Training Day - Part #1: The Big American Breakfast

Our first day on the job at the B&B began the very day after our arrival. It was a training day. Laura, Greg's wife and partner in the B&B, still hadn't returned from working with their boat in the Caribbean but Karen, the intermittent Innkeeper, was there to show us the ropes.

BREAKFAST:

Breakfast prep started at 7am. That wasn't too bad, I had been expecting worse. We did set our alarms for 6am just to make sure we were on time - though it's not like we had to factor in commute time!

The Inn styles itself as a Luxury B&B and in keeping with that they serve a full gourmet breakfast. For them, that usually means four areas need to be covered: there must be an egg, there must be a meat, there must be a bread and there must be a potato. Phew! But before all that, first they serve a fruit plate which we plate up and have ready on the table as a kind of place marker. I really like this idea, and the fruit plates look very smart and delicious.

Immediately I felt a little out of my league. I would have to learn and perfect the Great American Breakfast. For starters, potatoes for breakfast are a VERY new concept for me. I couldn't imagine eating potatoes for breakfast. Then again, Americans would NEVER imagine eating baked beans for breakfast as us Aussie's do. Also for me, breakfast is about grains - and nowhere on that list do they mention a grain. There were also no particularly healthy options, except the fruit plate. But on my outings to Cracker Barrel, a old-style southern eatery, it all seemed pretty customary.


I don't know about how other people in Australia go about their breakfast but in our family, big breakfasts like this were only made on the weekends. What do Australians usually eat? As far as I know, cereal (including the traditional Weetbix) and toast (yes, with vegemite!) generally. The big Australian breakfast consists of eggs and bacon (for Americans, that's more like a Canadian bacon with more meat than fat) or grilled sausages, as well as grilled mushrooms and tomatoes and, of course, baked beans. In Australia it is becoming more common to go out for breakfast, though in America with the multitude of breakfast institutions, such as IHOP, Denny's and the aforementioned Cracker Barrel it's habitual. But it's not just for eating out, the Big American Breakfast, it seems this is pretty much the norm EVERY DAY in most households. I know Chase's dad cooks scrambled eggs and sausages and sometimes even biscuits (scones) for breakfast every day. I'm amazed.


So anyway, while Chase and Greg were organising the fruit plates, Karen and I got started on the potatoes and the eggs. Today we were scrambling the eggs, and "hashing" the potatoes - not quite the patties you see at McDonalds, but instead we diced the potatoes irregularly, skin on after pre-cooking them in the microwave, and added some diced onion before frying it all up in a pan. They'll most likely become mushy but that's part of the "hash". As you may have guessed, Hash is a very vague concept, it's whatever you prefer really. It's traditionally a "leftovers" dish, not unlike Australia's Bubble and Squeak, Sweden's Pytti Panna or, as I understand, Austria's Bauernfrühstück. It seems every country has one. Quite delicious of course - but not for breakfast! Especially accompanied by tomato sauce.

Back in the kitchen, the sausages were taking care of themselves in the pan. Here's another variant in American breakfast: sweet sausages, and in this case, maple flavoured sausages. Americans love their "salty sweet" combination of flavours. Me, I'm not into it at all; I don't mix my sweet and savoury. I have read that that this combination is an important component to cooking; that's what makes Asian cooking so phenomenal, but it's subtle.

I think we did English muffins that day. Ok, I forget as I'm writing this behind schedule (what's new?) but who really cares? Any bread is pretty fine by me, I love it! Especially when it's pre-buttered and toasted in the grill (American's say "broil", I don't like it, that word makes me think of poaching and sounds gross!)! Real bread in America is lacking, like Australia, but the variants on bread, like English muffins, biscuits, cinnamon rolls and bagels, make up for it.

Coffee: Americans love it - but by "coffee", I mean purely filtered coffee. It's probably a better way than the way we do our instant dried coffee in Australia, but unless it's made strong, for me it's not very good. The B&B's coffee is not too bad, and first thing in the morning, it's even better! A key morning objective for us is to keep that coffee jug filled and keep the coffee flowing! That term "bottomless cup" is not just a catchy tagline.

Guests are offered breakfast between 8-8:30am. A pretty short window really but with so many guest rooms it's kind of imperative otherwise you'd be rushed off your feet for hours. As it is, we didn't get finished with breakfast until 9:30 (well, we did stop to eat; a great perk of the job - eating the leftovers! And by then, don't you know I was ravished! Those maple sausages didn't even taste that bad!).

The breakfast room is in the vestibule before you come in the main door. I really like this area for breakfast with all the morning light and the view of the mountains coming through all the big windows. This part of the house is quite new, it was only completed about a year ago. Before that it was just a small portico. Of course, in winter it's a little harder to keep warm but so far it's manageable with a few space heaters.

While I was comparing breakfasts I found a great page on breakfast around the world, with matching photos. If, you're interested, click on this link below (I'm liking the look of the Morrocan breakfast...):

50 of the World's Best Breakfasts

Dreaming of a White Christmas

Ok, this is belated, but I have had it drafted since Christmas, and even though I'm not up to date yet I thought I'd better throw it in before the year gets away on me!

I was anxious for a white Christmas being in the mountains and all this year, but unfortunately the weather had other ideas. And it's had other ideas starting about 2 weeks after we arrived here. Yep, Winter Park is still not producing the goods.

There is snow on the ground - so it technically could be considered a white Christmas - but we are still awaiting the season's deluge of white stuff. It's all anyone's talking about up here. I've heard about how we should be swimming in it by now, how you shouldn't be able to see anything but white, white, and more white. Last year they had an incredible season of snow. Of course, the season I arrive here it goes all out of wack; not only is there no snow, it's unusually windy! It's not good for the B&B and it's not good for the town, which relies on the snow to bring in business.

But Chase and I got ourselves the best Christmas present we could ask for - 3 full days with no guests so we were very happy. The last two weeks had been crazily busy and since the owner's were away we hadn't had any time off.

We had a lovely quiet Christmas day and that night we had one of our similarly orphaned friends, Dan, over for dinner. He's a great guy who Chase met when he used to live here years ago. They worked on trail crew together. They both left Winter Park about the same time and its just coincidence that they're both back here again this time. Dan works at the Ski Resort for NSCD (National Sports Centre for the Disabled) and is a really big out-doors enthusiast, he's even hiked the John Muir Trail, a massive 211 mile (340km) trail in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California!

Derrick & Patricia middle, back; Dan and Amy right, front

Check out this Colorado
craft beer - almost makes me
wish I drank beer!

The next night some more friends came for a belated Christmas dinner. Patricia and Derrick Taff are originally from Alabama (Derrick is also from Chase's town, though they became friends when they worked on trail crew together as well, so Dan, Derrick and Chase all know each other). I first met them when Chase and I lived in Atlanta in 2006, they came to visit us and we all got along very well. We also visited them where they lived in Tuscaloosa, Alabama after our road trip in America in 2008. At that time they were having their going away party because they were moving to Colorado. Now they live in Fort Collins (an apparently really cool university town an hour north of Denver) and both work for the university (Derrick is getting his Doctorate in outdoor recreation too - nice). We'll definitely be visiting them in Fort Collins sometime this year and I can't wait to see this cool town. Along with Derrick and Patricia, Dan came again for a second helping and brought his sister Amy who had just arrived for a visit. So it was a very merry gathering, with the boys reliving their old Winter Park days (I'm glad I wasn't there then!). 

Chase made the delicious ham and roast vegetables again that he made at Thanksgiving plus a home-made mac and cheese. I made a mega salad and cauliflower with cheese sauce, Derrick and Patricia brought dessert - home-made pecan pie and both sets of friends brought tonnes of wine and beer.

Our great Xmas gift from
Derreck & Patricia

Of course, we were all stuffed afterwards.

It's been pretty fun being in Winter Park for the Christmas season even though it hasn't been snowing much. I enjoyed seeing people driving home with real Christmas trees on their roofs (aka. The Griswolds!), and the carols playing actually mean something here. We were walking home from the coffee shop one day and we went via the park (Hideaway Park), there was carols playing over a loud speaker and there's a nice big gentle slope where a bunch of parents were at watching their kids sled down. With the background music, the snow covered park, and the children sledding, I really felt like I was in a Christmas movie!

 

There was the annual lighting of the Christmas tree a few weeks back and on Christmas Eve they had the annual Christmas Eve Torchlight Parade at Winter Park Resort. We were wusses and didn't go to either - it's too cold! The torchlight parade would've been fun to see but Chase and I were looking forward to our first night in a while in a quiet, people-free B&B. The Winter Park Resort employees (including Dan) ski down with lights in the form of a Christmas tree, then Santa Claus ski's down.

From the Winter Park Resort Website:

The event begins with Christmas carols around the bonfire at the base of the Resort then a procession of torch-bearing skiers and riders (employees of the resort) begin their way down Lower Hughes trail, followed by Santa Claus and his merry helpers. A spectacular fireworks display and snowcats adorned with Christmas colors light up the slopes in a Christmas tree formation to conclude the festivities. Immediately following the show at 6pm, visitors are welcome to attend Christmas Eve interdenominational services and Catholic Church services.

I've included a video from you tube but don't you think the long-exposure photo is most impressive?

[ It's long but if you pause and let it all load you can skip ahead to get the effect]