A few years ago I was hiking along a section of the Iditarod Trail with my husband Carl. Hundreds of miles from the nearest road, we meandered along, talking about things as we do. We picked our way along the natural openings in the landscape, looking for mushrooms and wildflowers. I dropped a stem of twisted stalk I had been twirling between my fingers and the action made Carl glance down. Something caught his eye and our in-synch cadence abruptly halted. A jagged-edged and weathered moose antler was just poking out from the underbrush.
It's not so unusual to see discarded antlers, but this one was part of an intact pair and, as we brushed away the dirt and leaves, we noticed there was an old rusted wire looped across the back of the antlers, held in by two small nails. This rack had once been someone's piece of artwork hanging on a wall. As we looked closer, we discovered we were standing over the collapsed roof of an old log cabin that had sunk into the ground ages ago.
In the first years of our marriage, Carl and I lived in a little one-room cabin not so unlike this one. We had a coffee pot on the woodstove, a tidy bed in the corner, and a kitchen area along one wall with tin cans lined neatly on a shelf. We used a bright red pitcher-pump to fill the basin in our kitchen sink with water. I cooked on a cabin-sized propane stove. Once every few months, a ski plane would land in front of our cabin with groceries, or perhaps Carl would snowmachine the 17 miles to the little post office to receive boxes of groceries through the mail.
Now, as then, Carl and I live in a pioneer spirit, but fresh food for us has always really been just a supply-plane flight away from Anchorage. I imagine those rugged and hearty people who built and lived in the old sunken cabin might have waited seasons, or longer, for food supplies to be packed in. Hardtack (a kind of dense indestructible cracker), beans, and perhaps a little salted and preserved meat were typical pioneer fare. I read about a man who would spread cooked beans onto a plank of wood and freeze them, then just break them off and eat the bean chips as a snack throughout the day.
To celebrate pioneer kitchens, or perhaps more to the point, to warm up on what is shaping into a particularly wintry Alaska day, I'm going to make a garlicky white bean and sausage stew for dinner. This dish is a mere nod to the classic French cassoulet, which includes duck confit and other smoked or preserved meats like goose or lamb. My version looks for ingredients more likely to be available in local markets, but the soul of the dish is the same.
Look for dense high-quality sausage with flavors you love. I don't typically use the "reindeer sausage" available in most Alaska stores. This type of sausage is sometimes made with bread fillers. The sausage will swell and burst when simmered in hot liquids and take on a kind of rubbery texture. Reindeer sausage is best served quick-fried in a hot pan.
Do you have any cabin cuisine favorites? Send them to me at kirsten(at)alaskadispatch.com
White Bean Stew
1 pound dried Great Northern beans, rinsed and picked through
5 ounces Mexican-style chorizo
1 pound Italian-style fresh (raw) sausage
1 tablespoon tomato paste
2 medium carrots, dice
1 onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 14-ounce can crushed tomatoes
8 cups chicken stock
1 bunch Swiss chard (about 1 cup)
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
Soak the beans overnight, covered in cool water. Drain and rinse them. Set them aside.
In a heavy casserole or stockpot, sauté the chorizo over medium heat. Add in the tomato paste. Stir and cook this mixture for about a minute. Add in the carrots, onion and garlic and turn the heat fairly low. Season the vegetables with salt and pepper to taste. Cook, continuing to stir, until the vegetables have softened, about five minutes. Add in the crushed tomatoes and the reserved white beans. Cover the beans with the chicken stock. Bring the mixture to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for about two hours (depending on how old your beans are).
While the beans are simmering, prick the sausage with a fork to prevent the casing from bursting. Heat the sausage in a sauté pan with one half cup of water added and cook until the sausage is browned on one side (about 10 minutes). Add one half cup of additional water and cook the sausage on the other side. (If you aren't using fresh -- raw -- sausage, cooking times may vary). Remove the sausage, slice them into half-inch rounds, and drop them into the simmering bean mixture.
Wash the Swiss chard well and trim the leaves away from the stems. Pat the leaves dry. Tear or cut the leaves into bite-sized pieces.
When the beans are tender to the bite, turn down the heat to the lowest setting. Taste a bit of the liquid and add any additional salt if it is needed. Stir in the Swiss chard. The heat of the beans will wilt and cook the chard. Just before serving, remove the pot from the heat and drizzle the vinegar over the beans and stir gently. This adds just a little acidic edge to the flavor of the beans.
Ladle some of the beans into warm bowls and serve with hot crusty bread.
Makes 4 to 6 servings.
Kirsten Dixon is an award-winning chef who has cooked and lived the past 30 years in the backcountry of Alaska. To learn more about her, visit www.kirstendixon.com.