April 12, 2010
Back in the Saddle

Hey Folks! Well, the weather has turned back to decent, if slightly strange in the sense that we have had several days of unheard of west-bound winds, and the fishing has been just great. John Sibley and Colin McCrossin accompanied me to Lago 1 for some excellent action with the resident brown trout population, and then Ana and John and I headed to Lago Vintter to try our hands at catching some of the big healthy rainbows out along the Chilean border. Those trips combined with a couple of very successful nights with the brook trout at the Corcovado boca have made for some really excellent fishing over the last week, and I am excited still about the weeks to come between now and the end of the season. In other news Ana has been having a good bit of success with mushroom hunting here of late, making excellent escabeche with her finds, and on top of that has taken up with a milk-producing cow just outside of town and begun to make home-made cheese! Yes, you heard me right. She milks the cow, then she makes cheese out of the milk. Then I eat the cheese. It’s a good system. The cheese needs not stand alone however; believe it or not, I have been using my free time to practice the ancient art of making bread. This is actually a lot more interesting and fun than I ever would have previously imagined, and it occurs to me that the possibilities for recipe tweaking and artisanal modification are nearly endless. There is something just wholesomely satisfying about watching a loaf of bread rise and turn brown across the top, and after all these years of eating store-bought junk bread I am amazed at how easy making my own really is, and surprised that I never tried it sooner.