Git Along Lil' Dogies

She is the Pied Piper of longhorns, gently calling the behemoth-horned steers into a journey that blends past and present.

As 210 longhorns crested a hill, it looked like a scene from a century gone by. A cloudy and cool September morning was punctuated with sunflowers waving in the Kansas breeze as Carmen Schultz led the way along with a longhorn named Roger. The Medford, Oklahoma, cowgirl is among the 35 drovers who are making the three-week Kansas Cattle Drive in honor of Kansas' 150th birthday.

They began the journey on Labor Day weekend in Caldwell and will end September 24 in Ellsworth. They are loosely following the Cox Cattle Trail, named for William M. Cox, a general livestock agent for the Kansas Pacific Railway Co. in the 1800s. By 1871, Ellsworth was a mecca for cattle drives, with more than 30,000 head of cattle shipped through the central Kansas town.

In days gone by, I suppose the locals were accustomed to watching cowboys herd longhorns from Texas past their own pasture fences on their way to market. These days, the out-of-state visitors in our area are more likely to be toting guns for recreational hunting, rather than using them to kill a jackrabbit to cook over an open flame for nourishment on their way to a Kansas cattle shipping outpost as they would have in the 1870s.

(You can see Randy on the pickup bed in the background - a blend of new and old!)

On Wednesday, Randy and I joined other sightseers to witness a cattle drive reminiscent of those our Kansas ancestors may have seen a century ago. A wagon with a matched team of horses led the way over a hill just south of one of the pastures near Quivira National Wildlife Refuge, where part of our cow-calf herd has spent the summer.

The cowboys at the back of the pack had a sign to the refuge's visitor center to point the way. (Of course, they could also have followed the hoof prints down the sandy road.)

To read more about the journey and "meet" the trailhands, visit the website for the Kansas Cattle Drive 2011. And come back here tomorrow for more of my glimpses from the cattle drive.

Happy Trails!

A Fountain of Information

It's the best thing since sliced bread. (Bet you didn't know sliced bread was made possible after Iowa inventor Otto Rohwedder introduced his bread slicing machine in 1928.)

Kansas State fairgoers can find out that little tidbit and see the wheat fountain at the Kansas Wheat exhibit in the Pride of Kansas building. The wheat fountain is back this year after a 40-plus-year hiatus. It debuted at the state fair in the 1960s and then was used to promote wheat at other functions and fairs.

According to Aaron Harries, the marketing director for Kansas Wheat, the fountain eventually was borrowed by the U.S. Information Agency and shown in Tanzania, Tunisia and in the Congo in the 1970s.

"It was supplied with Kansas wheat," Harries said. "However, visitors to the Tanzanian fair constantly took away handfuls of the grain. Had the fair lasted another few days, the fountain would have run dry."

The fountain was rediscovered at a storage room in the state fair's grandstand earlier this year. Kansas Wheat refurbished it to help celebrate Kansas' 150th birthday.

The fountain is housed in a large wooden box filled with 600 pounds of wheat. An auger in the middle of the box pulls the kernels from the bottom up and they flow out its top like a fountain. Gravity continues to pull wheat kernels to the bottom of the box to start the process over. They added a little mineral oil to try to keep the wheat dust under control.

It's been a conversation starter for people who visit the Kansas Wheat booth.

Randy worked at the booth last Friday, the opening day of the fair. He talked to people about wheat while I judged chocolate cakes. I guess both our jobs involved wheat, in one way or another.

Here are some "kernels" from the timeline at the booth:

• 1839: The first wheat crop was planted in what is now Johnson County, 22 years before Kansas officially became a state.
• 1874, "Turkey Red" was first planted by Mennonite settlers. Turkey Red was the first wheat variety that was suited and adaptable to the Kansas climate.
  
• 1919: K-State released its first hard red winter wheat variety, Kanred.
  
• 1931: 18.5 bushels per acre was a record high yield, but the price of 33 cents per bushel was the lowest on record.
  
• Today, Kansas averages 9 million acres of wheat planted each year, producing some 380 million bushels of wheat.

The annual recipe booklets from Kansas Wheat feature the recipes from the 2011 Festival of Breads.

For your copy, stop by the Kansas Wheat booth in the Pride of Kansas building. For more information or recipes, log onto Kansas Wheat's website.

It's a Tough Job ...

It's a tough job, but someone has to do it. I realize that judging scrumptious chocolate cakes doesn't sound like a daunting task. The tasting part is certainly easy enough. It's just picking the winner that's the trouble.

Fellow judge Lois Schlickau and I chose the winners in the Kansas State Fair C&H Sugar Chocolate Cake contest last Friday. I'm glad there weren't more than seven cakes. It would have made the decision even more difficult.

Denise Pounds of Hutchinson had the winning combination of yummy cake and unusual frosting. She is a perennial fair entrant. She wasn't at the judging to bask in her "crowning" with the first-place ribbon. (The third-place winner was a 15-year-old girl, so there's a wide range of people participating - from experienced fair entrant to novice!)

In a nationally-sponsored contest, I think judges are looking for something a bit unusual and not just a standard chocolate cake. The espresso powder in the cake enhanced the chocolate taste without overpowering it. Using C&H brown sugar in a meringue-style buttercream frosting was an unusual and tasty choice, which set Denise's cake apart from others.

Your mom told you not to judge a book by its cover. Same goes for state fair food contests. The contest isn't solely about outward appearance. In fact, that only counts 10 percent. (Scoring criteria for the cake is 40 percent aroma and flavor and 25 percent each for texture and grain. The frosting is split down the middle with consistency and flavor.)

Randy is eventually hoping for a taste test of his own on this cake. (OK, he'd be happy tasting any of these beautiful cakes! More recipes to follow ...)

Mocha Almond Toffee Cake

Cake:
18 tbsp. unsalted butter, softened but still cool
1 3/4 cups plus 2 tbsp. C&H granulated sugar
3 large eggs at room temperature
2 cups & 2 tbsp. cake flour, plus more for dusting pans
1 1/4 tsp. baking soda
3/4 tsp. salt
3/4 cup dutched cocoa powder
2 tsp. espresso powder
1 cup milk
3/4 cup buttermilk
1 tbsp. pure vanilla extract
1 tsp. pure almond extract

Filling
3/4 cup Heath English Toffee baking bits, divided

Garnish
1 1/4 cups sliced almonds

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Generously grease and flour three, 8-inch cake pans (Denise used square pans). Beat the butter at medium-high speed until smooth and shiny, about 30 seconds. Gradually sprinkle in sugar; beat until the mixture is fluffy and almost white, approximately 3 to 5 minutes. Add the eggs, 1 at a time, beating 1 full minute after each addition.

Whisk together the dry ingredients. Combine the milk, buttermilk and flavorings in a separate measuring cup. With the mixer at the lowest speed, add about a third of the dry ingredients followed by a third of the milk mixture; continue until all the ingredients are incorporated. Scrape sides of bowl and mix 15 seconds longer until the batter is satiny.

Divide into 3 pans. Spread the top smooth. Bake for 23-30 minutes. Check for doneness with a toothpick or when cake springs back in the center when pressed lightly. Let cakes cool in the pans for 10 minutes. Loosen sides from the pans and invert on wire racks to cool completely.

Brown Sugar Swiss Meringue Buttercream

5 large egg whites
1 2/3 cups packed C&H dark brown sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
2 cups unsalted butter, room temperature

Put egg whites, sugar and salt into a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water. Whisk until mixture registers 160 degrees, about 4 minutes.

Beat on high speed until stiff, glossy peaks form, about 6 minutes. Reduce speed to medium-low. Add butter, 2 tablespoons at a time, beating after each addition. (Meringue will deflate slightly as butter is added.) Beat until frosting is smooth and glossy, 3 to 5 minutes.

Assemble the cake:
Put the first layer on a serving platter or cake stand. Spread some frosting on the first layer. Sprinkle with half the toffee chips. Top with second layer of the cake. Put on additional frosting. Sprinkle with the rest of the toffee chips. Top with final layer of the cake. Spread remaining frosting over the top and sides of the cake, gently swirling on top.

Garnish: Toast almond slices in 350-degree oven for 8 to 10 minutes or until they are just starting to brown. Cool completely. Carefully push the almonds onto the sides of the cake.

Eye of the Beholder

When is a weed a flower? When is a flower a weed? When a wildflower is in your pasture, it may be a weed. But it doesn't make it any less beautiful.

I went with Randy last week for a 4-wheeler expedition to check the grass levels at our pasture on the Ninnescah River. Even though the grass has struggled to produce during this extreme drought, there are still pockets of color in the pasture.

After I posted photos of wildflowers from our trip to Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons, a fellow farm wife reminded me that Kansas has its share of beautiful wildflowers, too. Yes, we do. This year, the "crop" of wildflowers may have struggled to grow - along with every other green thing in Kansas. But our 4-wheeler trip still revealed some hidden gems in the pasture.

After looking through the Kansas Native Plant Society's website, I think this purple-pink plant is the Rocky Mountain beeplant, peritoma serrulata. (But don't quote me: I'm certainly not a plant expert.) But it makes sense after seeing the bees buzz around the pinkish-purple flowers. The butterflies seemed to like it, too.

Maybe they thrive in drought conditions because neither Randy or I had noticed them before and their showy blossoms would be pretty hard to ignore.

Nestled in some other wildflowers were these duck decoys abandoned by hunters.

The white "flowers" along the banks must have gotten some sustenance from underflow.

This looks pretty until you realize that this fish swimming in the stream was hardly covered with water.

There's certainly nothing beautiful about that.

We did get 0.25 inch of rain Saturday morning. It certainly wasn't a drought-busting rain. But the fragrance was better than any perfume, and it left us with a smidgen of optimism ... kind of like finding treasures in a pasture.

What a Difference a Year Makes

Time flies. Change is the only constant. That's been dramatically illustrated in our extended family this year as we've watched two babies change with each passing month.

Sometimes the changes come with less celebration and fanfare. The drought has brought changes, but none of them have been welcome. Earlier this week, I hitched a ride on the 4-wheeler as Randy looked at grass in our pasture along the Ninnescah.

Surprisingly, the cattle are in pretty good shape, considering the "diet" they've been on. Native grasses have struggled in this summer's triple-digit heat and drought. The babies are growing and the mamas don't have the lean look of New York City models who starve themselves for fashion.

But the evidence of the drought is everywhere. This photo below was taken this week.

Summer 2011

Compare it to the same location a year ago.

Summer 2010

Last year, I took this photo at sunset right before we left the pasture after a fishing expedition.

This year, there's no water to reflect the sun's rays as day fades into night.

Parts of the pasture look deceptively green. But cattle won't eat some of the native grasses, like this three-sided salt grass.

Other areas show clear evidence of the drought.

Most summers, the location below has water. This summer, all the cattle have gravitated toward the southern part of the pasture, where there's still water, albeit much less than usual.

Randy remembers having to haul water to the pasture one summer more than 30 years ago, but usually, the pasture's ponds and the Ninnescah River nourish the cattle in their summer home.

Unless we get rain soon, Randy expects he'll take cattle off pasture earlier than normal this year. He'll wean the baby calves and sell them this fall, rather than feeding them over the winter. We don't have the alfalfa, sudan or silage to feed them this winter.

But we are fortunate. Many cattlemen in Texas and Oklahoma were forced to sell their cow/calf pairs earlier in the summer due to drought. For us, there will be a "next year." For some of them, their herd is gone.

Amarillo Sky

My Farmer may not bring home flowers all the time. But who needs flowers when there's an amazing sunset just down the road?

He called me from the tractor a few days ago and told me, "There's a pretty sunset tonight." I was hidden away in the basement office. I would have missed it without a reminder. And it was way prettier than any bouquet.

As I watched the sunset and the tractor move through the field, I thought of the Jason Aldean song, Amarillo Sky. The country singer may have been talking about a sky in another state, but it works in Kansas, too.

It says, in part:

He just takes the tractor another round
And pulls the plow across the ground
And sends up another prayer.
He says, "Lord, I never complain. I never ask why.
"But please don't let my dreams run dry."
Underneath, Underneath this
Amarillo sky

While I was out there, I tried getting a photo of a sunflower and the sunset. I wasn't thrilled with the results until I worked a little magic with the computer and made it more like a painting than a photograph.

It's not like God needs my help with gorgeous scenery. He's an expert at creating Masterpieces.

Sharing Recipes the New Way

Back when I was a kid, we saved recipes by carefully copying them onto recipe cards. I still have some of the recipes I transcribed by hand as a 10-year-old 4-Her. They are stuck in a now-rusted tin box, but I still pull them out from time to time.

There is still value in hand-written recipes. Jill was getting a little nervous during the unpacking process in Topeka when we hadn't uncovered her Jill and Eric's Family and Friends Cookbooks that I'd made for a bridal shower gift. Most of those recipes were handwritten by family and friends and included in two binders. We found them this past weekend during more unpacking chores.

I still love browsing through cookbooks and leafing through old recipe cards, but the internet has added a new dimension to how we share recipes these days. I may find a recipe on a fellow food lover's blog. A couple of my young Facebook friends often post what's for supper or dessert in their Facebook status.

That's where both Jill and I saw the recipe for Picnic Pasta Salad. Jill's cousin Paige posted a link on Facebook last week. When Randy & I were at Topeka this Sunday, it was on the menu at Jill's. I did my part by chopping up the vegetables and Jill did the rest.

No matter how we share recipes these days - whether by recipe card, phone call, email, blog or Facebook - the sharing continues. And that's a good thing.

Jill served the pasta salad with paninis we each assembled ourselves and then put on the George Foreman grill. Yum! It's great to be a dinner guest!

Picnic Pasta Salad
from Taste of Home

1 package (12 ounces) tricolor spiral pasta
1 package (10 ounces) refrigerated tricolor tortellini
1 jar (7-1/2 ounces) marinated artichoke hearts, undrained
1/2 pound fresh broccoli florets (about 1-3/4 cups)
12 ounces provolone cheese, cubed
12 ounces hard salami, cubed
1 medium sweet red pepper, chopped
1 medium green pepper, chopped
1 can (15 ounces) garbanzo beans or chickpeas, rinsed and drained
2 cans (2-1/4 ounces each) sliced ripe olives, drained
1 medium red onion, chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
2 envelopes Italian salad dressing mix

Cook spiral pasta and tortellini according to package directions. Drain and rinse in cold water. Place in a large bowl; add the artichokes, broccoli, provolone cheese, salami, peppers, beans, olives, onion and garlic.

Prepare salad dressing according to package directions; pour over salad and toss to coat. Serve immediately or cover and refrigerate.

Yield: 14-16 servings (at least!)

Recipe Notes:

• Jill didn't use salami because she's not eating luncheon meat while she's pregnant.
• She didn't include the olives because neither she or I like them. Randy & Eric do, but they weren't the ones in the kitchen ... cook's prerogative.
• We used green onions instead of red onion (See above!)
• Jill used already cubed cheese to save time. Since her grocery store didn't have already-cubed provolone, she used a combination of sharp cheddar and a marble cheese.
  
• She used tricolor rotini, but she used regular tortellini.
• Jill didn't use 4 cloves of garlic.
  
• This makes a big salad. We ate it for two meals and there was still a huge bowlful left. It's a good thing Eric eats leftovers! Maybe that's how Jill and Eric can meet their neighbors: Show up at the door with homemade pasta salad!