Page 5 - summer 2017 flip

Friends oF red rock canyon 5
Sharon’s Slant

By Sharon Schaaf

Conserving America’s National Parks
Cowboy Cookbook

o help celebrate 100 years of progress In order for a recipe to make it into Sha-
T in national park conservation, Univer- ron’s kitchen, none of the ingredients can be
sity of Nevada at Las Vegas, School of Life exotic…as in “this is the only recipe it will
Sciences faculty member Scott Abella wrote EVER be used for”…and the list of ingredi-
“Conserving America’s National Parks.” ents and instructions has to fit on a 3” x 5”
card. Bruce and Bobbi Fischer’s “Cowboy
His book begins by honoring the legacy Cookbook: Great Recipes from Cowboy
of our national Country” perfectly fits my criteria. Honor-
parks that now ing the hard work done by the chuck wagon
host 208 million cook, the recipes have been adapted to mod-
visitors annu- ern cooking methods and tastes.
ally. Scott points
out that although The cookbook is well-organized into sec-
our 408 national tions that include breakfasts, main dishes,
parks cover side dishes, desserts, breads, salads and
only 3.3% of more. Anecdotes about cowboy life and how
the area of the Cookie served up his delicacies are scattered
United States, throughout.
they are home
to “the smallest, So far,
largest, tall- Tumbling
est, lowest and T’s Stew,
oldest things in Sloppy Joes
the United States and sometimes the world.” and Lazy P
The remaining chapters cover the conserva- Chicken have
tion challenges presented by fire, predatory made it into
animals and non-native species, as well as my kitchen.
highlighting the work being done in the parks That leaves
to conserve fresh water and clean air and deal 129 recipes
with the effects of climate change. to try.

Of special interest to us in Southern Nevada Both books
is the invasion of red brome. This non-native are available
grass provides fuel for fires as well as altering in the Ele-
the availability of plants that desert tortoises ments Gift &
like to eat. The book is filled with photos, Book Store
graphs, charts, maps and sketches and covers in the Visitor
all fifty states and five territories, ending with Center of the Red Rock Canyon National
15 pages of references. Conservation Area as well as on Amazon.

Summer 2017