tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-71068623788588756592012-01-23T21:59:09.532-06:00Musings on the good life, food, the food we'll find, the food we'll create, and the new friends we'll make as we RV from California to North Dakota to California, and ?????? and back.Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.comBlogger141100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-64049364489376084392011-12-09T16:27:00.000-06:002011-12-09T16:27:40.545-06:00

Today is Billy J Cotton's birthday.  I wish he could be with us to celebrate - it would be so much fun.  But, on September 30, 2009 I posted this on a cooking forum that we both loved:   Billy & Jesse - his last visit to California. ""My wind chimes just chimed!      Once in a rare moment God creates a beautiful Angel that he sends to earth to enrich the lives of all that he might touch.

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-15855704040507490632011-12-02T16:19:00.000-06:002011-12-02T16:19:39.892-06:00

     I last posted on August 18 - now it's the first of December!  Where did the time go??    We are still here at Sage Hills Golf & RV Resort.  This has been an incredibly busy time for us and we're truly enjoying our time here in Washington State.  I was raised in this state, although it was on the other side of the mountains, but it's nice to be "home".  We had hoped to have more time to

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-3377957048363103662011-08-16T21:34:00.000-05:002011-08-16T21:34:40.718-05:00

Sage Hills Road - Beautiful! WOW!  It was brought to my attention the other day that I hadn’t done anything with this blog in ages!   There is no excuse – it just didn’t seem like much was going on in my life – but I was reminded that a lot has happened since I last posted here and that there are a few people who used this blog to keep up to date on us.   I’ll start with where we are and

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-75461271413934262912010-09-07T12:57:00.023-05:002010-09-07T19:21:14.492-05:00

Yesterday we sat in the motor home listening to the pounding rain. It's hard to accomplish a damn thing when it 's like this. We couldn't load the trailer, couldn't load the truck so we can haul the last of our storage stuff off. We wanted to drag the small freezer outside so we could defrost and wash it out – we couldn't get that done. We couldn't get the smoker fired up and workable in

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-30168879045021013572010-08-26T17:48:00.000-05:002010-08-26T17:48:35.062-05:00

I've been negligent.  There's just been so much to do since we got back home with the motor home.  We made the difficult decision to put all of our stuff  (that won't fit in the motor home or in our 5 x 9 trailer) in storage and hit the road for a while.  It wasn't an easy decision, but circumstances just made it the right decision.  There's been so much to do to get ready, on top of general day

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-46809867886204059642010-07-04T23:04:00.000-05:002010-07-04T23:04:40.184-05:00

Last night we stopped at the Holiday Hills RV park in Coalville, Utah.  It was a nice little park with full hook-ups, no cable & no wireless but so what.  They had two adorable looking little cabins.   We got a nice start this morning and were thinking that we'd have no problem making our destination of Lusk, Wyoming.  Our first stop was at Fort Bridger, a very cool historical site that we would

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-84674120687647770382010-07-03T12:36:00.000-05:002010-07-03T12:36:51.786-05:00

We got a burr under our tail.  As much as we love the farm, and as much as we love North Dakota, we decided to get a motorhome and "cruise" the country - going back to the farm now an again.  We found the perfect coach in our price range in California and drove out to get it.   We spent 5 days with good friends (next to the word "friend" in the dictionary there's a picture of them) then found

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-74641997376213078412010-04-10T17:39:00.001-05:002010-04-10T18:40:45.486-05:00

Wow – it's been over six months here. We're told that we've survived the worst of it. We've lived through the winter without running back to sunshine. Uh, yeah. And winter was a revelation. The stunning beauty of the countryside with drifts of snow along the roads looking like someone had sculpted beautiful sparkling white buttercream frosting into delicate swirls. Little farmsteads

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-25414291460624344942010-03-03T17:58:00.000-06:002010-03-03T17:58:33.235-06:00

(Hey, don't look at me like that!) I wound up thawing a good sized package of venison chunks that were destined for the grinder by mistake. Of course I had to figure out something different to make with it. We had noticed the similarity between the venison and lamb – so Greek came to my mind, Pastitsio in particular. I had discovered this recipe in a 1971 version of "The New York

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-89185066885309509052010-02-09T18:03:00.000-06:002010-02-09T18:03:01.348-06:00

One of the wonderful things about North Dakota seems to be the quality of the food - cheese from pasture grazed cows, locally grown grain products, chickens and eggs from family farms, and more.  This fits so well with our goal to eat clean and locally grown food.   But once in a while  . . . . After several months of old standby's and hearty North Dakota food we suddenly went on an Asian food

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-73434990705936336872010-01-24T09:34:00.000-06:002010-01-24T09:37:11.923-06:00

The Farm is outside of town, on a mixed stretch of washboard pavement and dirt & gravel.  This time of year it's got patches of ice and snow in various places and the roadsides are covered in snow.    Every time we make the trip into town, or back home we see something that catches our eye. It could be a little farm tucked into the trees that we only noticed because it stood out against the white

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-55195939162485439922010-01-20T09:41:00.000-06:002010-01-20T09:44:33.633-06:00

We got up again this morning to find there had been a heavy fog and the temperature had dropped.  It's called hoar frost, and develops from the moisture in the ground rising and freezing.  The beauty is always stunning, never exactly the same twice.  Everything looks like it's been powdered sugared, with beautiful crystals forming.  This is the 3rd day in  a row that we've seen this specatcular

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-29329646822134104572010-01-18T11:01:00.000-06:002010-01-18T11:56:23.669-06:00

I have been derelict and I apologize.  When I frist started this blog it was going to be about our trip from California to North Dakota - highlights and low lights; the food, and the events.  Some day I'll post some of the pictures - most taken from the van because we couldn't stop; the truck with all of our belongings was at least 2 hours ahead of us every day.  It became a pain. There was

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7106862378858875659.post-18172061870623781362009-10-03T21:04:00.000-05:002009-10-03T21:27:45.377-05:00

Friends asked me to do this blog to keep them up to date on our little relocation project from California to North Dakota, the experiences we have, and the food we find along the way and when we get there.   I realize that the first thing most people think is "North Freaking Dakota?".  Yup, we really are going to North Dakota!  It was a plan we'd had for a long, long time - but we were thinking

Cook Afloathttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05733594438106825804noreply@blogger.com7