by Ree Drummond
Panko breadcrumbs: top casseroles, coat fried mozzarella, mix into meatballs
Rice: long grain, brown, jasmine, Arborio
Vegetables
Potatoes, onions, and garlic: store them in a basket so air can circulate
FRIDGE
Bacon
Butter by the ton!
Cheese: long-lasting varieties like Cheddar, Parmesan, feta
Eggs
Heavy cream: for cooking, desserts, and coffee
Lemons, limes, apples, carrots, celery
Tortillas: flour and corn; if stored properly, they seem to last forever in the fridge
(NOTE: The fridge list contains only long-lasting staples. Fill in the more perishable items weekly or biweekly!)
FREEZER
Beef, wrapped in butcher paper
Bread: crusty artisan loaves, sandwich breads
Chicken: breasts, wings, legs, thighs
Frozen dinner rolls (unbaked): make them as rolls or use them for calzones or hand pies
Frozen fruits: pineapple, berries, mango. Great for smoothies, pies, crisps, cobblers
Frozen vegetables: peas, corn, butternut squash, broccoli, green beans
Nuts such as pecans, walnuts, almonds: keeps them from going rancid
Pie crust
Pizza dough
Raw shrimp
Sausage: breakfast sausage, Italian sausage, chorizo
Bull, Interrupted
On a cattle ranch, male calves (also called bull calves) are typically castrated when they’re very young. Once castrated, they become steers, which are the kind of animal typically sold on the beef market. (Female calves, also known as heifers, can also eventually be sold as beef—or they can be added to a cow herd for breeding purposes.) There are many reasons to castrate a bull calf: it halts the production of testosterone, thereby making the animal less aggressive; and it causes the animal to have less muscle mass, which results in higher-quality, more tender beef. Castrating is just a regular part of animal management in a cattle operation.
Calf nuts, at certain times of year, are everywhere on the ranch. I remember Ladd asking me to stop by my in-laws’ house early in our marriage to grab a couple of packages of home-grown ground beef from their freezer. They were out of town, so I let myself in the back door and casually swung open the freezer door. Along with packages of ground beef, there was shelf after shelf of plastic freezer bags, bulging with frightening-looking oval-shaped objects I couldn’t recognize at all. There were veins and membranes visible under the surface of the frozen ovals, and I immediately slammed the door and ran out of the house, telling Ladd when I got home that his parents didn’t have any ground beef. I lied, but I had to. Whatever was in my father-in-law’s freezer scared the life out of me. I later came to understand that they were calf nuts. And hundreds of them.
Many country people eat calf nuts—partly because it’s a shame to let them go to waste, but also because some consider them to be a delicacy. They are typically prepared like fried chicken—breaded and deep-fried—and entire “calf fry” dinners are held (usually after a bunch of calves have been processed) wherein batch after batch of calf nuts are cooked in an outdoor turkey fryer and enjoyed fresh as they come out of the oil. (Dipping sauces are optional for some, absolutely required for me.) My brother-in-law Tim is known for his delicious nuts (sorry, I’m five years old and am laughing so hard as I write this) . . . I mean, for the delicious manner in which he prepares fried calf nuts. His secret is cutting them into pretty small pieces—picture a bite-size chicken nugget—and generously seasoning the flour with salt, pepper, and lots of cayenne.
I suppose if I had to eat calf nuts every day for the rest of my life, I would choose Tim’s version . . . but I would be a pretty unhappy person, because I simply do not like them. And I guess I want to like them. After all, I’m considered one of the more adventurous eaters in the Drummond family! But there’s something about them that trips me up, and I believe it’s a mind-over-matter scenario. I’ll pop one in my mouth, chew a couple of times, and start to think whatever I’m eating is pretty tasty—but then the reality of what I’m eating kicks in, and within seconds I’m sorry I ate it. I’ve actually spit one or two out before, because my mind attacks me and forces me to. I won’t ever judge anyone for eating calf nuts (or Rocky Mountain oysters, as they’re euphemistically called in some restaurants), as I think it’s responsible to use as much of the animals as we can for food. But it’s way down at about #2,985 on the list of things I crave on any given day.
The food component aside, there’s a strange peripheral issue that comes up during the times on the ranch when calves are being castrated. Without giving too technical of a rundown, on our ranch we castrate the calves surgically, using a sharp pocketknife. (Other methods involve banding or clamping, but we prefer the fast way. It’s over much sooner for the little guys!) The whole castration process takes about eighteen seconds per calf, and the first step of it involves slicing around and removing the fuzzy, fatty skin that’s covering the testicles. It comes off looking very similar to a rabbit’s foot, only much softer and cuter—and by the end of a busy morning of working calves, we might have a pile of a hundred or more of them on the ground. (I won’t go into the actual castration process, but it’s a very simple tug/slice and then it’s over.)
The weirdness comes into play because these little furry coverings are incredibly soft, and incredibly interesting from a texture standpoint. Because of this, they attract the attention of any kids that are on-site, and throughout the course of the morning, it isn’t unusual to see the kids picking up the little sacs and holding them, fiddling with them, playing with them, and—here’s the kicker—putting them in their pockets, which means they inadvertently forget and leave them there, which means they invariably wind up in the washer and dryer.
In case this will help any parents out there who contribute to the laundry duties of the household: If you don’t already check your children’s jeans pockets before you throw them in the washing machine, please do so—especially if you live in the country, and especially if you live on a working cattle ranch. Because the odor that results from not only washing, but also drying, the fuzzy sac that covers a calf’s testicles is not something your laundry room—or your sinuses—will ever forget.
This has been a public service announcement.
The Lodge Tourists
A year or so after we opened our restaurant and store in Pawhuska, Ladd suggested it might be nice to start opening up the Lodge, our guesthouse on the ranch where we film my Food Network show, for free tours when it isn’t being used for filming. The Lodge largely sits empty when we aren’t shooting my show or having some kind of family event, and in his way of thinking, offering folks a chance to drive out and walk around (and take in the view, which is stunning from the Lodge) would only serve to expand their visit to Pawhuska and give them more bang for their buck. I thought it sounded like a promising idea but told Ladd I needed a couple of weeks to think over the pros and cons, to which he responded, “Okay, but let’s go ahead and start tours tomorrow.” When my husband gets a notion in his head, he sees no reason to think over anything. Fortunately, most of his ideas are good.
Lodge tours did, in fact, start the next day, and have been going strong for the past three years. We have a couple of employees there on Lodge tour days, and they answer questions about the area and invite people to browse freely, check out the various rooms, and (yes, I really don’t mind) peek inside the drawers. To our surprise, the Lodge has actually become an attraction all its own, with folks sometimes returning to Pawhuska just to take another drive to the ranch and bring a new family member with them. It’s always fun to walk through an actual place you’ve seen on TV, so I totally understand the fun of it. I would be over the moon, for example, to visit Coto de Caza, the gated community in The Real Housewives of Orange County. But maybe that’s just me.
Sometimes people hear that we open our home to visitors and have l
ots of questions for us. “How can you let strangers into your home?” they say, confused. “How does that even work?” But the truth is, while the Lodge is Ladd’s and my home, it’s a guesthouse on the ranch and isn’t where we live and lay our heads at night. And in fact, the road that leads to the Lodge is a good mile and a half past the road that leads to our house, so it’s really like two parallel worlds are existing: everyday life at my house, where teenage boy underwear litters the floor and cow manure litters the yard . . . and everyday life at the Lodge, where there’s no dirty laundry or cow manure anywhere, just a gorgeous view of open rangeland and a cool kitchen some people recognize from TV. So Lodge tours can go on happily without our intersecting with them too much, and it’s turned out to be a pretty great thing—good job, Ladd! Only three or four times has a Lodge tourist misread directions and wound up on our road instead, and they usually realize it and turn around before they arrive at our house.
A few months ago, at about four in the afternoon, I decided, quite uncharacteristically, to take a bath. I’d been on a long walk and was sweaty and gross, and Ladd and the boys were out of town working cattle in Kansas. It was the perfect time to have a rare Calgon moment, so I used all the bubble bath I could get my hands on and settled in, using my toes to occasionally turn the faucet and add more hot water to the mix. I had a good hour before the guys would be home, and life was good.
I was naked, submerged, and almost half asleep when I heard pounding on the front door. It startled me, as I obviously wasn’t expecting anyone, and I just stayed in the bathtub. There was no way I could hop out, manage not to slip and fall, and put on a robe in time to get to the front door and answer it . . . and even then, who knows who it would be? What if it was a serial killer? I mean, it’s possible.
The pounding happened again. My phone wasn’t even in my room, and worse, the full-size window next to my bathtub looks out onto the front porch . . . and is covered with extremely sheer curtains. (We don’t have neighbors, remember.) Any movement on my part would have been detected by whoever was pounding on the front door, and then, not only would they know I was home, they would also see me naked, which I hadn’t signed up for that afternoon. I truly had no choice but to lie there perfectly still, a prisoner in my own bathtub.
I heard the faint sounds of chatter among two or three women; I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but it did seem like they might be about to give up and head out. But then, to my surprise, our door alarm chimed, indicating that someone had opened it. “Hello?!?” a woman’s voice called out, echoing in the living room. “Hello?!? Is anyone here?!?” I heard more chatter among the unexpected visitors.
“Hello?!?” another woman’s voice called out, even more loudly. It overlapped with the first one. I was still frozen in the hot bathtub, having not a clue what to do. All I knew was that I was in no condition or mood to encounter humans that weren’t my husband or boys. And there were unfamiliar strangers in my house—not on my porch, but in my house. And I was naked. So very, very naked. More naked than I’d ever been! And did I mention my bedroom door was wide open?
There were more “Hello?!?” cries, and then I listened carefully to try to hear their conversation.
“I know this is the place,” one voice said.
“It has to be,” another said. “Look, there are her cookbooks.” I had a stack of cookbooks in my kitchen; I was going to sign them for some donations later that evening after my bath. The bath that I was still being held captive in, by the way.
Then I heard a third voice. “There’s literally nobody here,” she said. “Should we just take the tour anyway?”
They thought they were at the Lodge. And they wanted to take the free tour.
I heard the visitors walking around the kitchen and living room, which is all a big, open space, commenting on this or that. It’s funny; I didn’t hear them say anything about the complete travesty my house was, with the laundry basket on the living room couch, shoes absolutely everywhere, dirty dishes piled in the sink full of now-cold, barely soapy water, and random papers cluttering the dining table. They must have assumed we’d staged the Lodge to look like a regular family lived there or something—ha ha, what a clever thing to do!
Kitchen drawers were opening and closing—the Lodge tour directions they’d picked up at the Merc said that was permissible, after all—and my heart was beating a mile a minute. My body was starting to feel waterlogged, and the bathwater was getting cold. When I’d first heard the pounding at the door about ten minutes earlier, I was sure whoever it was would eventually give up and leave. I sure didn’t think they’d keep knocking, and I most definitely didn’t think they’d wind up in my house. And in my wildest dreams, I couldn’t have envisioned what happened next.
I heard footsteps getting closer, and one of the voices tried one more “Hello?!?”
Then one of her friends said, “Oh, there’s one of the bedrooms!” The instructions also said bedrooms were on the tour.
I could hear them approaching the threshold between the hallway and my room, and I knew I had to do something drastic. There was no way I could leap up and grab a towel in time to cover myself up and graciously tell them they were in the wrong house—oh, and introduce myself. Hi, ladies! Nice to meet you. So glad you enjoy my cooking show on Food Network! I’m sorry, but the Lodge is up . . . that way.
So I panicked, pulled my chin to my chest, and belted, “You’ve got the wrong house!!!” in the deepest, most frightening man voice my body has ever produced.
All three ladies shrieked and exclaimed, “Oh my God!!! We’re so sorry, sir!!!” Their shoes clomped quickly on the floor as they exited the front door and ran out the way they came. I was still lying motionless in the bathtub when they ran past the window behind me to return to their car. I felt terrible that I hadn’t been more hospitable. I’d panicked! And again . . . I was naked.
Once I heard their vehicle peel out of our driveway, I finally felt it was safe to get out and dry off. My heart was calming down a little bit over the whole scenario—not that I was scared of the kind visitors, just that it was a very strange, awkward situation. I hope they’re reading this today, and I hope they will accept my apology for not just coming out and facing them (in my robe, don’t worry!).
On a side note, I’m kind of impressed that my male voice was so darn convincing. They called me “sir,” after all! I’m waiting for just the right moment to use it on Ladd and the boys. Maybe the next time we say grace at dinner . . .
Dogs, Dogs, Dogs
The ranch where we live actually belongs to the dogs. We humans are just guests here. The very first dog Ladd and I ever had was a Basset hound named Rufus. I’d innocently stopped by Bad Brad’s Barbecue to pick up some brisket for dinner one evening, and there was someone sitting in the parking lot, giving away Basset hound puppies. It was all over for me, of course. Rufus was very lazy and grumpy, and my brother-in-law Tim took him for rides on his light turquoise Harley. I’d had a Basset hound when I was a little girl, and Rufus awakened all the low-energy, stinky love that I remembered from the old days—and set the stage for Charlie, the most beloved dog of my entire life, who would come many years later.
Suzie was a Jack Russell terrier—the other end of the motivation spectrum—and we got her when my girls were babies. She was the sweetest, most intuitive dog I’d ever seen, and she hated all men. She’d go from cuddling under my neck to snarling her teeth if my boys (or, again, Tim) walked into the room. She was hopelessly devoted to me and my girls . . . until my father-in-law, Chuck, convinced her to go for a ride with him on his horse one day at our farm. After that she was his dog for the rest of her life, hardly able to leave his side. Suzie was the only dog Chuck had ever felt a connection with, and he was the only man she ever loved—a beautiful thing to behold.
We had a chocolate Lab on the ranch named Bob. He was not right in the head and always needed to be carrying in his mouth either (a) an empty Dr Pepper can or (b) a large log. Strange
ly, he would never touch a Sprite can or Coke can—it always had to be Dr Pepper. And he was always dragging off our firewood; one time Ladd found one of our logs three miles down the road. Bob thought horses were dogs, and he thought cats were rabbits. He snorted but never barked. Maybe he thought he was a pig. Species confusion was an issue with Bob. He was the least intelligent dog I’ve ever known, but it was part of his charm.
Nell, our Border collie, was obsessed with soccer balls to the extent that she destroyed them. She didn’t mean to destroy them—again, she loved them. But she would lie on them and chase them and hug them and kiss them and call them George, to paraphrase the abominable snow bunny—and she’d carry them in her mouth, which almost always resulted in a puncture. Have you ever loved something so much that you hurt it? That was Nell and soccer balls. I’m kind of glad they were in Nell’s life, to be honest. No telling what kind of chaos would have gone on if they hadn’t been.
I want to talk for a minute about stray dogs, which were plentiful given that we lived in the country. There was Buster, a beagle mix who beat up two of my dogs the day he showed up at the ranch, but then decided to stay for a year after that. He was a sweet dog at heart and made amends with the dogs he’d wronged on our homestead, but then one day he was just gone—he’d clearly decided to move along to his next stop. And that’s something I’ve learned about many stray dogs! They’re either so grateful they finally found a home and they stay forever, or they really just think of you as an extended-stay hotel and eventually check out. Buster checked out, but that’s the life he chose. Everyone has their own journey.
Birdie, a heavily pregnant stray bird dog, showed up at our little house the year after we were married. I was heavily pregnant, too, so we nested together, Birdie and I. I turned our yellow brick garage into a birthing center, complete with hay bales, blankets, and all the food and water she’d need to have a comfortable multiple-puppy birth. I even planned to be her midwife and birthing partner . . . but right before she had the puppies, she left, and I never saw her again. Another vagabond dog for my memory book. I hope she told her children about me.
