Da worst ting about smokin fish….

Is keepin ’em lit!

I know I know, bad joke!  But was thinking about years back and how lots of fishermen’s stages had a smoker on the side of them.  I don’t recall any ever in use, but Roy’s stage back in Apsey Brook had one, and was often a good spot to hide when playing hide and seek. It was just a tin lined “chimney” with nails sticking out going up the sides.  Roy, and of course whoever else used them would hang caplin or herring up in them, light a fire at the bottom, generally with alder wood, and smoke them to make… well smoked caplin and kippers!

I love the taste of smoked fish of all varieties, and when we got a little older, Eric and I bought a little electric smoker between us.  Had a little element in the bottom with a small pan, and we’d add wood chips and let them smolder to smoke our own kippers, and lots of other things, but mostly trout and our own moose and beef jerky!

We could buy all kinds of chips, and of course get our own alder, and sometimes apple and others.  We’d experiment with making different brines to add different flavours (hmmm did I ever tell the story of “Who put the salt in the punch?”) and smoke lots of different things, including trying cheese on one or two occasions.

Junior Patey used to love trouting, but he was never really find of the trout, so he’d freeze a lot for his family, but one day he tried the smoked ones Eric and I made, and he loved them, and whats not to love? Its like fish bacon!  Anyway, over the next few weeks he emptied his freezer of trout and smoked them all!

I know Eric still smokes stuff now, and I do too, tho for me its smoking bought stuff as there’s not many trouting holes here in the city (plus I have no idea if half these weird fish up here are fit to eat anyway, I liked that we had trout and only trout back home).  Eric sent me up some jerky he made last year, and I think it lasted all of 20 minutes, cause I was sparing it along!

Anyway, keep yer fish lit, and have a smoky ole day!

February 16, 2014 by Uncategorized 4

Random Memories

Just recalling some old stories and memories from back in the day… not long enough for a blog post on their own, but some may remember them

  • The Bank of Barry – It seemed in the early 90’s almost everyone on the upper end of the island owed Barry money, me included on occasion.  Wonder if he ever got paid it all!
  • Driving with Eric in his father’s old yellow station wagon (with wood paneling), picking up Boyd Rideout, and after coming around the tunnel, him saying that we were going so fast he could see the tail lights out the side window as the car bent!
  • Eric and I driving to Hants Harbour planning to call dad, cause he was always saying we’d be over there if there was a bridge across! Unfortunately we couldn’t find a pay phone there (was a Sunday when stores were still closed on Sundays).  We did call him from Whitbourne though! (Also, the number of amazing looking girls out walking in the small town of Cavendish that Sunday was unreal!).
  • Taking the ferry to Quebec and calling Lindy collect.
  • Three words “Oh shit, diesel!” the rest of the story and the participant will be left nameless to protect the less than innocent.
  • Tipping Dad’s atv over backwards on top of Eric and I when we first got it
  • “You tried that Dennis!” When Stan had been hit in the nether regions for the umpteenth time when playing road or ice hockey with whatever we were using for a puck
  • Playing hockey in the big ditch area by Gunther Krom’s.
  • Lorrie and Julie playing on the springing caterpillars or whatever they were in the Shoal Harbour playground at about 2am after leaving the playhouse.
  • “Peter, doors open, lights on” – We were stopped at a roadblock one night, and being nervous, I asked the cop if she wanted the light on when searching the car. That was Junior’s response.  She was laughing her butt off, of course that may have been partially cause Eric and Junior has been commenting on her butt.
  • Convincing Kendall that the white wrapped hay we saw on the farms was in fact marshmallows and that they grew that way and had to be sent away to be cut and packaged.
  • The Mr. Bean car Derek bought off Stephen, we drove that everywhere, up across banks and ditches and gardens.
  • Chevy Van!
  • Derek bought another car off Joe Baker. Had an accident in it near Ivan’s old place.  I think the story was he hit black ice in July, but knowing Derek he probably fell asleep.  The funny part though was Joe coming and seeing it and saying “She wasn’t like that when I had her”
  • Getting a speeding ticket in the old Corisca the day of David’s and Celeste’s wedding when Eric and Derek and Leanne had me drove nuts about the motor being gone.
January 30, 2014 by Uncategorized 3

Sweet Leaves, Frankum, and Spruce Buds

Sweet Gale

The other night I had a memory of being on the grass on Celie Burt’s garden in Elliott’s Cove, with Tony Burt I believe, but that part of the memory is foggy.  Its my most vivid memory of eating something we all ate as kids I’m sure; sweet leaves.  Eric and I were trying to figure out what they officially are named earlier, and thought they might be Sweet Gale, but that grows up to a meter high and that doesn’t sound right, but maybe so.

We used to chew them up and they had a delicious sweet taste, that I do remember, and we spent a lot of time pulling them out and getting that sweet juice.

Another thing I’ve had occasionally, and came back to me with the same memory, and I’m sure others have had even more frequently is the soft new growth that pops out from the spruce buds in the spring of the year.  I’ve read it’s good in salads, and can be brewed into spruce beer.  I’ve had both (the growth and the beer) and while one may be derived from the other, I’m not sure what I had was, as the beer was disgusting, while the buds weren’t that bad!

Lastly there’s frankum.  I doubt many of the young people now have had it, or even heard of it, but the older generation used it like chewing gum.  Its the hardened resin from a spruce tree, and Dad used to cut it off and trim off the bark, and start chewing it.  Its a bit hard to get going, and tastes a bit barky till you get it going, but its not that bad!  The worst part is if you didn’t get a nice hard piece, you ended up putting raw sticky resin in your mouth, not a pleasant experience!

January 24, 2014 by Uncategorized 0

Keepin’ Yer Feets and Hands Warm!

Yesterday I posted about the old loom, and it reminded me of another staple past-time/skill of the older generation of ladies; knitting.  I bet nearly all my generations Moms knit, and perhaps many younger still do.  We all had ugly cardigans and fisherman’s knit sweaters, and the ugliest of all the Christmas one with the deer and snowflakes (thank god I never had one of those!).  But the best thing of all, and something we often got at Christmas were our vamps and double mitts!

Darning Needle

I know from experience if you tell someone from outside Newfoundland that you’re wearing vamps they won’t have a clue what you are talking about.  But I still wear them to this day to keep my feet warm on the basement floor here. What are they?  Well they are over-sized socks, not like store bought wool socks which are a finer stitch, but more like a sweater for your feet.  Often well worn, and holes darned up with the old darning needle, making them a patchwork of multiple colors, but like comfort food, they are something that just makes you feel cozy.

Another staple we wore back in the day was what we called a double mitt.  Rather than the traditional mitt, with a thumb and larger section for your fingers, these had a thumb, index finger and then the larger space.  There’s probably a reason why, but darned if I know what it is.  These were almost always (except in my picture of course) had a different square pattern on the back of the hand from the rest of the mitt.  If anyone has a picture, I’d love a copy!

Besides keeping yoru hands warm, though these often had another use, and maybe that was the reason for the index finger.  If you think back on watching the older fisherman in their stage at the slitting table, you’ll likely recall at least some of them wearing a double mitt on one hand, to better get a grip on the slippery fish!

For whatever reason, likely nostalgia, these in my memory seemed to keep our hands warmer than anything store bought.  I can remember now, coming inside with balls of snow stuck to them from making forts and tunnels, throwing them in the warmer, or on the oven door of the old wood stove, and hauling on a dry pair of vamps after a day outside.

January 19, 2014 by Uncategorized 2

The Loom looms….

Yes it does, the loom looms over the whole room! There, that’s my attempt at poetry for today.

As a kid, I never gave much thought to it, but so many people back home had looms, and wove all kinds of things, (well I assume there were all kinds of things, the only real one that comes to mind now is place mats). Like everything in rural Newfoundland, I am sure it served a much greater purpose than just a craft for enjoyment, our fathers and mothers were more practical, not by choice but by need.

But now that I’m older, I sometimes wonder what that purpose was.  I know so little about the loom, just how big and complicated it looked, and watching Aunt Vick, amongst others, sliding the shuttles back and forth and pulling the weave tight.  But I wonder what did our forefathers use the woven material for? Clothing? Table cloths? Bags? Bed clothes?  I really have no idea!

I think all our foremothers knit as well, and I’ll write a piece about the old double mitts and vamps soon, but I’m curious now as to the use of the loom!

January 18, 2014 by Uncategorized 1

The First Pizza

Growing up back home, pizza was a foreign commodity, we’d heard of it, but there was none around Clarenville at all.  The only pizza we saw were the (I think) chef boyardee pizza kits, with a can of sauce and dough mix that was never big enough to cover the pan and some herbs to throw on, and a little (again i think) parmesan cheese.

 

It tasted exactly unlike anything pizza was supposed to taste like.  Of course we needed toppings, so seeing as we’d also never seen salami or pepperoni, we used the next best thing….. vienna sausages!  if you’ve never had these wondrous little delicacies, well then don’t.  They are one of the most horrendous products ever made in my opinion, though of course I know many people who love them.  I remember making someone, I think it was Tina Cooper, though that may have been dill pickle chips, throw them out the window of the car when they opened them, saying either the sausages went or they did. The smell is disgusting!  The only way I could manage them at all was to fry them up, not sure how anyone was able to eat the raw…. but I digress.  On those old pizza kits we’d slice these up as our pretend pepperoni, and throw the whole works in the oven.  It of course tasted nothing at all like pizza.

My first real pizza wasn’t eaten till I was 16 or 17, and in St. John’s starting at the College of Trades and Technology.  I decided to try it and went to Mr. Jim’s in Churchill Square, and sat down.  A waiter or waitress came and asked me what I’d like, and having no idea what any of these foreign sounding things were, I ended up with a cheese pizza.  Needless to say, after burning my mouth on melted cheese, and having no toppings, I was a little underwhelmed.

But that was the first real pizza, other than the kits.  I can still see those on the shelf at the CO-OP in my minds eye now!

January 11, 2014 by Uncategorized 2

The Seal

So Pam Anderson was back home yesterday, offering money for people to stop sealing.  People seem to fail to understand that the seal hunt isn’t clubbing babies anymore.  Its as humane as any hunt can be, and more so than any slaughterhouse.  Yes seal furs are used for clothing, but so is cow leather.  Seals are over populated and threatening fish populations, noone mentions that. Nor that they provide a source of food.

But anyway, this isn’t a political blog (and I’m not going to allow hate filled comments here either), its memories.

Seals weren’t that common back home, at least not right up in the sound, but they weren’t that uncommon either.  And anyone who’s seen a big old harp up close, snarling and trying to get at you isn’t going to say they are very cute either.  But they are some damn good eating!

Once many years ago, Eric and, I believe, Cory Avery encountered one on the beach in winter in just such conditions.  Perhaps they were looking for it, I forget, but I believe one of them had a license and they managed to kill it.  Once they did that though I think they were stumped as to what to do next.  None of us were squeamish about cleaning things, and that was done pretty promptly, but they really had no idea how best to cut or process it.

If I remember correctly they came to Dad, and he gave them some advice. I’m not sure how much Eric and Cory ate, if any, but I know Dad and I had a few good meals from it.  I love the taste of seal, reminds me a great deal of the taste of turr, but if it gets any blubber on it during the cooking it can ruin it.  I think this is why a lot of people don’t care for it.

Dad had some trick of soaking it in water and baking soda though, and that somehow made the blubber crystallize, and it could be separated easily. But the biggest memory was  that Eric and I used Dad’s old band saw to slice the frozen meat.  If you didn’t like seal before that I’m sure you wouldn’t after.  Seal sawdust has quite a pungent smell!

 

December 19, 2013 by Uncategorized 0

Oh that Dogberry Wine

In rural Newfoundland, store bought anything in earlier days was rare. People fended for themselves, and their neighbours, and as I’ve mentioned before, trades of things were common.

Store bought alcohol was as well rarer than now.  People made their own home brewed beer with their own recipes, not the kits like we used. I remember even hearing of potatoes and raisins in the mix.  Lemon Gin was popular, though it may or may not have had any lemons or juniper berries for that matter though they do grow back home.  Wine was also common, usually from blueberries which are plentiful.  I’ve heard some made some from apples and other berries as well. And I’ve even heard tell of people making dandelion wine, though I can’t say its something I’d ever want to experience.

But the granddaddy of them all had to be dogberry wine.  Dogberries are plentiful most falls back home, people would often use them as a portent of winter.  More berries meant a longer winter. Being so plentiful, people used them as another source for wine, and one year Eric and I decided we had to try it.

Finding a recipe for it from either mom, or a book, I forget, we followed it, and fermented the berries into wine and bottled it into, whatever bottles we had on hand.  And of course we tried some.

Well lets just say the results were less than spectacular in the way paint thinner is a little unlike champagne. It has to be pretty bad when we couldn’t even manage to drink any of it.  Other than a taste here and there to remind ourselves how bad it was.

That said though, we did manage to get rid of it.  To this day I’ll never understand how he could drink it, but one day Eric, Junior and I (and likely more) planned to meet and head off ice fishing and atv/skidooing.  I remember we went to round pond and L pond, and on the path between them there was an old one room cabin.  We went in there and lit a fire, warmed ourselves for a while, and had a drink, and watched and laughed as Junior was somehow able to manage to drink a whole bottle of the stuff.  As for me, I’d rather have drunk a bottle of varsol!

Good times with good friends.  Those are the things we miss most.

 

For anyone foolhardy enough, here’s a recipe from Downhome Recipes: Downhomelife.com
Dogberry Wine (Beverages)
Ingredients:
• 2 quarts dogberries
• 1 doz. apples
• 4 quarts water
• 8 cups sugar
• Yeast
Directions:
Cook berries and apples in water. Strain. Add sugar in a large crock. When lukewarm, add 1 pkg.
yeast. Store in a warm place until all bubbles have gone. Strain again and bottle.

December 15, 2013 by Uncategorized 6

The Night of the Broom

Many years ago, a man who shall remain nameless used to drive around with several shovels, and a broom standing in a rack in the back of his pickup.  I really have no idea why, I can only assume it was a target for some mischievous young lads.  I really can’t think of any other reason.

Of course, lads being what they are, enterprising and all, accepted the target and made plans to do something about it. Not bad at heart though, they didn’t plan any destruction or damage.  They just realized that a mop was a much more suitable thing to have in the rack than a broom.

There being an old mop laying near the old, and at the time closed down, Cormack/Island Lounge on Elliott’s Cove Road, they considered that a suitable replacement.

One dark night, those lads, with perhaps some liquid persuasion, proceeded to carry out their plan, driving to a community some distance from their own, and staking out the scene.  Parking off at a distance, some of the lads proceeded to sneak through tall grass and approach the truck in question.  Replacement of the broom ensued, and much hilarity was had.

Of course all this is hearsay…. But I wonder whatever became of the broom?

 

December 14, 2013 by Uncategorized 1

Christmas Concerts of Old

I went to my nieces school Christmas Concert today, and was reminded of those of old.  Until the old one room school was torn down in Apsey Brook, it was still used as a center for events, or, as we knew them “times”.  Baked Bean suppers, Pot Lucks, Soup Suppers, all held to raise money for something or other and to be a social event as well.

One thing we always did as well was have a Christmas Concert, or Recital, or time. The parents, or church or someone, I forget who in lots of cases, would work with the kids to learn songs, and skits, and they’d all get up on that little stage and perform them.  A supper of some sort was cooked, and a crowd of people chatted and yarned and told stories, and the kids whooped and hollered.

The parents would all have a gift prepared and later on Santa would stomp his way in shaking snow off himself, or mud as the weather might be, and stomp over to the tree with a hearty HO HO HO! Even as kids, we all knew Santa was Ross, or at least I think we did, but it still didn’t make a difference in the thrill of him coming in with a big sack with a gift for every kid, prepared before hand by the parents.

Gifts in those days weren’t as big an affair as now, at least not at these events, and I remember seeing pencils, Hilroy exercise books, Hot Wheel’s cars, and other smaller items, but it was a huge deal of fun for all of us.

Later on, when I was a more adult kid (well that still applies now doesn’t it) I too took on the role of Santa, though I doubt I gave it the same performance as Ross always did.

Similar concerts were held at every community on the Island, and at different times, so we could attend them all.  We had relatives everywhere of course, and we often went to those in other towns as well, each with their own Santa, and little gift, and supper and Christmas Cake and holiday cheer.

Times aren’t like the used to be, and while we’ve gained lots, I’d love to be able to head off to the old school for a “time” too.

December 10, 2013 by Uncategorized 4

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