# Dick Proenneke's stew recipe??



## wyld thang (Nov 16, 2005)

Thought I'd ask here since a few of you have mentioned having the book--I caught the last 20 minutes last night, and he made a stew and I laughed cuz he threw in handfuls of stuff like I do, does he say in the book what went into that stew?

all he needed was a wyld thang to rock his world  I'd say he was pretty satisfied with his primitive tech


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## unregistered29228 (Jan 9, 2008)

I don't think he wrote the actual recipe for his stew but he often talked about the ingredients he used in each pot. He was heavy on the spices (just the way we like it) and would eat just about any kind of meat including porcupines - who annoyed him all the time by chewing on his cabin. He often mentioned potatoes and carrots, rice and beans, onions and hot sauce in with the meat.

WIHH, I have often thought that he must have left a family behind or been divorced, but his biography says he never married. So it must have been a broken heart that drove him to the mountains. He had a couple of women who worked at a Catholic school (don't remember if they were nuns) who would fly out to see him sometimes, or he'd go visit them.


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## wyld thang (Nov 16, 2005)

I'd love to have the dvd, I've never been able to catch the whole show, just bits, and never the beginning (poo). 

I think I saw him throw in chili powder, worchester, tobasco AND hot sauce  salt, lotsa black pepper, just curious. Actually I'd love to see a list of food stuff he had to work with.

Like I said, he needed him some wyld thang, not "just" a woman  

I sure admire him! Hope he got a sense of how much people appreciate what he did and how he left a record of it. And I'm sure there are many many many more unsung folks out there doing it too.


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## November (Dec 8, 2008)

I had to dig, but I found my copy of the book. There are _*many*_ entries about what he was fixing for a meal at any given time. I don't suggest reading it if you're hungry, 'cuz you will be. Always writing about fresh meat, fish and stews...sourdough pancakes and syrup topped with bacon...sopping it all up with fresh biscuits. I also have the DVD and it really is something the way he lived. The preface says he caught rheumatic fever during WWII which, once recovered, drove him to test his body to it's physical limits. Says he despised how weak the fever made him and wanted to prove to himself that he was better than that. I get wanting to spent a weekend alone in a remote cabin in Alaska for some solitude (I'm married with kids), but a lifetime? If that was his dream then he was a lucky man. In any case he was a model of self-sufficiency and ability.


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## AngieM2 (May 10, 2002)

Welcome to HT and the forum here, November. 

Thanks for jumping in with applicable information.

Angie


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## November (Dec 8, 2008)

AngieM2 said:


> Welcome to HT and the forum here, November.
> 
> Thanks for jumping in with applicable information.
> 
> Angie


Thanks for the welcome. I've been enjoying the site for a few months and thought I'd chime in.


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## lonelytree (Feb 28, 2008)

November said:


> I had to dig, but I found my copy of the book. There are _*many*_ entries about what he was fixing for a meal at any given time. I don't suggest reading it if you're hungry, 'cuz you will be. Always writing about fresh meat, fish and stews...sourdough pancakes and syrup topped with bacon...sopping it all up with fresh biscuits. I also have the DVD and it really is something the way he lived. The preface says he caught rheumatic fever during WWII which, once recovered, drove him to test his body to it's physical limits. Says he despised how weak the fever made him and wanted to prove to himself that he was better than that. I* get wanting to spent a weekend alone in a remote cabin in Alaska for some solitude *(I'm married with kids), but a lifetime? If that was his dream then he was a lucky man. In any case he was a model of self-sufficiency and ability.


And I am building it as time allows. Stick frame not log though. Not enough time for logs and they would have to be freighted in.


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## elkhound (May 30, 2006)

Dick didnt got to the wilderness until he was 50 years old.not sure what happened to him int he feamle department.but in the book he talks about a accident as a mecahnic that almost took his eye sight.he said that was when he decided life was short and he didnt need to work so much when it was jsut him.


wyld thang there is no doubt you would have put him on the 'side line'....lol...you sexy thing.....i can see you now in crocheted bikini....your husband is a lucky man.


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## wyld thang (Nov 16, 2005)

o elkhound you cad  seriously, I love it here in Oregon, but if hub was to say let's go to Alaska I would so be packed in 5 minutes and in the truck. 

Here's some Alaskan "underwear modeling" fer ya :nana:









PS, Angie, I have a good list of Alaskan homesteader memoir books, trying to find it...in order to justify this thread.

I could live in huckleberries and salmon, when I grew up in Seattle most(at least the suburb I grew up in) filled their freezer with salmon, made a special trip to pick huckleberries and many folks had a deer hanging in their carport in the fall. 

okay, back to bed I'm getting delirious again with this cold.


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## toni48 (Mar 25, 2008)

What DVD are you all talking about. This sounds so interesting.


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## unregistered29228 (Jan 9, 2008)

There was a PBS show made into a video, which is a collection of Proenneke's home movies. How he built his cabin, the mountains, the squirrels he fed, the lake and other things. He was never happy with that video, or the first book of his journals. He felt they were changed so much it wasn't even his story anymore. So the last book of his journals were left unchanged, spelling errors and all. I loved every word of it! You really get a good sense of the man and his life. Can you tell I'm a huge fan?

Movie:

http://www.amazon.com/Alone-in-the-...ef=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1237066266&sr=8-6

Books:
http://www.amazon.com/One-Mans-Wild...bs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1237066266&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.com/More-Readings...bs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1237066266&sr=8-2


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## wyld thang (Nov 16, 2005)

what didn't he like about the video?

I hope I can score the dvd and load it onto my ipod. The other night when it was on and I caught the last half hour of it, it was at night, having a hard time falling asleep cuz of a sore throat and fevery feeling n stuff (oh wah, wah, wah!!!) and just watching all that lovely snow and listening to the guy's words(which I guess is not his voice or maybe not his exact words either, but whatever..) was very good medicine, very peaceful bedtime story, I know I would have loved it as a kid. I know I was always building huts in the forest as a kid, so if you have a kid that does that this dvd would be wonderful.

My grandpa was a lot like that, he was always making stuff. I really miss my grandpa, never really got to know him when I was an adult (kwim?), I mean, I loved him as a kid, but I understand him so much more as an adult, now knowing all his demons and skeletons (heh , aint life interesting?!). Anyways, I got a knife he made, and I think I'll be getting some chokers and dozer chains of his too. And there's supposed to be some 1800's rifle from his father that was, uh, used to kill 3 men my uncle wants to pass on down to me.

Anyways, just sayin how the whole Dick Proennekke thing relates to me


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## Jim-mi (May 15, 2002)

Just finished watching the program . .again . .second time.
It was broken up into segments so that they could do their "fund raser" (PBS)
Had to chuckle as he made his "stew"
Three dashes of this 4 dashes of that.........
Any left overs would not need to go in the 'fridge' . . to many spices.

Thirty years up there . . WOW


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## AngieM2 (May 10, 2002)

"PS, Angie, I have a good list of Alaskan homesteader memoir books, trying to find it...in order to justify this thread."

I think it's very much survivial - isn't that what that fellow did in Alaska? Sounds like something we could all learn something or a lot of somethings from, even if only a mindset.


Angie

PS: Why are you out in the cold in just the longjohns?


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## wyld thang (Nov 16, 2005)

ha, that picture was my 2007 Merry Christmas picture. Actually I was very warm in my longjohns, it was only like 30 degrees that day . Actually those things are too hot to wear usually--I only wear them when I'm camping--sleeping in my bag when it's like 15 degrees.

Those longjohns are so TOTALLY worth the money--they are Duofold, cotton on the inside, wool on the outside. My hub is from California tho, he gets cold like at 40', so he wears them under his clothes and it keeps him warm.

I think I got them at Cabela's like 10+ years ago. I'm sure Dick P had a pair or two!

PS, I bought them a little big(they are man-sized) so that I could wear stuff underneath, I just wear them pajama style or around the house. Also the sleeve and leg cuffs are extra long so I can use them like mittens/socks.

Probably more than y'all wanted to know about longjohns!


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