That’s right a hot dog.  I don’t know if I should admit that I actually enjoy a good hot dog, but nonetheless there it is… I like a good hot dog.  There is no better time to eat a hot dog than at a baseball game.  The problem is finding out what is in the hot dog.  99 percent of the hot dogs out there probably shouldn’t be eaten, and I won’t be partaking, thank you very much! Read More→

So I just have to mention Lone Mountain Ranch again.  After our amazing sleigh ride dinner on Tuesday we headed back to LMR for a morning of cross-country skiiing.  Jordan, the girls and my mom went.  Dad, having trouble with his knees opted out of skiing but entertained himself walking around the ranch looking at the horses and just communing with all the beauty God has created.  This was our first endeavor into cross country and it will definitely not be our last!  What an incredible time we had out in the forest with snow falling.  Perfect quiet.  Peace.  It still gives me chills just thinking about it.  It’s moments like these that I feel closest to my heavenly Father.

After the morning of skiing we had worked up quite an appetite so we headed up to the LMR Lodge.  The owners of the lodge and the chef are committed to working with local farmers to bring in local produce and meat for the restaurant.  At the front of the restaurant they had a framed commitment to the community farmers around them, pledging to use locally grown and raised produce and meat.  I really appreciated the information and happily without guilt dug into, some great salads, white bean and vegetable soup and pulled pork with a blueberry chipotle barbeque sauce.  I have one word… YUM!

So one quick phone call later I was able to find out the prime rib dinner was from locally raised, free range (aka grass fed) Montana beef.  Yippie!  The rest of the meal consisted of sauteed mushrooms, steamed vegetables, roasted potatoes, and finished with homemade cheesecake with a blueberry sauce.  All this was prepared in a cabin in the woods south of Big Sky without any electricity on an antique iron stove recovered from the railroad.  If you’re ever in Big Sky and have the opportunity to visit Lone Mountain Ranch, you’ve just got to go!!

Well, one month down and no one’s complaining for lack of their favorites.  In fact, the girls and dear hubby are more spoiled than ever as I cook more and more.  I personally am loving the challenge of not relying on any convenience foods and my efforts of creating things like Ranch dressing, mac-n-cheese, and chocolate sauce are turning out well!

My greatest disappointment this month was ice cream.  My youngest daughter turned 7 so of course we needed ice cream.  After looking at nearly every brand including the organic ones in my local Ralph’s grocery store I was completely disappointed by the ingredients I found.  Even Breyer’s “All Natural Ice Cream” had a new suspicious ingredient…  Tara Gum.  What happened to the milk, cream, sugar, and natural flavors?  Just as I suspected, Breyer’s has added this new ingredient to help maintain the creaminess and texture of their ice cream.  Frankly, I don’t want the ground up endosperm of seeds of a South American tree in my ice cream.  The only ice cream I found still maintaining pure ingredients was Haagen-Dazs.  Of course it was twice the price of everything else.  Yes, I could have made ice cream, but in true mommy form I was shopping at the last possible moment!

Fun restaurants I have found/researched this month meeting the requirements of only eating real sustainable, humanely treated food…  Chipotle, Sharky’s Woodfired Mexican Grill, and Granville.  Each are doing their part to revolutionize the food industry.  By showing that making food from scratch with organic produce and meat only from humanely treated animals is possible.  A big Thank You to them.  I hope you have one of these in your neighborhood.  Send me a comment on your favorite sustainable restaurant!  Let’s get a list going, after all, us mommy’s shouldn’t have to cook every night!