YUM !!

BIT OF A GOURMAND ?

Certainly Not A Gourmet !

pleasure derived from eating

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.. There was a football game: somebody won. There was an ice fishing tournament: somebody won. There was a neighborhood BBQ: we all pigged out.
.. Super Sunday in the neighborhood means a BBQ - weather be damned. It was 15° F and dead still. Last night it got to -11° F. The high pressure has settled in and the snow is afraid of the cold.
.. Depending on the annual host; it's steaks, hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken, pork chops, or "all-day-brisket." This year it was chicken. Simple fare and plenty of it.
.. It's an easy recipe: drench, (you can think marinade,) the chicken halves in several gallons of "Yellowstone Brown Ale BBQ Sauce," overnight in the refrigerator. Then jab it with a fork and let it sit at room temperature for 3 or 4 hours. Keep it moist and keep turning it. Giant punch bowls serve for the containers. Then just BBQ the chicken over coals for about 45 minutes to one hour per side, (low heat in a covered grill is preferred.)
.. Serve with home-made potato or macaroni salad and freshly sliced tomatoes. Grind some dill seeds and sprinkle to taste over everything. Everybody should get at least 1½ chickens; fingers is O.K.
.. The key ingredient is the sauce. You can cook it up yourself if you can't find it in your local super market. It contains Moose Drool Brown Ale, Garlic, Onions, Sugar, Brown Sugar, Tomatoes. Everything is run through a blender, (or food processor,) and salt and peppered to taste. Simmer for a few hours to thicken. Make it thick and let it sit for a week before using.

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Apropos Of Nothing

MIDWINTER ESCAPE

The Lowlands Beckon

we respond

Headed into the promised land.
Few folks fish up'ere in the winter.

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.. It's a fur piece of road between here and there. It's a bit of burned hydrocarbons and furry eyeballs to get there and back over a three-day weekend. In the winter with snow in the air and ice on the roads it's a bit over seven hours of safe and sane driving. That uses up most of one day.
.. Getting situated and scoping out the possibilities and contingencies finishes off the first day and demands a bit of well-won sustenance. So that's what we did.

Three Fly Arsenal.

.. Up at dawn to a great breakfast at Pourman's Cafe - chorizo con huevos and other gut bombs to get through a long day. Then to the river road.
.. It's possible to fish downtown but it's better up the road a piece. So we get going to a place where the neighbors know us and the water is clear and the snow ain't too deep.
.. There's ruts and mud and ice and mud and ruts and ice. We knock on the door and accept the invitation for coffee. We're on the water by 9:00 AM.
.. Just three flies are ever necessary here, (well four, if you count the size 8 elk hair caddis that serves as an indicator.) The fish are willing and hungry all year long. The water, in winter, is never colder than about 40° F. Sometimes it gets to over 50° F in the shallow and sunny spots.

The Place.

.. We fish all day and even take a few. Big rainbows of 14" with shoulders like Gibraltar. They look like lake fish with their small heads and substantial girth. The air is cold. It freezes our guides, and hands, and ears, and warms our epitome.
.. Dark comes a little later down in the lowlands. It still comes too early and we're back in town by 7:30 PM. At our age it means an early dinner and bed. We do it.
.. We get up on day three and have the same breakfast. We fish a bit closer to the highway and downstream from town for a few hours. Then back in the trusty horse and gas up.
.. It'll be dark as we enter the mountains at 4-corners. That's O.K., we know the road and it's treachery very well. We look forward to the vacant wheat fields and the company of monster trucks and the neighbors' pickumups.
.. Home at 9:00 PM. Crash shortly after eating a couple of racks of Baby-Back ribs from the deli, (got there just as they were locking up - perfect timing.)
.. We'll sleep-in tomorrow.  Don't have to be at the salt mine until 2:00 PM. Our stomach growls as we snooze on the couch - typing this is exhausting.

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Heading home. A view for Mark in Texas.

"DRY FLIES" for the mud

QUICK AND DIRTY

Throw The Rejects

light colors work best

THERE'S A FLY IN MY EYE

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The road to high water success

.. Gawd that's an ugly fly. Wasted a hook on that poor effort! Fingers get fatter and tremble more with age. Give those things to the trash. Put 'em in the reject jar. And so it goes.
.. During every fly tying session there's a fly or two, (in our case many more,) that don't quite make the grade. The proportions are wrong, there are too many fibers in the tail, the hackle is poor, the head is ugly, etc. etc.
.. Most of us either salvage the hooks and do it again, (hopefully better,) or put them in the "reject jar." These flies are just plain ugly. Well, a couple of the crusty neighbors have devised a way to use the rejected flies. In fact two of the old farts actually claim to tie ugly flies on purpose. We nod, smile, and for the sake of civility pretend to believe them.

A once proud dry fly

.. The flies are used as drowned morsels during the high water phase of our rivers, (right now.)
.. Preparation is critical. The flies are rolled and squashed between the fingers and the hackle is well-mussed up and bent.
.. Sometimes the body rolls and the damn thing looks not unlike so much lint from the umbilicus of an orangutan.
.. No flotant is used and the fly is flung with a hope and a prayer into the fishy places of our high water rivers.
.. Fish eat them. Fish eat them with surprising regularity. Fish eat them with gay abandon and gusto.
.. We're not advocating that you lose your hard won tying skills; no way, no how! But on that rare occasion when you mess up a fly we suggest that it may be a diamond in the rough. Choose it, use it, lose it - so what? It just may catch a fish that couldn't see the pretty fly.

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.. With the Firehole River going more than 400 cfs above it's previous record for this day we suggest that a mud fly is appropriate.
.. Don't even think about the Gibbon River it's now way out of bank and flowing at 700 cfs above it's previous record for today.
.. Even the Madison River is flowing at 100 cfs above it's previous record for today. These record flows are going to curtail catching by all but the most savvy, (or lucky,) anglers.
.. Mud flies are in. They work if you can find where the fish are hiding from the current and the dark brown water.

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UGLY GRAPHS BELOW

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VIEW OVER A GREAT FISHING HOLE

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