Does it Get Any Better? from My Leaky Waders on Vimeo.
{ 0 comments }
Adam Barker presents: Getting Your Images Published – From Capture to Cover from Manfrotto Imagine More on Vimeo.
Webinar featuring one of our favorite geniuses behind the camera – Adam Barker.
{ 0 comments }
When you’ve been married as long as we have (we were both mere children…), it’s actually damned rare when your spouse says something that induces genuine shock and awe.
Nonetheless She Who Must Be Obeyed shocked me yesterday when she said, in reply to my query about a Mother’s Day dinner this weekend, that she’d like some type of grilled artisanal hot dog.
She was, of course, probably speaking entirely in jest.
It was, of course, too late.
The moment she uttered the phrase ‘hot dog my mind was racing with images of nifty, uptown dogs from places we’ve visited over the years. Being a fly fishing foodie my mind then conjured up images of the mighty slaw dog.
I can’t hear the words ‘slaw dog’ without thinking about that other fly fishing blogger who keeps writing about slaw dogs. TC is obviously one of the very few fly fishing bloggers who can actually write; combine that increasingly rare talent with what appears to be a tormenting fascination with slaw dogs and you’ll end up with some riveting results. (Click over there and search for ‘slaw dog’; nine pages of results pop up. I tip my hat sir.)
It was in fact under Tom’s tutelage that I first learned that West Virginia is the ancestral home of the slaw dog (evening going as far as to map the features of the slaw dog by county), though I’d venture you’ll not see this Bahn Mi Slaw Dog version in the WV hills.
While I readily admit stealing this slaw from another bahn mi recipe we’ve fallen in love with it’s now found a new permanent home on the Bahn Mi Slaw Dog.
See you at the grill on Sunday.
Bahn Mi Slaw
3 cups carrots, coarsely grated
3 cups daikon white radish, peeled, coarsely grated
3 green onions, finely chopped
1/2 cup rice vinegar
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp kosher salt
2 tbsp. sesame oilSriracha Mayo
1 cup mayo (or gasp, Miracle Whip)
3 green onions, finely chopped
1 tbsp. fresh basil, finely chopped
1-2 tbsp. sriracha or your fav hot chile sauceThe other stuff
Aidell’s Pineapple and Bacon Chicken Sausages
6 12-inch long baguettes
Jalapenos, stemmed, seeded, sliced thinly
Cilantro springs
Slaw time. Combine the slaw ingredients and mix well; needs at least an hour at room temperature to bring the flavors together.
Mayo time. While waiting on your hardwood charcoal to burn down stir the Mayo together; cover and chill.
Grill time. Over a medium fire grill the precooked sausages until the skins are ‘snappy’, marked and charred to your preference.
Bahn Mi time. Cut each baguette in half horizontally (sandwich style); remove enough bread from each side to leave about 1/2 inch of a bread shell. Slather with the Sriracha Mayo, top with the jalapeno slices and a few cilantro sprigs, load in two sausages and pile high with the Bahn Mi slaw.
You’ll need several iced cold ones too.
Enjoy.
{ 12 comments }
After a day of running errands in town and catching up (or rather, attempting to…) on office work, I needed to get outside in the sun. We’re having a week of temperatures in the 70s, and despite a damnably stubborn cold that won’t go away, I decided it was just too nice not to be outside.
So last night, I loaded up the camera and fishing gear and set off to explore Sheep Creek Road, a good, old-fashioned, dirt and washboard, ranch country, by-God Montana road not too far from my little hut. Sheep Creek runs across wide-open ranch lands before bumping up between the Missouri River and neighboring hillsides.
I fished for a bit, enjoying the waning light and minimal winds of a spring evening, but then the ever-present itch to get behind the camera won out.
With good, warm evening light and quiet spaces to photograph, it was the perfect close to a busy day.
{ 3 comments }
Via the multitasking madman, friend of Chi Wulff and coffee impresario Sinjin E. and CO TU:
The “Protect Our Rivers” license plate is on its way to Governor Hickenlooper!
With strong bipartisan support, the Colorado General Assembly has passed Senate Bill 224 to create the Protect Our Rivers license plate. The bill passed the House this morning on a final vote of 44-21, having passed the Senate previously on a 26-9 vote.
Each purchase of the plate will generate $25 for Colorado TU and 100% of the funds generated will be dedicated to the protection of Colorado’s rivers.
Many thanks to our prime sponsors for pushing this through some strong anti-license plate sentiment: Senators Kerr and Baumgardner, and Representatives Hamner and Wright.
Many thanks to our staff for countless hours advocating, testifying and prideful begging: David Nickum, Stephanie Scott and Shannon Kindle. To Nick Hoover for his terrific design work. And to past CTU President Sinjin Eberle for stepping down in time to let me take the glory!
We still need Governor Hickenlooper’s signature on the bill, and then have some work to do with the Division of Motor Vehicles, but we’re told the plates should be available for purchase by January 1, 2014. This is a big win for Colorado TU, but an even bigger win for Colorado’s rivers!
If you know others who would be interested in the Protect Our Rivers license plate, encourage them to sign the petition of support – we will then keep them apprised of the license plate’s availability via email.
And thank you for your support of rivers, which made this victory possible!
- Rick Matsumoto, Colorado TU President
{ 0 comments }
After a couple weeks of warmer temps, flows are finally starting to come up here in Southwest Montana. Checked the Gallatin this morning and there has been a definite spike:
Most of the small waters in the area are blown out, and it won’t be too much longer before everything else is too. Time to hit the tailwaters and lakes… From the sounds of things, caddis are out in force on the Lower Madison. Most waters are still really pretty damn low, and from the sounds of things we can expect that this summer too. Enjoy the high water while you can, ha.
{ 0 comments }
Seems like May is always a good month for fishing. My two best days of the year came along in May last year, and my best one so far this year was too. Last Sunday Shane and I decided to take a little road trip and hit Between the Lakes on the Upper Madison. Bear hunting hasn’t really gotten good, flows are starting to come up, and we both felt the itch to get out of town.
Fueled by some very strong coffee from Nancy at Beartooth Fly Fishing (when she says “careful it’s the early brew and might be a little strong”, take heed) we got up there a little later than we figured. To our pleasure and surprise the crowds weren’t bad at all. Having not fished this stretch much at all and having heard many stories of the “combat fishing”, I imagined shoulder to shoulder crowds all day.
Due to the fact that we were going to be fishing some big water and that I am part of the team at Swing the Fly Magazine, I brought the switch rod along. I don’t know jack shit about spey casting, but I’ve always, always wanted to learn more. A day spent flailing around trying to form a decent D loop might give me some valuable practice…
When you hook into a big fish in the first 20 minutes of the day and end up chasing him downstream hooting and hollering as you watch your line rip off the reel is a good way to start the trip, even if the fish comes up and shakes your hook with a massive headshake. (Side note on that fish, I saw him roll and it was quite possibly the largest fish I’d ever seen in a river)
I got into three good fish right off the bat, followed by a bit of a lull. We walked downstream for a couple hundred yards, losing flies and rigging one after another as we went. I don’t think I’ve lost that many flies in a long time. Eventually, we ended up in a decent run, and we had it all to ourselves.
One of the things that really gets me about fishing is those days when you are trying every fly in the box and nothing seems to work until you stumble upon, by sheer dumb luck, the magic fly. There were four of them in the box, and by the end of the day they were all gone. For almost an hour and a half that fly was enticing a bite almost every five minutes. I honestly don’t remember how many fish I caught in that stretch, but I do remember the smallest of them was around 15 inches.
The fishing slowed down after that. Shane got a nice old warrior of a brown on a swung streamer, and I was sorely tempted to go grab the 5-weight in the car when a couple of sporadic risers showed up. I’m not quite sure I was doing it right, but as the day wore on my spey casting got a little better. It’s a pretty cool feeling when that long rod loads up and you can bomb out a big cast…
We fished upstream, downstream, new water, old water, both got sunburned as hell, shot almost 800 pictures, both caught some great fish, and had some good laughs. This was one for the books.
Photos by Shane Rickert and Jake McGlothlin
{ 4 comments }
Damn.
A mentor, Ed, is fond of saying that ‘even with the most diligent planning events NEVER move down the ideal path we’ve drawn for them in our minds eye’.
This past week’s announcement launch of Swing the Fly magazine has been a great demonstration of that simple truth.
We’ve frankly been stunned at the level of interest as evidenced in subscription sign ups and the attention Swing the Fly has drawn so far on Facebook and Twitter. By the way, subscribers who sign up before the July 1 launch by the way will be enrolled for gear and swag giveaways.
We’re deeply humbled at the interest and wish to issue all who have expressed interest thus far a hearty THANK YOU!
We’ve launched the Swing the Fly Blog here; we’ll be posting (not every day mind you) updates on projects we’re working on for the mag, reminders about regional claves, meet-ups, events where the greats will be demonstrating casting and other skills to we mere mortals. There might even be the occasional fishing report.
Submissions are humming; frankly Zack sent over a piece this weekend from a friend of his that may have been the most impressive piece of fly fishing prose I’ve ever read on a single page. More on submission guidelines and contacts here.
We’re standing by the submission hot line day and night (I guess nobody probably actually uses the ‘hot line’ phone any more…)
New teams members will be announced this week as well.
Finally, we’ve locked down a store portal and will have it up and running with the first iterations of Swing the Fly swag in a couple of weeks.
Thanks again.
{ 1 comment }
