The Joys of January

Anyone who has delved into Robert Ruark’s timeless tales of “The Old Man and the Boy” (and everyone who has any interest in the outdoors should do so) likely remembers that some of his finest experiences were solitary ones that came late in the hunting season. I particularly relish reading and re-reading two of his pieces of this sort, “Everyone Took Sick But Me” and “You Separate the Men from the Boys.” Actually neither of them is set in January—the former occurs in December and the latter in February—but the solitude they evoke, the “feel” for the special flavor of small game hunting in the dead of winter they provide, along with Ruark’s inimitable ability as a teller of tales, sets the mood for this season of the year.

At present I’ve got Ruark squarely in my thoughts, and for a very good reason. For the last couple of months I’ve been hard at work on a truly special task. A year or so back a fellow from over Wilmington, N.C. way (that’s Ruark’s boyhood stomping grounds) whom I’ve known for a good while, Steve Bliss, contacted me with some fascinating news. It turns out that the manuscript of a lengthy biography of Ruark written by Alan Ritchie, who served as Ruark’s secretary from the early 1950s up until Ruark’s death in 1965, had just come to light. Steve and a companion who is deeply involved with the Ruark Museum at Southport (and who knew Ruark personally), George Saffo, shared that glad information with me and did me the singular honor of asking me to edit the work for publication.

The end result of all of this, after a couple of meetings and detailed discussions, is that I will indeed serve as editor for the biography, which is to be published by LiveOak Press. The Press is an adjunct of Sporting Classics magazine, a publication with which I have been affiliated for a quarter of a century. Each issue of the magazine carries a book column I write, and I’ve had plenty of solid, satisfying experiences with LiveOak Press (most recently in The Lost Classics of Jack O’Connor and the Remington Cookbook). They also published the original edition of The Lost Classics of Robert Ruark, and that’s where I entered the picture on the present effort.

That’s enough about the forthcoming biography for now, other than to note that I think any fan of Ruark will find it fascinating. It’s incredibly full (the typed, double-spaced manuscript from which I’m working runs to well over 700 pages, and the book will likely come close to 300 pages). Rest assured that there will much more depth and insight on Ruark than is to be found in either of the lives of him currently available (Hugh Foster’s rather indifferent biography and Terry Wieland’s solid effort). If you are a Ruark enthusiast and would like to be put on a list to receive the book as soon as it is published, with publication of both a limited, numbered, and signed edition and a regular edition scheduled for late 2007, just send me an e-mail note and I’ll be sure you are notified.

The dead of winter was a delightful time for Ruark as a boy, and the same has held true for me as a boy and a man. I’m writing these words on New Year’s Day, the last day of the whitetail season here in South Carolina. It’s rainy, wet, and generally miserable, but duty-bound, I’ll be in the woods this afternoon. Truthfully though, it’s tomorrow and the days to follow which will bring me joy. Woodcock season is open, as is that for rabbits, squirrels, doves, waterfowl, and birds (when you say “bird” in this part of the world, you mean quail). The woods are empty of the pumpkin army (deer hunters), and a man is free to wander and wonder to his heart’s content.

That’s exactly what I loved to do as a boy. Rabbit hunting outings were, for the most part, group efforts. But there were always those welcome days when I’d be all by myself as far as human company went, although I would usually have from one to three canine companions. One example from the vaults of fond memory should suffice to give some indication of why I loved January. It involved a truly special day of hunting with a single, aging beagle, old Lead. It was one of those magical moments when everything seemed to go right, and that day I was hunting alone.

I’ve always enjoyed pursuing sport by myself. Indeed, in warm weather nothing tickles my fancy more than a day on a trout stream when I never see another soul, and I revel in late-season mixed-bag hunts that might involve some or all the species mentioned above. Perhaps that mindset is why my wife has, more than once over the years when she was a bit vexed with me, suggested that when I was gone a fitting epitaph might read: “Jim Casada hated people.”

That wouldn’t be quite right, but there are times when I’ll take my portion of humanity in mighty small doses. On this particular outing, on a long ago New Year’s Day, I never saw another soul from first light to last. It was quite chilly when Lead and I set out from home, but I had a bountiful lunch stored in my coat, there were springs aplenty for water along our intended route of travel, and besides that, boys never feel the cold the way my much older bones do today.

My destination was some nearby uplands situated within walking distance of my home. I jumped a rabbit on a hill leading from a branch to the uplands, and after a lively chase Lead turned it back my way and I managed a telling shot. A half hour later I killed another cottontail on the jump, and after lunch there would be a third one to stuff into the capacious game back of my hand-me-down Duxbak coat. I even managed to kill a quail when a covey got up in front of me (my little 20 gauge was choked tighter than a miser’s purse, certainly way too tight for bird hunting, and on top of that it was a single shot). As the shadows lengthened and the chill of evening strengthened to embrace the grey landscape, I began to make my weary way back home. I’d probably covered a dozen rugged miles, something that was standard operating procedure then which would leave me bone weary now.

At that point a big old boar bushytail, doubtless on the way back to his den after some late afternoon foraging, ran up an oak tree in front of me. I threw my hat on the opposite side of the tree to “turn” him, and when he scurried in view my shot echoed through the still air as he tumbled to the ground. With the back of my Duxbak coat sagging in a most satisfactory fashion, with a trio of cottontails, a squirrel, and a bobwhite, I headed to the warmth of home and a traditional New Year’s Day repast. The supper table would have held, as it did every year, big bowls of black-eyed peas and turnip greens, a pone of crackling cornbread, and a platter of backbones-and-ribs from a hog we had butchered back around Thanksgiving.

Three rabbits, a bobwhite, and a squirrel may not seem like much in today’s world of big whitetails and plentiful gobblers, but rest assured that for a 12-year-old boy it took on all the proportions of the hunt of a lifetime. There have, to be sure, been lots of years and lots of hunts since those innocent days, but the seasonal experiences I will always treasure most are those from boyhood.

Among these treasures, the jewels which shine the brightest are, more often than not, times spent alone. The greens in the New Year’s Day meal mentioned above supposedly represented wealth, and I reckon the 50-odd years since that boyhood experience have been rich ones indeed. Not in terms of money in the bank, mind you, but in building memories from days afield and astream. I suspect the same holds true for many of you. Resurrect some of your own January joys, help youngsters get started in making their own memories or, best of all, continue making them as you savor the season. Here’s hoping you and yours will have a wonderful 2007!

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JANUARY COOKING

To me, there’s nothing quite like a pot of savory venison stew or a cauldron of rich, steaming soup when it comes to satisfying the inner man in January. Much the same holds true for traditional New Year’s Day fare. Here are some recipes for that sort of food.

HOPPIN’ JOHN

Where I grew up in the North Carolina mountains, the traditional black-eyed peas were cooked with a ham hock or piece of streaked meat (called fatback in other locales), seasoning, and nothing else. Here in South Carolina though, matters go one step further, and I think it is a positive step. Black-eyed peas and rice are combined for a dish called Hoppin’ John. It was standard fare on the January table of one of my favorite outdoor writers, Archibald Rutledge.

½ pound dried black-eyed peas
Small ham hock, good chunk of streaked meat, or leftover pieces and ham bone from Christmas
1 chopped onion
2 cloves of garlic
½ cup long-grain white rice or wild rice
1 can diced tomatoes
2 stalks chopped celery
Red pepper flakes or freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 bay leaf
½ teaspoon of salt (or to taste—will depend on saltiness of the ham)
Pinch of cumin

In a big Dutch oven or soup kettle, combine the peas, meat and 3 to 4 cups of water. Add onions, bay leaf, and pepper flakes. Bring to a boil and then reduce heat to a simmer. Cook until peas are tender (but not mushy). Then add a cup and a half of water and bring back to a boil. Add rice and simmer until the rice is almost tender. As a final step add the remaining ingredients and further simmer until rice is fully tender. Serve with corn bread.

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QUICK AND EASY HOPPIN’ JOHN

1 large onion, chopped
2 large cloves garlic, pressed
2 tablespoons butter, melted
2 (16-ounce) cans black-eyed peas, drained and rinsed
2 cups chicken bouillon
1 cup uncooked regular rice
1 teaspoon salt
Crushed red pepper to taste

Sauté the onion and garlic in butter until tender. Stir in peas and other ingredients, then bring mixture to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer for 20 minutes or until liquid is fully absorbed and rice is tender (add a bit of water if needed).

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MOUNTAIN BOY BACKONES-AND-RIBS

There may be something that’s easier to prepare than what my Grandpa Joe used to call a “bait” of backbones-and-ribs, but if so I don’t know what it is. Just take the meat (if you are buying pork at the store, what is advertised as backbones and ribs isn’t always the “real McCoy.” Be sure you can see the actual ribs. Remove as much fat as you can then place the meat in a crockpot with an inch or so of water, add salt, and slow cook for several hours. I like for the backbones-and-ribs to be cooked to the point where the ribs are so tender, especially at the point where they join the backbone, that you can easily crunch them with your teeth and suck out the rich marrow. Leftover meat can be pulled from the bones, chopped up, and, with the addition of your favorite barbeque sauce, be used to make fine sandwiches.

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CHERRY VENISON STEW

Venison goes wonderfully well with almost any fruit or berry which has a bit of “bite,” tartness, or distinctive taste. Here’s one such recipe using cherries and chopped pecans. It’s different but I think you’ll find it a delight.

¼ cup canola oil
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
2 pounds venison, cut into 2-inch cubes
1 can (12 ounces) cola
1 small bottle maraschino cherry juice (reserve cherries and cut in half)
2 cups chopped pecans

Heat oil in skillet. Mix flour, salt and pepper. Toss venison cubs with flour (a paper bag works perfectly well). Brown venison in oil. Remove from skillet and drop in saucepan in which coal and cherry juice have been brought to a boil. Reduce heat to low and cook for an hour and a half or until tender. Stir occasionally. Add cherries and nuts and simmer 30 additional minutes or until gravy is thick. Serve over hot cooked noodles.

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CROCKPOT BRUNSWICK STEW

Hearty, healthy, and delicious, Brunswick stew is a staple in the South. The recipe offered here features ground venison, but you can readily substitute squirrel or rabbit.

1 ½ pounds boneless chicken breasts (or whatever parts you prefer; we often use leg and wing meat from a wild turkey)
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 small onion, quartered
3-4 cups water
1 pound cooked venison (ground venison browned or leftovers from a roast chopped up)
1 can (14 ounces) chick broth plus 2 cups broth from cooking the chicken or wild turkey
1 package (10 ounces) frozen baby limas
1 package (10 ounces) frozen whole kernel corn
½ cup chopped onion
1 can (28 ounces) whole tomatoes, undrained and chopped
2 medium potatoes, peeled and diced
2 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon salt
1/8 cup sugar
1 teaspoon black pepper
¼ teaspoon red pepper (or to taste)

Combine chicken, celery, quartered onion, and four cups water (or amount needed to cover chicken) in a large stock pot; bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat and simmer 45 minutes or until chicken is tender (wild turkey dark meat will take longer0. Remove meat from broth and chop when cool enough to handle. Remove celery and onion from broth and place two cups of reserved broth in crockpot. Add canned chicken broth, chopped chicken, venison, and remainder of ingredients. Cook on medium 6 to 8 hours or until potatoes and vegetables are tender.

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