The very fine art of Tubing…

(photo © kiwidutch)

We are at Camp by the Lake in Maine, when our friends ask us if we might like to go tubing?. Ok, first off, what they actually asked was ” would we like to go toobing” . I had no clue what was being offered here and so had to admit that maybe I might, if only I knew what a “toobe” might be.

Ah Ha.. it’s ” tube” … and a tube turns out not to be particularly tubular at all anyway. It’s a doughnut shaped tyre that has a canvas cover over it and a canvas bottom on one side. The Tube name originates from a tyre ” inner tube” , and if you go ” toooobing” then you get towed behind the motor boat on this contraption. There are handles inserted into the canvas to hang onto, but ultimately the speed of the boat is what determines the smoothness of the ride or if you get unceremoniously tipped off into the drink.

We accept the challenge and Hubby is first to have a go… he’s 196 cm tall ( which I think is roughly 6 feet 5 inches in non metric speak) so there was no way in creation that he would ever be able to fold his legs into the inner space that was the hole in the doughnut… so he hung them out over the front of the tube, parked his rear end into the middle space and hung on for dear life.

(photo © kiwidutch)

He made the mistake of telling my friend that she wouldn’t be able to get him to fall off, a challenge she took up with great relish, and his ride got rougher and rougher with many a close call. Amazingly she didn’t succeed , simply because he was strong and determined enough to hang on with sheer brute force… (this time at least LOL), but later she managed some excellent boat moves that sent him flying off the tube and into the lake.

Tubing is excellent fun and if you ever have an offer to go ” toobing” then you should take up the offer and hopefully like us you will find it a brilliant experience.

Mastering “American Speak”…

(photo © kiwidutch)

We are staying with our American friends. Hubby and I have been to America before and picked up some ” American Speak”  during our travels. I have learnt that what I call in English the ” boot” of the car or the ” bonnet” is called here; the ” trunk” or the ” hood”,  I know that my ” footpath”  is their ” sidewalk” , that my ” motorway or highway” is  their ” freeway” that by the way, might be a toll road and not free at all. (the Dutch call this a ” snelweg” which literally means  “fast way” and is far more logical a word then any of the English options.)

I ask my friend’s children to please put something on the bench in the kitchen, they ask ” what is a bench please?”  We do the describing Game and learn that my bench is their “counter” …

Still, Just when we think we  know what is going on in the conversation,  new words jump out that we don’t expect and leave us  with vacant stares on our faces,  as our brains desperately try and make sense of a word that doesn’t seem to fit or is new and we just have no clue of the meaning.

Take this situation in the supermarket for instance: My friend and I have a supermarket trolley each… they are standing side by side in a supermarket isle. We are going though a list of items we need for the next weeks and looking for the various items.  Good enough. Suddenly my friend leans over her trolley and exclaims “ oh we don’t have enough hamburger!” and rushes away down the isle and disappears around the corner, off to who knows where in the supermarket. I lean over and look into her trolley..  enough hamburger? I don’t see any hamburgers at all.  This isn’t making sense for me at all.

Now, I am a foodie, and I have tried very hard to at least  learn Foodie American Speak… I know the Cilantro/Corriander one,  that Americans add a Glaze or Frosting to a cake whilst I add Icing to mine,  and have learned that Pop, may or may not have something to do with fizzy drinks or Fathers, depending on  the context of ” Mom and Pop Diner” or “my favourite flavour of Pop“. So when my friend rushes back to me clutching a sty-foam tray that contained a large slab of minced meat ( or ” mince” for short) and dumps it triumphantly into her trolley,  I felt a little duped.

Noooooo.. surely this can’t be ” hamburger” … I had already learned that this is what over the pond was called “ground beef” , Hamburger is when you have round white bread and fried patties of meat…. right?

Well, apparently Yes and No…. “ground beef” also goes by the name ” hamburger” here. (sigh) Just when you think you have cracked it, along comes another word that you didn’t know. Just to confuse things further, in Dutch ” hamburger” means a meat patty, either uncooked or cooked, But  importantly it refers only to the rounded patty, and never ever to a large square or rectangular slab of ground beef/ minced meat.

(photo © kiwidutch)

So it just goes to show.. we are learning all the time, Now I know a little more American Speak…  I know that there’s still a lot more to learn and that these strange moments of miscomprehension will happen again, but in the meantime we laugh and learn.

Maple Sugar in Maine…

(photo © kiwidutch)

It’s not only Canada and Vermont that make excellent Maple Sugar…. it’s a famous product of Maine too.

There is a Sugar House in Dover Foxcroft called “Bob’s Sugarhouse” and we went in to see what was on offer.
Yum! an excellent selection of Maple items, and Maple syrup in all sizes, even small ones that will make great gifts for us to take home for friends and family.

Very good quality maple syrup needs to be found from specialist sources in the Netherlands and as usual for quality items, it isn’t cheap.

But… it is worth it …
We noticed in diners that often what was touted as ” maple syrup” was actually ” maple flavoured syrup” .. so basically it was corn syrup with a little bit of flavouring added, in one instance I picked up a bottle of this in the supermarket and it did say that it contained ” flavouring” but maple wasn’t listed as an ingredient. Ouch… this is definiately a case of “ you get what you pay for“  ( or .. what you don’t pay for).

I would rather pay more for a small bottle of  pure , real , genuine Maple syrup and enjoy a very small amount, used sparingly and savoured, than an inferior quality product that  gives a very small hint of the true flavour. For this reason I don’t mind to pay for a small quantity of real Maple syrup….

So if you have never had the delight of looking inside a sugar shack,… here’s a look inside a Maple wonderland….

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

So now you have seen into a real Sugar Shack !    We loooove Maple syrup !

Cooking up a storm in Maine.

(photo © kiwidutch)

We are having a great time at Camp…. cooking is one of our hobbies  and we have certainly been enjoying  some excellent food. American style  cooking is very different to European style cooking and we are enjoying the temporary change and new experience of cooking on the big outdoor BBQ, and in the ” summer kitchen” at Camp.

For the Kiwiduch family, living in an apartment  in The Netherlands,  it’s also great for the kids to be outside, swimming in the lake and burning off all their excess energy. Since we have arrived we have had one short cloudburst of rain, and two rainy days. The rest of the time the weather has been fabulous.

We have been very lucky indeed… up until the day we arrived,  Maine had had a rocky start to the Summer, a month and a half of rain preceded our arrival, not the usual weather pattern at all.   meanwhile, back in the Netherlands  for the past month and a half, the weather has been unseasonably warm, we had been enjoying sunny days with long walks to the beach and back, frequent  walks around the city.

We liked to joke that we  packed the sunshine into our suitcases and bought the good weather with us from The Netherlands.. which would normally be a double joke  indeed  even if it were possible, as it’s usually a national pass-time of the Dutch to complain about their lousy weather!

I find cooking relaxing and enjoyable and it’s wonderful to stay with people who feel the same way, needless to say we have been having an amazing time in the kitchen together!

Here are some of the highlights of our home-made cooking frenzies… fresh green beans…

(photo © kiwidutch)

Sweet corn that had still been on the stalks in the field early this morning… my eight year old set a record for eating 7 of these !  Dutch corn isn’t half as good, if she would eat one at home we would be going well ! (or did this have more to do with beating the kids of the family were were staying with in a sweet-corn eating race? …. Kids!)

(photo © kiwidutch)

… coleslaw, a very American dish. Hubby is slowly getting used to it.  I love the stuff.

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

and of course…    pie !

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

Cooking local treats,  fresh and in season and with friends… wonderful ! That’s one of the things that really makes a holiday brilliant 

Boston Baked Beans and Brown Bread… a traditional Maine treat.

(photo © kiwidutch)

We are in central Maine on holiday and after our sojourn into Canada we are now back at “Camp” and back to our own home cooking. Now we are treated to a traditional Maine favourite… Boston Baked Beans and Brown Bread. (maybe I should call that “B to the power of 5” )!

Now, here’s another instance of ingredient confusion: European cultures abound with dark breads, …from every shade from very pale tawny brown hues to very solid sliced thin, dark mahogany coloured rye loaves full of grains, “Brown bread” to me means a wheat flour with various amounts of whole grains, yeast etc baked in a loaf, comes out in neat square, round or rectangle shaped loaves with a crust and is sliced for morning breakfast, sandwiches for lunch, toasted with your favourite filling in toasted sandwich maker, but basically it’s white bread but brown or browner, with or without extra grain bits in it… …right?

The surprise here, was that the Brown bread here in Maine,  that traditionally is paired with Boston Baked Beans comes in a metal can, is round in shape, doesn’t appear to have a crust like conventional bread and looks nothing like any brown bread that I have ever seen before in texture.

(photo © kiwidutch)

Well, that’s not quite true… I do know something that looks very similar to the texture of this, but it’s something Dutch call “ontbijtkoek” and has a similar cake-like texture but ontbijtkoek is not something that we would even contemplate calling “bread”. I’m confused.

(photo © kiwidutch)

The beans for this recipe are cooked in a  bean crock, …

Here is  Recipe  Number 218828 “Grammie Bea’s Boston Baked Beans” from Recipezaar Member ” Linda’s Busy Kitchen” which can be found here: http://www.recipezaar.com/Grammie-Beas-Boston-Baked-Beans-218828
SERVES 6-8
If you make it, then I’m sure that Linda would appreciate it if you would Write a Review!

Ingredients:

(photo © kiwidutch)

3 cups dried white pea beans or dried navy beans, cleaned
1 large onion
1/2 lb salt pork
1/2 cup sugar, a little under
2 tablespoons brown sugar
2 tablespoons molasses
2 teaspoons mustard-seed-and-powder dry mustard
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon salt, (if salt pork has mostly meat in it) or
1 tablespoon salt, (if salt pork has mostly fat in it)

Directions:

1. Clean beans of pebbles and rocks.
2. Put cleaned beans in pot. Set aside.
3. Mix sugars, molasses, and mustard. Add salt and pepper. Mix into beans.
4. Add enough water to cover beans.
5. Place salt pork down into beans. You can opt to cut it up, or leave it whole, like my gram used to do.
6. You can also put the onions in whole, or opt to chop them up. She used to keep them whole, so us kids could fight over them lol.
7. Bake in bean pot, at 200F degrees, ( all night or 8 hours If not done, finish in the morning.
8. When beans are ready to be eaten, turn oven up to 450 until beans start to boil, then turn back to 200, until ready to serve.
Note: If beans look like they are drying out, just add water as you are cooking.

My friends say that these beans are often  eaten with sausages….

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

Your step-by-step guide to cooking Lobster, Maine style…

(photo © kiwidutch)

OK, Let’s be honest, if someone asked you to name the State symbol of Maine, you might be forgiven for making “Lobster” you very first guess.

Yep, it was my first guess and I was surprised too to find that Lobster wasn’t the State symbol, and that the Pine tree was. As soon as you leave Boston it’s clear that there are a lot of trees in this States, and I mean a LOT of trees. It’s become a game in the van that as soon as a kid says’s : “I’m bored” that I quickly reply, “Good, I have something for you to do, please count all the trees!” you can count about 2.5 seconds until the replying sigh of disgust and although I’m sure they must know that I’m joking, they invariably start some game or activity of their own in order to instantly change the subject. That’s called a whine-free Result !

Back to the topic of Lobster… me, I kind of like them, I especially  with garlic and butter, but plain steamed I’m not so fussed. If I had to rank my food preferences in order of “top 100” Lobster might well be in my list, but maybe it would be somewhere at the end of the list.  Number 99 or number 100.

Actually if I actually start to think of all the fresh fruit and veggies that I adore, then I think I might need a “Top 200” list… and then lobster would certainly feature somewhere below the 100 mark… after all it would be competing with items like freshly picked asparagus, direct from the garden  and ditto tomatoes, green peas in their pods,sweet corn,…. or the mango and papaya I used to get from my parent’s garden for breakfast for breakfast when they lived in the tropics, …. or bread fresh from a Portuguese or French bakery, … or the loaf of bread that you pull out of your oven or bread maker , let cool and then slap a large pat of butter onto.

Heck, “butter” would make it onto my list as a food item complete and wonderful just by itself… as would  Garlic, or Basil or Coriander (Cilantro).

Hubby on the other hand loves lobster, actually he likes all the slippery beasts of the sea but the mention of the word “lobster” makes his eyes glaze over with a special kind of dreamy anticipation and appreciation. I will therefore leave it to your imagination the expression on his face when our hosts announced that another  family member would be joining us later in the day and that he would be bringing fresh lobster with him for a lobster feast, Maine style, later that evening.

So.. lets take you though a Lobster feast in true Maine tradition.

First, you build a fire…

(photo © kiwidutch)

Let the fire burn for a while and die down so that there are lots of hot embers…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

Put on your Lobster Kettle.. they come in various sizes but even the small one we are using tonight is not what I would call a “ small” pot ! Inside it is a wooden platform with slats, there will be a little water below the platform and the lobster will be on top of the platform so they will be steamed and not boiled in the water.

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

Put in your lobster and close the lid. No, for the squeamish amongst you , there were no screams or claws clambering to get out… Me, I’m not really squeamish, but that said I also didn’t want to be the one to actually tip the lobsters into the pot and close the lid. So, Squeamish, No, Wimp, Yes. (there’s a subtle difference LOL)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

Steam them…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

The Lobster are ready, they are now bright red in colour… the small amount of water from the bottom is drained off and the lobster are left to rest a little moment whilst the rest of the food is bought out…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

Hubby is in food heaven… lobster and lobster and lobster! ….Just another reason to love Maine.

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

.. but that’s not all…  we finish the meal with an amazing Pie… Yum !

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

So … according to hubby, this is  Maine perfection !

Signposts that give more information than just where to go…

During our travels I came across  many signs that caught my eye and had me reaching for my camera…

in Nova Scotia I came across a place called Pugwash ! Maybe a certain Captain Pugwash lives here?

(photo © kiwidutch)

The signs on this bridge look like they might cause  accidents rather than prevent them, because drivers are trying to read them all?…

(photo © kiwidutch)

Car number-plate on Prince Edward Island…

(photo © elmotoo)

you won’t see this sign in Europe…

(photo © kiwidutch)

..or a traffic lights like these…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

..and these street sign designs are just inspired…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

…Look out Moose !

(photo © kiwidutch)

…and on this car… well one of those time when a picture says it better…  LOL.

(photo © kiwidutch)

Why remembering people like Harold Geddes is important…

(photo © kiwidutch)

Whilst we were visiting Sackville in New Brunswick, I took some  photo’s of  a plaque  on a building and a broom and a shovel…

Later on I  read though the information on the plaque and wanted to tell you about how the life of this man impressed me.

Harold Geddes was born in Halifax, probably in 1914. He passed away in Sackville, New Brunswick at 90 years of age.

Sackville is a not so small town but retains the feel and atmosphere of a small town.  Maybe that had a lot to do with Harold’s life. He was orphaned when he was only three during a famous explosion in Halifax in 1917 and adopted by Charles and Alice Geddes of Sackville where he spent his formative years.

Later he worked at the Fawcett Foundry,  and at an aircraft factory in Nova Scotia during World War Two. When the war ended he returned to Sackville, where he became a custodian at Mount Allison University,  until his retirement.So… nothing unusual then?  Well, not so far in Harold’s life.

But after he retired something special happened.

Apparently ” retirement” meant something different to Harold than it does for most other people…  because every day this brisk  and gruff gentleman took it upon himself to spend his time voluntarily cleaning the streets of downtown Sackville. He took pride in clearing the footpaths , all year long though the heat of summer and the cold of winter he shoveled the pavements free of  snow, picked up litter, broken glass, cleaned gutters of dirt and leaves and even washed windows.

Harold was someone  that we would label ” a character”  someone who doesn’t quite fit neatly into society, and he was apparently rather rough around the edges, and it’s said that he would often refuse to acknowledge “outsiders”. (heck, I thought that that is rather usual practice in many small towns all around the world )

Sackville  appreciated all his hard work, completely voluntary and in all weathers, so a memorial called ” “Remembering Harold” was created by local sculptor and Mount Allison sculpture technician Kip Jones.

In 1998, he was presented with the Good Neighbour Award and In 2000, Harold received the first-ever Mayor’s Award for his “pride, initiative, and interest in keeping Sackville neat and clean…on a totally volunteer basis.”

Clearly Harold was a quirky man, he had his ways and was what he was. Apparently, what you saw is what you got. He might have been a little rough around the edges, but he  sounds like one of those people who was a diamond in the rough.

It’s not often that a town has cause to honour a man for accomplishments  that feature, not on the big and showy world stage, but quite literally at ground level,  famous for doing the messy work, the hard graft, getting his hands dirty, mucking in.  Harold sounds like one of the world’s unsung hero’s… a volunteer, turning up day after day to get things done just because they need doing.

Bravo to Harold for being true to himself, for being his grouchy, brisk self and people just had to accept him for it. You know, if you are a square peg, Why not just accept that you are, and be happy in it, rather than trying desperately  to contort yourself into a round hole your whole life.

Bravo to all volunteers everywhere… who do the jobs that need doing, no pay and not nearly enough Thanks. Volunteers teach us that  money isn’t always everything, satisfaction of a job well done is important too, and that “giving back” can take many many forms.

I can only wish that there were plaques and statues for all those who volunteer…  so if you are a volunteer, then Kudos, this post is a  big Thank-You for the work you do.

More Road Journey photos, Part 2…

There were too many photos from my last topic to post in one thread so this is Part 2….

More photos from on the road in Maine and Canada…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

..some lovely building decoration…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

I love the forest…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

.. a storage shed that is like a little barn…

(photo © kiwidutch)

the wilderness is gorgeous…

(photo © kiwidutch)

A lovely drawing on historical Acadia…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

Signs leading to Prince Edward Island…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

..a postcard I bought shows the Confederation Bridge to PEI far better from the air than I could manage on the bridge itself…

(photo © kiwidutch)

Photographic muses of a journey by road…

Of course I took a lot of photos in Maine and during our travels into Canada… not all of them have made it neatly into my blog posts, but there are still some that I found funny, inspiring, beautiful, quirky or just plain interesting.

Often taken just quickly out of the window as we drove, here are a few…

(photo © kiwidutch)

Of course I am enamoured with the wide open spaces that we miss so much, living  as we do in the  densely populated province of South Holland in The Netherlands…

(photo © kiwidutch)

Nothing delighted us more than traveling on first the big highways, seeing so many trees… and so many more trees !

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

.. then to the smaller roads, …

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

…through bigger towns,

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

…though small towns.

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

…even to some very very small roads, that lost the bitumen and became gravel, but fortunately connected much later to a bigger road to our relief as we were afraid at one point that we were really heading into the middle of nowhere!

(photo © kiwidutch)

We looked out for moose, and I would have loved to see one,  good for them, but sadly for us they stayed away from the roads and I looked for naught…

(photo © kiwidutch)

.. and saw watertowers that reminded us a little of journey’s though the French countryside…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

We practiced our linguistic skills, (or lack of them) with the aid of  some local road signs,…

(photo © kiwidutch)

We moved over for wide loads…

(photo © kiwidutch)

… and drooled over the wide open spaces… again,

(photo © kiwidutch)

..and again,

(photo © kiwidutch)

.. and again …

(photo © kiwidutch)

I played a sport  called ” let’s try and photograph a lighthouse sign”  this is only one that came even close !the other 99.9% of my efforts resulted in blurred imaged of forest greenery…

(photo © kiwidutch)

I loved the houses.. so very different in style to Dutch ones…

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

… and the Barns…. beautiful !

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)

(photo © kiwidutch)