At The Table

It has been great driving around northern Indiana seeing all the sights, including Amish buggies, lakes,  small towns full of unique shops but we also took time to eat.  Let me tell you the people in this part of the country do know how to cook and bake and fry and roast and smoke - well you get the picture.  Everywhere you go there are places to purchase hand-made cheeses, candies, canned and pickled vegetables and some of the best baked goods you have every put in you mouth.

There is a place called Rise & Roll Bakery just outside of Middlebury, Indiana where you walk in the door and want at least one of everything they have on display.  You can gain 5 lbs. just breathing the air inside.  Just down the road from them is the Guggisberg Deutsch Kase Haus Cheese Factory with over 20 kinds of hand-made cheeses that are all out of this world.  Believe me you will not go hungry around here.



In addition to what you can buy to take home there is a restaurant on every corner with home-made meals served family style.  Every meal is topped off with a large selection of pies, each better than the one you tried the last time.  Thank goodness there are also many bike and walking paths to counter-balance some of that great eating.  I just have to remember to do more of the walking and less of the eating.

Part of the walking has been through the woods to find the every allusive morel mushrooms, more commonly know as yellow sponge.  I am glad for friends and family who have shared some of their findings as I have logged over 12 hours in the woods and have found a whooping 7 mushrooms.  At least I can't be accused of hogging more than my share.

Farming Unplugged

If you have ever farmed or lived in a farming area you will appreciate all the work that goes in to doing everything with horses.  I could not believe how easily the Amish can handle a six or eight horse hitch and how much ground they can cover in one day.  It was fun to watch one field being plowed by a tractor with eight huge tires and a 24 row disk and across the road a 4 row disk pulled by eight horses.

I think the reduction in overhead is what makes them do what I showed them doing in a past blog - making a trip to Wells Fargo Bank.  It's good to have the men in the field as it gives the women time to do all the great cooking we have been sampling.


Until next time - Unplug and travel safe
Jim (unplugged)