This post is sponsored by the University of Minnesota Press.
Incomplete information, thematic differences, plain old lack of space: These are just a few of the reasons good stories don’t make the pages of the books that unearthed them. Here are a few of our favorite outtakes from Lake Superior Flavors: A Field Guide to Food and Drink Along the Circle Tour, which launched this week.
Join authors Becca Dilley and James Norton at Kitchen Window tomorrow night for a special “Behind the Pages” presentation and food sampling. And the authors will also appear Monday, April 21 at 7pm at Common Good Books in St. Paul.
The Copper Harbor Can-Can
NORTON: “The Harbor Haus in Copper Harbor, at the tip of the Keweenaw, has an absurd but charming ritual: Whenever a ferry from Isle Royale cruises past the restaurant, the servers all drop what they’re doing and run outside to wave and dance a can-can for the passengers. It slows down service a bit, but it’s worth it for the sheer silly spectacle of the thing.”
Teatime on St. Joseph Island
DILLEY: “We enjoyed this quiet traditional high tea on an island outside of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. The setting was beautiful, the food was tasty, the experience was cozy and comfortable. “
Superior’s Icy Cold Hand of Watery Death
NORTON: “Our dawn trip out past Knife Island with herring fisherman Steve Dahl was, hands down, one of the most beautiful experiences of my life — the interplay between birds and sky, fish and net, and boat and waves was constantly engaging. It was also, for a weak swimmer like myself, totally terrifying. Dahl’s skiff sat low enough in the water that it felt as though there were just a couple old centimeters of wood between myself and certain death in Lake Superior’s icy grip. But, yeah. Very beautiful, too. Above, you can see me trying on one of the numerous shades of green I modeled that morning.”
Canadian Kit Kats
NORTON: “It’s a little-known fact that Canadian Kit Kats, made as they are for a population with better taste in chocolate than the American public (read: anywhere else in the world), are notably more delicious than our version of the candy bar. Imagine a Kit Kat — not a bad candy bar, even as it is — covered in inexpensive but real milk chocolate instead of that brown wax American companies use. It makes a world of difference.”
The Inukshuks of Lake Superior
NORTON: “All along the Trans-Canada highway, particularly as we came down the eastern shore of the lake toward Sault Ste. Marie, we saw these stone symbols called inukshuks flanking the highway. They hail from Inuit culture and are used as points of reference for navigation or worship, to assist in the herding of caribou, among other duties. They don’t really look like much until you start to notice them, and then they really catch your eye as you make your way south along the highway.”
Canadian Thanksgiving in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario
DILLEY: “We inadvertently scheduled our first circle tour during the observance of Canadian Thanksgiving, which is more than a full month earlier than American Thanksgiving. We were trying to figure out the authentic Canadian Thanksgiving experience and ended up, by way of a hotel dinner, discovering that it was very much like an American Thanksgiving, but with rutabagas.”
Michael Setala of Kivela Bakery in Thunder Bay
DILLEY: “Michael Setala started at the Kivela Bakery in 1959 as a driver and he’s still there, now an owner. I was taken by the character in Setala’s face, which perfectly matches the weathered feel of this Finnish bakery — steeped in history, still holding on.”
Pannekoeken at an Upper Peninsula B&B
DILLEY: “One morning, we awoke at a B&B in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to this delicious pannekoeken. It was accompanied by house-made jam and increasingly frantic piano music (mostly show tunes) played by the B&B’s owner. It definitely ranked as one of the odder breakfasts of the tour.”
Standing in the Lake
NORTON: “Occupied as we were with documenting everyone we talked to, every place we visited, and everything we ate, we didn’t have a lot of opportunity to pose for our own photos on these trips. But this rock just off the Keweenaw Peninsula called to us for some reason. Here’s Becca, enjoying herself off shore.”
Coffee at the Hoito
DILLEY: “We visited the Hoito several times — it is a central part of the Finnish district of Thunder Bay and crowded at breakfast times. I just really liked this quiet still life while interviewing some of the older residents of the neighborhood. ”
This Is Indian Land
NORTON: “This inscription on a bridge near St. Joseph Island, Ontario, struck me in the gut as we drove past it. A sentiment like this — raw, honest, and starkly direct — is legitimately provocative. It’s one of the images from this trip that I remember most clearly.”
A Drive Up the Keweenaw
DILLEY: “My goal with the images for Lake Superior Flavors was not to fully document the nature that we saw but instead to show the stories of the food people were creating. However, this part of the Keweenaw Peninsula, which we visited when the sun was just behind the trees, was one of the most magical parts of our trip.”
