Grandma Jean's Chocolate Chip Cookies

I've always lived far far away from my Grams, but she made it feel like we were so close. There was always something in the mail: cards, letters, small puzzles, pressed flowers, a comic strip clipped out of the paper, lace edged handkerchiefs, and once in a great while, a box of home made cookies.

Her chocolate chip cookies were superb, like none other. I thought it might all be in my head, since Grams made these, they just HAD to taste better than any other cookie. I never thought to ask why.

One day, my aunt handed me the recipe card. I had not asked for it, she just thought it was important enough to hand down - thank god she had the presence of mind to pass down a recipe I didn't even know I needed. As I glanced through the ingredient list it was as if the heavens opened and a glorious beam of radiance filled the kitchen, along with the chorus of angels. Grams chocolate chip cookie recipe was indeed different from all other I had ever known - she made her cookies with pudding. My god. Pudding in a cookie. Genius!

Of course she would want me to put my own spin on it, so I've experimented all around and my favorite alternate mix is using chocolate pudding with walnuts seasoned with cinnamon and chili powder.

Grandma Jean's Chocolate Chip Cookies

2 1/4c. flour 
1 tsp. baking soda 
1 c. butter, softened 
1/4 c. white sugar 
3/4 c. brown sugar 
1 tsp. vanilla 
1-4 oz. box instant vanilla pudding 
2 eggs 
1 pkg. choc. chips 
Cream butter and sugars together. Blend in eggs, vanilla, soda, and pudding.Then, mix in flour. After well blended fold in the chips. Bake at 375 for 8-10 min.

Pateros Annual Salmon Bake and Cultural Celebration

Dan Nanamkin stands by his team’s cedar dugout canoe

By Joanna Bastian

Shortly before noon on Saturday (June 25), a long cedar dugout canoe floated down the Methow River to the confluence and then turned up the Columbia River. The team of six rowed the craft to shore to kick off the third annual Salmon Bake and Cultural Celebration fundraiser for the Community Resource Center for Pateros Brewster (CRCPB).

The CRCPB was created in the months after the Carlton Complex Fire, to serve the communities of Pateros and Brewster. With assistance from Room One, the Okanogan County Long Term Recovery Group and the Community Foundation of North Central Washington, the CRCPB was launched to provide much-needed resources including case management, client advocacy and behavioral/mental health services.

Grace Larsen, secretary of the CRCPB board, and Jim Larsen, vice-chair of the board, manned the CRCPB information booth at the celebration. The CRCPB was the recipient of all the money raised.

Other booths included a traditional basket weaving demonstration by Elaine and Tillie Timentwa, a native flute demonstration, native artwork displays, teepee construction, drumming, and archaeological speakers.

The DayBreak Canyon Bluegrass Band kept the toes stomping with their strumming and fiddling, while large salmon fillets sizzled on an open grill.

Ernie Brooks, Confederated Tribes language instructor, was on hand to share the Nxaʔamxčín language and teach people common phrases. Ernie has dedicated nearly 30 years of his life to preserving the Salish language. When he first started, there were eight elders who could speak it fluently. Today, there is only one still living. Ernie has worked to preserve the words: recording elders telling their stories, and writing down the translations. 
 

Dan Nanamkin stood near the cedar dugout canoe to answer questions. He and his rowing team had negotiated the Methow River that morning to bring the canoe to the event. Just the week before, they rowed 105 miles upriver from Grand Coulee to Kettle Falls, completing a traditional route and trading along the way. On Sunday, the team took the traditional canoe across Lake Chelan, and next week they are rowing all the way to Canada. Next year, the team will attempt to complete a voyage all the way to the Pacific Ocean.

The cedar dugout canoe was made from an old growth cedar provided to the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation by the Quinalt Nation. The massive tree was delivered to the Nespelem Community Center, where over the course of a year community members learned how to create a traditional vessel. Designs of coyote tracks and salmon were burned into the sides, telling the story of the coyote who brought the salmon back to the people. The dugout canoe was christened “Xwil wi,” meaning “journey.”

Xwil wi will serve as an educational tool, as the team rows to different communities raising awareness of the importance of the cleanliness of our waterways, the health of the salmon, and cultural traditions of the Pacific Northwest native people.

If you would like to know more about the Pateros Brewster Community Resource Center, and either contribute or become a sustaining member, visit crcpb.org.

 
Randy Lewis hands off a sizzing salmon to Aaron Naumann

A youngster learns the art of drumming.

Methow Valley News, June 29, 2016

Hyas Pretty and the Bear

Methow Valley News, June 15, 2016

In October 1886, Tom Robinson and his brother Jim first met Narcisse, a Methow Indian who lived below the stony bluffs at the mouth of the Methow River. Narcisse and his friends, seeing Tom’s blonde hair and blue eyes, nicknamed him “Hyas Pretty.”

Narcisse saddled up horses for the two men and guided them to the upper reaches of the Methow Valley, where they were soon joined by Alfred “Parson” Smith, a fur trapper and poet by nature. The men became fast friends and trapped together that season.

Tom and Parson were eating lunch one fine spring day along Slate Creek when a grizzly bear suddenly joined them, growling fiercely. What followed was what anyone might do should a bear try to bully away a tuna sandwich: namely, lots of yelling, running and sheer chaos until someone shimmies up a tree, bear in tow.

Parson captured the action in an epic poem on par with Homer’s “Iliad”: a vast setting over mountains and valleys, deeds of superhuman strength, over-the-top narration, and a hero.

Parson wrote other poems, and perhaps the most famous one is a short verse that he carved into a tree, proclaiming his love for this area. After the tree died, a bear set to snacking on the juicy grubs that had taken up in the wood. The U.S. Forest Service removed the stump with the poem emblazed, and you can see it today preserved at the Winthrop Ranger station.

Hyas Pretty and the Bear
By Alfred (Parson) Smith, 1887

I’ve a vivid recollection of a valley
Wondrous fair.
Of a man called Hyas Pretty and
A monster grizzly bear.
I can shut my eyes and see them
Yet; the valley, man, and bear.
The narrow strip of bench land,
And the lakelets silver glare.

On the right there rose a mountain,
Towering high and capped with
Snow.
On the left a ragged rock bed
In the valley far below.
In the foreground Hyas Pretty; with
A smile serene and fair.
Followed close in all his movements,
By the playful old she bear.

When first I saw them goin’ I
Marveled at their speed;
With the old she bear to rearward,
And Hyas Pretty in the lead.
And I stood convulsed with laughter;
For it seemed to me a pun.
A bear slayer in such frantic
Haste that he could not use his gun.

As they charged along the benchland
It at first appeared to me,
That the race was well worth
Climbing those ragged heights to see.
But like some moving panorama,
Or some frantic midnight dream,
While the actors still were moving,
A change came o’er the scene.

And while I mused and speculated
On who should get the pelt,
Hyas Pretty cast his gun aside
And loudly called for help.
‘Twas a time sore fraught with danger;
As plainly I could see
And Hyas Pretty in a time of
Stress, had placed his faith in me.

And I could not, would not fail him;
Yet it caused my blood to boil.
That Hyas Pretty when in danger,
Should from the fray recoil.
And I felt the strength of Sampson
In every pore and vein.
As I shed my roll of blankets and
Charged across the plain.

While Hyas Pretty sorely winded,
High had climbed within a tree,
And left the old she grizzly with
The battle ground to me.
Yet I neither flinched nor faltered;
As I grappled with the bear.
And felt her hot breath flowing
In my face, and eyes and hair.
While we pulled, and tugged, and
Tussled, back and forth, time and again.
And sometimes I was uppermost
And sometimes on the plain.
And as we strove and wrestled;
Hyas Pretty, from the tree,
Raised his voice and shouted;
“Say! Give her one for me!”

And he often times has told me
That it nearly froze him stiff,
TO SEE ME RAISE THAT BEAR
ON HIGH AND TOSS HER
O’ER THE CLIFF.
And when we stripped the old
bear’s skin from tip of tail to head,
Hyas Pretty brought the pelt to me,
And this is what he said.

“Honored Sir, I bring this trophy,
And lay it at your feet.
‘Tis the just reward of victory,
The hide and half the meat.
And in all the years to follow, if
I by chance should meet,
With other famed bear slayers,
And be asked to name some feat.

Where a brave man all unaided,
Free handed, and alone,
Had fought an old she grizzly on
The front step of her home,
I shall give to you the glory;
For you saved my life to me,
And slew the fierce old monster,
While I was up a tree.

Unarmed and all unaided, ‘twas a
Noble thing to do,
And my hat I’ll doff in honor
When’er I meet with you.
I shall paint your name upon the
Cliffs, that all who pass may read,
How you rescued Hyas Pretty in
His hour of greatest need.”

The Methow Valley, Young at Heart

 
Photo by Joanna Bastian
View of Pipestone Canyon from the Rim Trail. Pipestone Canyon was carved initially by glacial meltwater. Later, the Methow Indians carved  stone from the canyon into pipes and bowls.

Methow Valley News, May 25, 2016

Ever wonder how the Methow Valley was formed?

I am constantly in awe of the beauty of this valley, how the shifting light of morning illuminates the variance in topography, how a rainstorm in the distance cuts a path through a maze of hills and valleys before crashing into the rocky crags of a high mountain peak.

When the warmth of spring melts back the winter snows, I wonder at the sheer number of flowers that bloom, all in different hues and scents: the lupine, balsamroot, Indian paintbrush, wild rose, shooting stars, buttercups, blue bells, and a myriad more whose names I can never remember.

The Methow Valley is geographically young, compared to other areas in the United States. It still bears the recent scars of formation by plate tectonics and glaciers. The Methow Valley is also anthropologically young, as one of the last areas in the country to be settled.

Next Wednesday (June 1), from 7 – 8 p.m. at Sun Mountain Lodge, I will be exploring the formation of the Methow Valley: going all the way back to early beginnings, and how different cultures carved a way of life in this scenic paradise.

I’ll be sharing excerpts from a diary of early fur trappers, early interviews with Indians and settlers, and archaeological evidence left by the first people who lived here 10,000 years ago. I’ll also share some of the experiences I’ve had while writing for the Methow Valley News.

It’s totally free, and I promise to make it entertaining. Where else can you get tectonic plates, glaciers, First People, salmon, fur trappers, European explorers, miners, China Ditch, orchardists, fire and floods all in one hour? Which reminds me of a T-shirt I recently saw in support of keeping the Three Devils Road open: “Because Hell and High Water Do Happen.”

The history presentation was the idea of my boss, Dr. Tom McCord, director of the Bear Fight Institute in Winthrop. The Bear Fight Institute conducts research for space missions, including the Dawn Space Mission, a NASA Discovery Program. Members of the Dawn team will visit the Methow Valley next week for their annual team meeting. As part of the evening’s entertainment, I will be talking about the history of the Methow Valley on June 1. Everyone is welcome to join us.

The following night, Thursday, June 2, from 7 – 8 p.m. at Sun Mountain Lodge, McCord and Dr. Marc Rayman, director and chief engineer of the Dawn Mission, will hold a public presentation about the Dawn Mission and its orbit around Vesta and Ceres, protoplanets from the beginning of the solar system. The presentation will be informative and entertaining, geared towards the general public. It is a perfect opportunity to learn more about our solar system and will offer a chance for budding scientists to ask questions of professionals in the field.

Bee-leiber

Methow Valley News, May 11, 2016

Due to a series of unfortunate events I did not have any bees last year. Long story short: 2014 gave us all a complex, stressing the bees going into winter of 2015, which they did not survive. Ankle reconstruction left me dubious about handling bee boxes while hopping around on one leg. As a result of wildfire, Frankenankle, and disappearing bees, I am just now getting that one part of life back into order.

This year I am trying two different sets of bees: a nuc — which comes with five frames of brood, 10,000 bees and a queen — and a package, which is a box full of bees, no frames, and a queen in a little cage.

The nuc arrived in early April about the same time that the snow melted and the wildflowers began to bloom. The frames easily slid into a waiting hive box and the worker bees downed a bottle of sugar water before setting out to find their own food sources. Within a week they had filled the other frames with comb and required another box. Today, they needed a third box as the second was already filled with nesting baby bees, nectar, pollen and capped honey.

The package arrived on the same day as my cousin Shelby, who flew out from Ohio to visit for a few days.

The package was delayed by a week. That day, I picked up Shelby at the shuttle drop off in Peshastin and apologized profusely that we had to cut our Leavenworth visit short because of my bee addiction. Shelby stopped me with, “Are you kidding me? This will be amazing!” She was thrilled that the bee shipment coincided with her arrival. It’s like we’re related.

After quickly downing a Bavarian lunch of ale, baked pretzels, and smoked salmon drizzled with huckleberry sauce, we returned to the Methow.

At the bee drop-off at the Methow Community Center in Twisp, everyone was true to form: covered in bees and grinning ear to ear.

Shelby also shares my heightened sensitivity to bee stings. We both donned bee jackets for the car ride home with a few “groupies” hanging on to the outside of the package.

At home in the garden, Shelby and I poured the bees into the waiting hive. The bees immediately formed a line at the entrance of the box and fanned their scent into the air, calling everyone home. For the next few days, they spiraled through the air above the hive box, orienting themselves. The buzzing was loud as they communicated where to find water and food with elaborate dances at the hive entrance.

After three days, the bottle of sugar water was fully consumed, and the buzz reduced to a quiet, satisfied hum. The bees no longer flew in spirals. Instead they come and go with a focused determination, some arriving with full pollen buckets of bright orange and yellow. Other bees diligently clean the hive, hauling out bits of trash and the rare dead body. Fascinating creatures.

Backcountry Birthday

Methow Valley News, April 27, 2016

It is a dangerous trip down river with the spring runoff at peak flow this week. The drive itself is dangerous. I’ve pulled over several times to safely observe the flow without drifting into oncoming traffic. I don’t know why I look. The sight fills me with terrible awe. My stomach churns with just as much ferocity as the turbulent water. Whole trees rush by, roots clawing at the air. I wonder if they make it to the ocean in days, or in hours.
Phil Brownlee in Pateros recalls the flood of 1948 whisking a haystack downriver. A rooster perched on top, crowing his discontent.
I met with Rebecca Meadows recently — she said she had something to give me. I expected maybe an old newspaper article, or photos, or maybe some flower bulbs. Instead, it was something even better: stories recorded by her father, Wayne Luft.
The family lived at the mouth of Black Canyon. Wayne led guided horse packing tours through the Sawtooth and Pasayten ranges. In his final years, Wayne made a series of CDs, recording his memories of the early days guiding through hillsides full of flowers, rockslides and high mountain lakes. One of the sweetest memories Wayne shared was that of his daughter’s seventh birthday.
Young Rebecca had asked to ride up to Boiling Lake for her birthday. The family and a few friends loaded up the horses and rode into the Sawtooth range to fish and camp for a week.
At the campfire that first night, Rebecca made the sad observation that this would be her first birthday without a cake. Her father told her he would make it up to her with a triple-decker cake when they got home, but she replied that it just wouldn’t be the same. Here they were with all these people and no cake to share with their friends.
Wayne asked his young daughter if she wanted to lead the group to Cub Creek the next day to fish. Her eyes lit up with the idea of riding in front. After breakfast the following morning, Wayne made an excuse to stay at camp to prepare a big birthday dinner.
When the riders got out of sight, Wayne, his son Pat, and his friend Manual started digging a fire hole to roast the dinner. Legs of lamb were rubbed down with garlic and wrapped in foil with potatoes and onions. Wayne mixed up a cake in a Dutch oven and placed it in the fire pit on top of the lamb. After an hour, Wayne pulled out the Dutch oven and set it on a stump. He dusted off ashes before lifting the lid. The three men held their breath and looked into the oven. Manual declared it the prettiest cake he’d ever seen. The men mixed up a sugar frosting and spread it over the cake.
Late in the afternoon, the fishing crew returned with Rebecca riding tall in the lead, grinning from ear to ear. After dinner, everyone sang happy birthday and the cake was revealed. From the sound of Wayne’s voice on the CD, it is hard to tell which pleased Rebecca the most: leading the fishermen to Cub Creek that morning, or the surprise birthday cake at Boiling Lake that evening. The look on the face of his 7-year-old daughter was something Wayne remembered vividly years later, when he recorded his memories along with all his other “Tales of the Methow.”

Mysterious Footprints

Methow Valley News, April 13, 2016

It was a dark and stormy night.

In truth it was a starlit, clear and cold night, but any good mystery starts off with ominous storm clouds and mysterious footprints.

A group of adventurous Methowites were enjoying a spring skiing trip in a remote area of the Sawtooths when they came across the trail of a mystery snowshoer.

During the last week of March, Dwight Filer, JoAnn Metzler and Sam Greebowich camped and ski-toured the basin below Hoodoo Pass above Lake Chelan. On their first day, Monday, March 28, they came across snowshoe tracks and deduced that someone had recently camped at Boiling Lake. As they toured the area the next morning, they observed the snowshoe tracks leaving Boiling Lake. On the last morning, the group woke up to find footprints of a wolverine that had investigated their tents the night before.

The snowshoe tracks are remarkable in that the area that is so remote and difficult to access. Skis can traverse a snowy landscape in mere hours, compared to snowshoes. The skiers were impressed by the snowshoe tracks and would love to know who might have been enjoying the same stretch of spring snow in the higher elevations.

Photo courtesy of Dwight Filer

JoAnn Metzler and Sam Greebowich on a ski trip into the Sawtooths.

The wolverine tracks were less mysterious and need no explanation. Or do they?

Another mystery readers could help solve is a discouraging case of illegal dumping and polluting.

Within the last month someone dumped a large air conditioning unit in the waters of Gold Creek, two-and-a-half miles up the road, between the South Fork and North Fork bridges. Illegal dumping in state waterways is a criminal offense punishable by a fine.

Just in gas and effort alone, it would have been cheaper for the violators to take that air conditioner to the annual metal drive on April 30.

Dumping in creeks not only destroys the scenery, but also has a negative impact on fish, birds, deer and numerous species of animals who depend on clean water. Less than a mile downstream are numerous family homes with wells that depend on clean ground water for drinking and eating. There are family-owned campgrounds a football throw away from the dumping site. Here, people filter water from the creek for drinking and cooking, cleaning, and their grandchildren enjoy a dip in the cold water.

Further down the creek are beaver ponds, salmon spawning redds, and a community swimming hole. Illegal dumping may be convenient for some, but it hurts everyone else.

If you or someone you know left an air conditioner in Gold Creek, please come pick it up and take it to the Methow Recycles metal drive either Saturday, April 30, or Sunday, May 1, at Cascade Concrete on Horizon Flats Road in Winthrop between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. There is a $15 purging fee for appliances that once contained coolants, like air conditioners. Everything else is free.

Fifteen dollars is cheaper than a criminal record and fine for illegal dumping. Also, the person who retrieves their air conditioner would be giving back to the community instead of taking away the view and the clean water for their neighbors.