Snow covers our hills and meadows this morning as we muddle through another frigid January day.

The tall hemlock has its branches gracefully draped in a coating of white, and it’s not hard to find beauty in this ice-coated day.  Several pairs of cardinals flaunt their red coats against the snow as they throng the feeder amid the smaller birds competing for the birdseed.

There is very little traffic on our secondary road, and things seem to have come to a standstill.  It’s a silent world; coated in snow and ice.  School has been canceled, and the children are home, but it’s too cold for sledding and snowball fights.  Days like this used to perfect for an extended game of Monopoly, but the children now seem to spend their time with their tablets and electronic games.

It is a perfect time to cook and bake, and try new recipes.  I have to confess however, that some things that I try turn out less than perfect.  Sometimes when I put an unfamiliar dish on the table, Criss will look at it suspiciously and ask, “Is this one of your experiments?”  He is more of a “meat and potatoes” fan, and strange casseroles leave him less than enthusiastic.

I think back to the meals of my childhood, and I remember with longing the big, homemade table, covered with a bright, red-checked oilcloth, and more kids than we had table.  We also had a homemade bench behind the table—also made by Grandpa.  It was a rare meal when one of the kids didn’t fall off the end of the bench, sometimes with the help of a well-placed elbow.  Often it happened when Daddy was asking the blessing. He used to say that he had to say grace with one eye open—which was not much of an exaggeration. With seven children, plus Grandpa and Cousin Leo, we made quite a table full.

The babies learned early to run to Daddy to be fed, and they also learned not to put their hands in his plate. Daddy had so much patience with the little ones.  Even the grandbabies learned early that it was Daddy who loved to feed them, but by the time the great-grandchildren came, we were feeding Daddy.

Mom brought our food to the table in huge bowls (Criss’ family always called them “lifting dishes”) and enormous platters were heaped with fried potatoes and cured ham.  We had a gallon pitcher that held milk from our own cow, and there was always a bowl of rich, yellow butter.  Mom had the biggest bread pan that I have ever seen.  It was so big that it would barely fit in the oven, and she would bake it full of biscuits, plus a smaller pan.  I can still hear Grandpa say, “Fetch up some more bread!”

I can still see all of us crowded around that table, with the row of little blonde heads on the bench behind it.  The old table is gone now, the bench with its row of grubby young’ens is gone, and most of the folks who sat around that table are also gone.  All that is left are the memories, which grow brighter as the years flow on.  Our own table that was once crowded with eight chairs has dwindled away to the present two—and time marches on.

Isn’t it wonderful that the seed catalogs arrive this time of year?  Right in the dead of winter, when warm weather seems only a dream, these brightly colored catalogs of impossibly perfect fruits, vegetables and flowers bring hope and cheer.  Many an hour can be passed by planning and dreaming about the best garden yet to come.

It is hard to imagine that right now, deep under this ice and snow, buried in the rich humus of the forest, lie the tightly curled fronds of the maidenhair ferns.  Nearby, the pale anemone sleeps a dreamless sleep.  They are awaiting the warming kiss of the springtime sun to bring them back to life once more.  And so, the life cycle begins all over again.

Spring isn’t here yet, but winter is, so we will have to bear it with as much grace as we can muster.  There is no way we can change it anyway.  When it is 95 degrees in the shade this summer, and our back is breaking from hoeing that last row of corn, we will look back with longing on these lovely winter days.

In a recent article, we printed a recipe for parching sweet corn.  This person’s memories were like mine—we used field corn also.  Merrill Jividen of Red House writes, “When I was a youngster growing up on the farm, (I am 80 years old now) we would go to the corn crib and get an ear of field corn, bring it back to the house and shell it.  Then we would parch it in an iron skillet.  I did not know you could use sweet corn.”

I found a recipe that the late Jo Raines used in her column years ago that I want to try when one of our hunters brings in a rabbit.  You can use either tame or wild rabbit in this recipe.

RABBIT SKILLET DISH

1 large rabbit, cut in pieces

1 quart tomato juice

1 quart water

½ teaspoon black pepper

½ teaspoon sage

1 bay leaf

¼ cup brown sugar

Butter

1 large onion minced

¼ cup chopped celery

¼ cup chopped carrot

¼ teaspoon basil

Flour

Cornmeal

In large bowl, combine rabbit, tomato juice, water, pepper, sage, bay leaf and brown sugar. Cover and refrigerate overnight.  Heat butter (enough to be quite liquid) in iron skillet.  Add vegetables and basil.  Simmer until vegetables are tender, and set aside.  Roll rabbit in combined flour and cornmeal; brown quickly in hot skillet.  Add enough strained marinade to cover rabbit.  Put vegetables back in and cover.  Cook until rabbit is tender.  At this point, this could be transferred to slow cooker and cooked on low for 4-5 hours.

Night gathers about us once more, and we are expecting another blue-cold day.  As the thermometer keeps dropping, I pray God will watch over all of us, and keep us warm and safe.  Spring will come.