Welcome to Ransom Canyon, Texas!

A community of 1096 residents, and just as many ordinances.

I've never taken the time to ponder this question before, but how many ways are there to explore a place unknown to you? One can consult the expert guidebooks and websites before the trip and plan ahead. (Such was the case with the Ranching Heritage Museum which we learned about by watching Red Stegal's RFDTV show.) One can ask a local-- or better yet, ask a local to be your guide to the little known gems in his community or region. (An excellent approach when off the English-speaking beaten path.) Or one can buy a map and plot out one's own adventure. [Or, one can forgo maps and just wing it.]

I don't think there's any need to debate the virtues of one over the others, so long as your repertoire of place exploration includes them all. [Including winging it, on occasion. Nothing like being lost teaches the value of a good map.]

We picked up a map of Lubbock County. Mr. Big Food's attention was immediately drawn to the blue parts-- the water. So we went in search of water. 

The price-tag turned us off the first lake. $6.00 per individual to see a lake? Are you kidding me? So we turned around and headed toward another splotch of blue.

Across the street from the "Welcome" sign. Please note that I did not leave the paved highway to take this photograph.

I don't know the crops of this region of Texas, but these acres, planted in some blond grass, were unlike any we'd seen closer to Lubbock. Lovely.

Water in the canyon.

This was quite a sight! Lubbock and surrounds are shades of brown. See, for example, Shallowater. 

Ransom Canyon is blue... and green!

We were probably violating some ordinance here. But we took care to keep two wheels on the road while we got out of our tiny little rental car to enjoy the view.

And get a closer look,

thanks to the camera's zoom.

And that's when we turned and discovered this.

Interesting.

Note, once again, that we did not leave the paved road.

Not even when we turned around and saw this.

Having had a few good laughs, we proceeded to get back on the highway

descend into the canyon

and come up on the other side,

on our way to another map-inspired exploration of Lubbock County, Texas.

As it turns out, had I done some research beforehand, I'd have learned that near Lubbock was an exclusive community of big-name architect's houses inhabited by a handful of folks who make way more money than the Texas median, and where Vogue had done a recent shoot-- models standing on the roof of the brown house & all. The community sits on the rim of a canyon and drifts down its sides. 

The Highlight Reel

We made the most of our final day in Lubbock.

We saw this,

and 47 other structures from the frontier days.

We drove out to the east and saw

the sorriest looking cotton I have ever seen

on our way to

Ransom Canyon,

where, as at the Heritage Center, 

there are some interesting abodes.

From there we made our way to 

home of

where they brewed a pot of coffee for us to enjoy with

our cookies while we

looked around the museum of old baking equipment.

Just around the square from the bakery there was an antique store!

It was here that we were able to put a face to the place.

Mr. O. L. Slaton

(As an aside, just so I remember to mention this again, there was big money in getting a town named after you back in the crappy olden days of the RR.)

We then proceeded to depart Slaton,

via the scenic route,

and return to our sweet suite in Lubbock, Texas.
~~

We went to the 'burbs for supper at a Texas Steakhouse Chain. (No. Not the one with sawdust floors. One that serves real steaks.) 

Tomorrow? Back to Mississippi! Texas is always fun-- no place like it! But it's time to be back on the Farm. 

My Kind of Town

"Your kind of town."

What a great day! Wait until you see all of the stuff there is to see in Lubbock County!

Guess what Mr. Big Food found in Slaton, Texas? A crappy old cookbook!

And... guess what I found? ;-)

Day 1 in Lubbock, TX

Lubbock is not set up for pedestrians, which really doesn't bother me all that much except for the fact that we were pedestrians this morning. So the day begins with contextual griping. But we walked our way to our destination without incident.

On campus, we met up with Mike, a dear old friend from Cincinnati. We talked about guns and gun control and what underlies the seemingly intractable debate about these issues. Mr. Big Food had some things to say about reward vs. fear circuits in the brain. I showed a picture of our neighbor, Walker. (I'll add links when I'm home.)

"Emotions and the Marketing of Gun Control"

Mike's talk had some reprints of crappy old NRA ads from back in the crappy old days, as well as some more recent. He made some exceptional points about the emotional appeals of the ad, and how they'd changed over time.

Then Mr. Big Food did some decision theory about Libertarian cooperation, and we suffered through a really not good talk about something, and a not so bad but I was getting bored already talk about feminists perspectives on female social networks.

And then, thank God, we high tailed it outta there. Seriously. I've never been in Lubbock. At this stage of the game, all college campuses look alike to me.

You can change the vegetation,

you can rotate the message of the week,

but they all look the same.

Add a little rain and a bull dog or two and it's like I'm in Starkvegas.

So Mr. Big Food and I hit the road. And by hit, I mean we were in a tiny little rental car. Yesterday, when we picked up you little rent-a-tiny-car, the fellow asked what we'd prefer. I said, "a truck."

I didn't get a truck. And I'm trying to drive this tiny thing like a truck in Lubbock, TX.

Anyway... .

We got a map of Lubbock County and we proceeded to explore Lubbock County.

Now. I wish I had more pics for you but here's the problem. The speed limit on two lane roads is 75. It's hard to take pictures and drive 75mps. I did my best.

We were racing our way to Shallowwater, TX.

A representative abode in Old Shallowwater, Tx.

We drove around,

came across the Shallowwater Elementary School,

and found then the Middle School, and High School-- which was expanding-- while looking for down town.

Meanwhile-- and I wish I'd taken pics but there was a cop and I didn't want to be conspicuous, not driving a truck and all-- I saw little kids playing in the streets in of low-income mixed raced diverse neighborhoods. 

We couldn't find the downtown. Keep in mind that every time we exited and then re-entered the town, there was a sign telling us we were entering a town whose population was 2471 (or close to it).

And then we figured it out. Why is the high school expanding? Because

Fences

And then we picked up some BBQ, brought it back to our sweet suite, turned on the tv to watch Texas high school football, and commenced to wonder what this (above) would mean to high school Texas football.

Like, do you let your little boys out after dark with their helmets secured to scrimmage with the Big Boys over the fence?

A Funny Exchange In Lubbock

I'm in the middle of writing up events of the day. 36 hours ago I bought a pack of cigs. I still have some. I know from past experiences on the road, if I don't record my impressions while I'm on the road, I'll over-think them by the time I get back to the farm.

But a need a break. So I, in my regulation flannel jammies and a big long coat sweater go to smoke a cig. But I have no matches. I go to the desk. I apologize for my attire. She says, "Hon, don't worry. You're at home here."

And I say, "Please don't take this wrong, Hon. But if I were at home, the dogs would be up there in our room."

She laughed. She must have dogs.

Where In The World?

That's correct! Lubbock, Texas.

No Place Like Texas

"From A Ranch Near George West, Texas"

Sent to me from Mr. Big Food's Dad my wonderful Father-in-Law!

"America the Beatuiful"

I've lots of fun Mississippi stuff from yesterday to share, but I've also a kitchen to clean, and squash to freeze, jalapenos to pickle, corn to fertilize (fish emulsion), and an energetic dog to take to the pasture (before it rains????). So for now I'll copy/paste a short bit from NRO's The Corner by Michael Walsh.

West of the truck stop at Fort Stockton, Texas, and all the way to El Paso, there is almost nothing but mashed-potato hills, scrub brush and the open road. The speed limit is pretty much whatever you want it to be, and Texas Rangers are few and far between. For a few hours, you can imagine what the first settlers felt upon encountering the vast, majestic emptiness that is west Texas and all from the safety of your steering wheel.

You feel free.

He goes on to say, "You haven’t seen the country until you’ve driven across it." 

Indeed. Read the rest here.

Funny stuff

Mr. Big Food's Dad sends this along with the comment

ONLY IN TEXAS!!! Well, maybe in Mississippi, too......

Feel free to share.

Check out Fion!

If you're in or around Austin, check out Fion in Steiner Ranch. There's a Valentine's Day Special that's running all week, I believe. 

And if you're not in or around Austin, check out Fion's site on the World Wide Web for Chef Albert's recipe of the month.

Fion is good BIG. You can take our word for it.

Soup Contest Entrant #4: Chili Soup

Not chili, chili soup!*

For me, it's a tie. Mr. Big Food is still thinkin' on it. I've got it tied with Slow Cooker Potato Cheese Soup with Wieners (here, and here).

If you are new to this game, we're having a Fall/Winter Soup Contest. This is the 4th entrant. There have been several disqualified entrants, namely Leftover Turkey Gumbo and Across the Garden Soup. (We make up the rules to this contest as we go along.)

Mr. Big Food thought he was pulling one over on me. He explicitly said he wasn't going to tell me what was in this soup until after I'd tried it. Please. I see the menu. I shop the aisles (he shops the periphery). And I saw that he didn't begin to fix supper until about 15 minutes before supper time. I had a pretty good idea what was in this soup. Clearly, I was not biased by this knowledge. 

"Recipe" below the fold

Guest Post: MR. BIG FOOD HIMSELF!

The Big Food Manual and Survivalist Flourishing Guide recently crossed the 14,000 recipe mark. For readers unfamiliar with this collection, I started it back in the early summer of 2006, before Marica and I left “The Compound” in Cincinnati’s Northside community for “The Bunker” in rural Rileyville, Virginia, where we were on a year’s sabbatical just a few short steps from the Shenandoah River. It began as simply a way to get a bunch of old hand-written recipes I had compiled over the years, stuffed into a blue three-ring notebook, onto my laptop computer. Those recipes came from a variety of sources, including recipes from Gran, Tait, Buncle, and other “old timers’ at the Dallas SPJST Hall (Slavic Benevolent Order of the State of Texas), handed down to me mostly by Mom and Aunt Bee. (Though I did find a number of these recipes hand-written in old cookbooks I acquired from Gran.) I then started working through the many old, mostly locally published cookbooks I had collected over the years, adding favorite recipes I had cooked out of those books for as long as I’ve been cooking. And that’s awhile. I started collecting those books in my college undergraduate days when I learned how to cook seriously, first at the old North Campus Dining Facility at UCLA, back in 1980. (However, I’m sure Mom will remind me that I cooked as a kid, too.) Anyway, the project kept expanding, and eventually it hit me that I was compiling a definitive collection of American home cooking recipes. I started adding more recipes from my collection of old cookbooks, even ones I had never tried personally—I just started intuiting which ones should make good food. And I continued searching earnestly for more old cookbooks.

            Now we’re at the point where it would take a person more than thirty years (and closing in on forty years) if one simply did 1 recipe (and whatever variations are included on its page) per day. 

Fredericksburg, Texas USA

Felix Reinbach

As I begin to compose this post, there are fewer than 14 hours until we will depart The BIG Sovereign State of Texas and make our way back to The Farm in rural Mississippi.

It's been a delightful trip. To channel some old Steve Martin from an old SNL, if I had one wish that I could wish this holiday season, it would be that all people had families and families in-law as engaging, giving, opinionated, and wonderful as mine. Corny but true.

Today Mr. Big Food's Family and we traveled to Fredericksburg, in the Texas Hill Country. We found a place to park-- a non-trival matter-- and had a nice lunch of German fare. We then did some window shopping, and took in a show. 

By the way, I have a new camera! Below the fold (i.e., click on "keep reading) and you will find some photos-- some with commentary-- of Fredericksburg, Texas.

[I'll post the color commentary of last night's dinner at Mr. Big Food's Cousin's Wine|Beer|Cigar Bistro when I'm back on The Farm.]

Nuts and berries and cheese

A fine start to a very fine meal

Bless us, O Lord, and these thy gifts, which we are about to receive from your bounty. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Christmas is coming. It's time to bake some vanočka!

Merry Christmas (in Czech)!

Unbeknownst to me before I met Mr. Big Food many years ago, Texas has a large population of folks of Czech decent. Count Mr. Big Food's Mom among them. Both her grandmother and grandfather were born in Czechoslovakia. The Czech's have a rich food heritage. Needless to say, this heritage has found its way into Mr. Big Food's Big Food Manual and Survivalist Flourishing Guide which contains (among many other things) recipes for  "Tex-Czech and Tex-Central European foods, handed down from Gran, Tait, and other “old timers” from the Dallas SPJST." 

Because it's Christmas time, Mr. Big Food's Mom and her son will soon be making a vanočka! 

Prepared for vanočka

 I'll post the recipe soon so you, too, can enjoy some Czech vanočka!

UPDATED to correct multiple errors brought to my attention by Mr. Big Food's Dad!