Which means another five weeks of cooking and camping! There are a few changes this year, all good. First, we're not in Big Bear anymore... We're in Garner Valley somewhere between Idyllwild and Pinyon in the mountains above Palm Desert, camping on private land surrounded by pine, oak, sage, and Wellman cattle. This location is very special because there are a few buildings on the property, like a guest house we call the "cook shack" and a large garage we use as a pantry and school house. This is the first year we have a BED and... Wait for it... Electricity! We have refrigerators and a freezer. We cook with the help of electric juicers, food processors, and stand mixers. Technology is good. Here's a picture of our outdoor kitchen and garage called "Purgatorie Hill." Interesting.
The things that remain the same are good too, though. The staff remains nearly the same with the addition of Thalia, former student and amiga, and E.J., Cadie's son. And Mike came up to set up and help bbq the first weekend. Here's E.J. and Mike showing his more serious side:
The reason I come back every summer, Cadie with Daniel
And return students Tim Murphy and Mat Lowe, I don't even remember this/have any idea what's up with the knives ;/
We have cool camp dogs, Roxy, Tiger, and here's Nilla:
And the food is still really good. In a week, we served 280 breakfasts (like blueberry lemon pancakes with bacon), 280 lunches (I can't tell you how much lunch meat we've burned through), 280 dinners, cakes, cookies, muffins, and snacks (innumerable). Here's a picture of bbq pork and asada tacos with kimchi made lovingly by Mark Woodson. Woodson also took all of these pictures (Mike and I are waiting for our new camera to arrive). Thanks Mark!
Everything is going great. Week one is over, the menus for the next four weeks have already been planned, and I look forward to getting to know the students better this week. So far, they are hard working, nice, and like the food. That is great. Now, it's nap time... See you next week!
Damn, that looks bomb!
ReplyDeleteI remember those pictures! No idea what the deal with the knives was, just that they were posing with them while you were cutting whatever it was! Yay!
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