Corned Beef, Red Flannel Hash, and Cabbage Soup

I have never much cared for corned beef. Tough and fatty, it is highly processed and seems the very opposite of health food. Besides, we seldom eat beef of any kind. Nevertheless, corned beef was on sale last week, as was cabbage (at 19 cents a pound!). So I succumbed and, following an old recipe, made a New England Boiled Dinner, with potatoes, beets, carrots, and of course, cabbage. It wasn't too bad.

The same old cookbook had a recipe for Red Flannel Hash, made from the leftovers of the first recipe. You drain off the liquid, chop up the meat and vegetables, and bake in a cast iron skillet lined with butter until it is brown and crusty. It was very tasty.

Some other leftovers remained, including about a quart of cooking broth from the boiled dinner and half of a large green cabbage. Skimming the fat from the cooking broth and adding chicken broth to make two quarts, I used it in my cabbage soup recipe. The taste was delightful! I'm still not a fan of corned beef brisket, but wish the recipes using the leftovers weren't one-offs.

Reheating the soup for another meal

Hospitalero time is coming

 We have our plane tickets. We are studying our Spanish every day, but we do not feel ready for prime time conversation yet. Even in our dreams, we only see ourselves as being able to communicate basic needs, like shopping in the little tienda-- “I want those vegetables, over there on that shelf.”

 

 But we are greatly looking forward to the experience and then to walking with Pam and James for a couple of weeks and almost 200 miles.

And, we are having fun buying gear again, although we already own more than we would consider carrying. It is just such fun to find new, lighter, better versions of stuff we have. I’m bringing my same rain poncho. After my testing it thoroughly last year, we never had any rain.

Right now, we enjoying our great Golden Retriever, Jake. We do not have many days left with him. We keep him close for this last little time we have together.

 Next weekend is the Annual Meeting of the Friends of the Lower Suwannee & Cedar Keys NWRs. I will move from being president to being past president. I feel good about what we’ve accomplished in my two years, getting 12 paddling trails mapped out, with a 13^th underway; establishing 12 Initiatives for 2013, with a volunteer champion for each of them, and putting some governance changes in place to strengthen succession of leadership. 

I will be happy to hand over the gavel…well actually we don’t need a gavel at our meetings. I think I’ll hand over the coffee pot…we do need coffee.

After that…train, train, train for the hike and study, study, study our Spanish. It is almost countdown time.

 

 

Becoming Hospitaleros

Not at all sure how it got started, but it surely was sometime last Spring. We had decided to attend the Annual Gathering of the American Pilgrims on the Camino in Winter Park, FL, in March. The meeting lasts about three days, and there is an optional two-day extension; one can arrive early and be trained to be a volunteer hospitalero in a network of albergues along El Camino de Santiago. We saw the Gathering as a mini-vacation--a chance to meet up with people we knew from two years earlier and, especially, spend some time with our sister and brother-in-law, who are seasoned pilgrims and Gathering goers. Somehow a notion took hold; why not extend our little vacation and take in the hospitalero training? It should be fun, and we were curious about what it entailed.

So we took the training. It was interesting and fun, but we didn't volunteer last year, deciding to walk instead. As things turned out, we found ourselves walking a much more rugged and demanding route than expected, and that might have helped to make the idea of holding still for a couple of weeks seem more appealing. I don't know if it was then or sometime later, but the idea of volunteering gained currency, and last week we decided it was time to put our names in.

Our first choice of where to go was the famous Albergue Guacelmo in the mountain village of Rabanal. We informed the operators, the British Confraternity of Saint James, of our interest. We got an offer, but unfortunately the July dates they had available didn't fit with our plans at all. Our second choice was the municipal albergue in El Burgo Ranero (the Town of Frogs), a dusty village in the Kansas-like Meseta. We got the offer and the dates we needed, so we will be off next May. We've gotten a welcome and a few instructions, but it appears that, like most other things on the Camino, it will be an informal, cordial, and physically demanding undertaking.

El Burgo Ranero, including church with resident storks

The Albergue

The wetlands, home to the town's frogs

Paddling the Cedar Key Backwater

Yesterday we spent most of a delightful day paddling the Cedar Key Backwater Trail. Starting in a small tidal creek on the mainland, it takes paddlers through near pristine wilderness to the picturesque built environment of a traditional fishing village. As we entered the Gulf of Mexico and headed for the Cedar Key Beachfront Park, we encountered a marvelous expanse of mirror-like water.

Christmas at Russ and Peg's

We had a wonderful Christmas. It was a perfect day to take a long walk, which we did. Then we ate, opened presents, ate, played with our presents, cooked, ate, and sat by the fire enjoying the evening. We are very lucky.

Early Christmas

Pam and James were here for the weekend. We put up the tree, shopped at the Farmers Market, went to the Thomas Center Art Show and bought stuff, hiked at the Prairie Creek Conservation Cemetery. All the rest of the time? We spent a lot of it eating, a lot of it talking, and some of it listening to music.

Bathroom Project Finished, Almost

The painting is done and the new toilet installed. Now I just need to find new shower curtains, towels and rugs. It ought to be the easy part. I hope it is

A Thanksgiving Week Project

Thanksgiving seems like a good time for a project. How about a rehab of the other bathroom? It was the last room with wallpaper. So very 1990s.

 

 

And now?

 Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all.

Let the painting begin!

A Camino Class at Santa Fe College

 We are going to teach a class about Hiking the Camino as part of the Community Education offerings at Santa Fe College. Classes will be from 6:30 to 8:00 on Thursday evenings November 1, 8, and 15 on the campus in northwest Gainesville. The College charges $24 for the course.

Registration is open now. You can call 352-395-5193 to sign up. Online registration is also available.  Go to www.sfcollege.edu. Click on Community Education and scroll down to "Register Here" the course number is NAT 0094.1F.

The class is geared for people who are thinking of walking the Camino de Santiago de Compostela in Spain, or who just want to know about the nitty-gritty of going on this long distance hike. We will discuss the legends, history, and culture of the trail. 

The focus will be heavily on the practicalities, such as:

• How do you know where to start?
• How do you get there?
• Where do you sleep?
• What do you bring?
• How do you train for such a hike?
• Do you have to walk all 500 miles?
• How much time do you need?
• What does it cost?
• When is a good time of year to go?
• What do you eat?
• Are there rest rooms?
• Is it safe?
• Do you have to go with a group?
• Do you have to go alone?
• Do you meet interesting people?

If you saw the film The Way and were intrigued, or for some other reason the Camino is calling to you, come and learn more about it. It is an adventure to cherish.

Spanish Crocuses

These little crocuses seemed to be almost everywhere we walked this September in Spain. They were particularly abundant in the hard-packed soil of the trail. We aren't sure, but think they may be close relatives of the domesticated species used for harvesting saffron threads.

Leaving Madrid

A view of the Prado, unfortunately glimpsed only briefly on Sunday morning as we were rushing to catch the shuttle to the airport...maybe next year. Don't mind the image of the finger at the top of the photo; it must be my fault, because who could conceive of a design flaw in an iPhone?

Beginning the Trip Home

We bid goodbye to our pilgrim friends and we are off to the train station. Tonight Madrid. Tomorrow Gainesville.

Side Trip Cancelled by Rain

We'd planned a fun side trip to the former capital of Spain, Valladolid. This morning when the 5 of us met in the lobby to head to the bus station, the changed forecast was 80% chance of rain both there and here in Zamora. We decided to stay here where we have a hotel to take refuge in.

It never rained.

I guess that is good ... Although I hate to carry my poncho all this way and never use it ... How's that for a conundrum?

The 5 of us had breakfast together and then went separate ways until our pilgrim meal at 2:00.

Russ and I wandered the Romanesque building walking tour, visited the cathedral, and took pictures from the ramparts. Later I want to shop for a trinket to add to our Christmas tree decorations. I try to buy one memory per trip for the tree.

Wine and cheese with our pilgrims friends at 7:00. They will hang here until Sunday to avoid a forecast of heavy rain on the trail tomorrow. We are sorry to not be going on with them. Sunday's walk looks very pretty and not too rigorous in the guidebook.

But Florida calls and our tickets home are for Sunday.

Last Day on the Trail

Less wind, 40 degrees when we started and mid-50s by noon, partly cloudy skies, wide open vistas across rolling, harvested farms, a shepherd and flock of sheep running across a field and then road ahead of us just too far to capture on camera but close enough to hear all the sheep bells clanging and pick out the black sheep from the white, one smelly barn to walk past with 3 barking dogs tied not as securely as I would have liked but securely enough...we got by unharmed, about 12 miles to Zamora.

Our new Hungarian friends had bused ahead because of a sore leg and found a new, clean, inexpensive hostel and great restaurant. They met us at the medieval bridge onto town...so for once we didn't get lost entering a city.

When we got to the hotel, they had champagne and little sandwiches waiting! What a treat.

We rested, ate a wonderful meal, visited the albergue where we might volunteer sometime, saw the city on foot, bought cheese and had a cheese feast at the hotel on the evening. The bus riders had, bless their hearts, brought some wine from El Cubo albergue so we had that too. Great day.