!

Here is my recipe - I did not measure out the ingredients but they are close to what I came up with below.  Also I did find that 1 pint jar made 2 pies just about perfectly.  Then when I made it for Stuey I used a 1 pint jar and added another 1/2 pint jar and it made 3 pies just about perfectly. I included links to all the recipes I looked at because I think it is a good idea to mix and match, and you may want to do it slightly differently.

Ingredients - 

1 pint jar of canned deer meet for 2 pies 

1 cup of frozen peas

1/2 cup of frozen corn

1 cup chopped fresh carrots

1/2 cup of chopped celery

2-3 tablespoons of corn starch

1/2 cup of water

dash of thyme

salt and pepper 

1 tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce

1 Pillsbury read made pie crust (from refrigerated section at Safeway)

1 tablespoon oil

1 1/2 tablespoons of Campbells condensed golden mushroom soup (I did it for the mushroom flavor)

Method:

1) In a sauce pan I added the chopped carrots and celery and browned them in the oil for a few minutes.

2) Added jar of canned meat and its gelatinous meat sauce to the browning vegetables, and broke up all the meat chunks with a fork and butter knife.  

3) Added the corn starch to a glass with the cold water and condensed golden mushroom soup base, and stirred it all up.

4) Heated the sauce pan until meat, carrots and celery were simmering and then added the corn starch, water and soup base to the mix.  This should thicken it all up.

5) Added all the frozen vegetables to the simmering mix and stirred it all up.

6) Added Worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper, and a dash of thyme.

7) Spooned the pot pie mix into the small pie dishes and cut the pie crust to shape to fit over the tops. I found that one pie crust could cover 3 small pot pies but that I had to use multiple strips.

8) Put the pies on a pie sheet and put into oven pre heated at 350 degrees.

9) Bake for 45 minutes or less - until the tops are golden brown.

10) take them out of oven and enjoy!

Post script: The last time I cooked this instead of corn starch I tried flour.  I browned the flour with the carrots and celery.  I think this tasted better than the corn starch. And I used dried mushrooms that I re hydrated in water - I used this instead of the 1/2 cup of water.

Nearing Peak Snow

 

This winter we just recently got any snow so it is hard to say when we will or have reached peak snow. What I call 'peak snow' is when Pyramid Mountain achieves the greatest snowpack.  Usually this happens sometime in late April. Last year it was April 16th (click here for post) and that was earlier than usual. Peak snow is actually later than when we lose snow at the bottom of the mountain - for a while we gain enough snow up high on the mountain to off set what we lose down low.  Up high Pyramid got a lot of snow in the last couple of weeks.  We actually got most of our snowpack since early March.  So I do not quite think we are at peak snow - yet.

That said, in the last few days we have lost a lot of snow low down on the mountain.  On Sunday it was easy to ski to the road.  Then in just 3 days we lost almost all of it - I fear that yesterday is the last time this year that I ski to the road. But, this year, we barely skied to the road until mid March anyway.

In any case, in town it is supposed to rain through the weekend. If we gain snow - or even moisture content - above 1200 feet then I feel we will still are gaining snow.  But if it rains to the top then I fear we will have reached max snowpack.

Patrick

Ryan and Bode

The chase pack

Snow to the road just a few days ago