Winter weather is finally here. And the shortest day of the year is fast approaching.
Quick Bites: Seasonal Sweet Tooth
Posted inFood & Drink
The Real McCoy: Going large at the Cowboy Dinner Tree
Nuthin’ fancy at the Cowboy Dinner TreeSilver Lake, Oregon is a place where the word cowboy means a job, not a style of dress. And for bonafide cowboy cuisine, the Cowboy Dinner Tree is The Real McCoy. The legendary, albeit out of the way, steakhouse is set off of one of Oregon’s Scenic Byways in the heart of the Oregon Outback.
It’s rugged country for sure. But it’s also a place where you can drive for many miles undisturbed in your thoughts as you reflect on the hearty souls who decided to take up ranching in this land of sagebrush, mountain lions and ferocious winds. The desolate landscape is surprisingly refreshing, and I enjoy its uncomplicated terrain in the same way I appreciate the simple, authentic food at the Cowboy Dinner Tree.
No Morton’s of Chicago is this. For $23.50 you get either a steak or chicken dinner. Sound mundane? Just wait. The steak is an aged top sirloin that is portioned into a true Cowboy Cut of 26 to 30 ounces. Twelve to 24 hours before it is served, the steak gets a special dry rub. What has now become your dinner steak is cooked over an outdoor barbeque to medium rare once you’re seated.
Posted inFood & Drink
The Real McCoy: Going large at the Cowboy Dinner Tree
Nuthin' fancy at the Cowboy Dinner TreeSilver Lake, Oregon is a place where the word cowboy means a job, not a style of dress. And for bonafide cowboy cuisine, the Cowboy Dinner Tree is The Real McCoy. The legendary, albeit out of the way, steakhouse is set off of one of Oregon's Scenic Byways in the heart of the Oregon Outback.
It's rugged country for sure. But it's also a place where you can drive for many miles undisturbed in your thoughts as you reflect on the hearty souls who decided to take up ranching in this land of sagebrush, mountain lions and ferocious winds. The desolate landscape is surprisingly refreshing, and I enjoy its uncomplicated terrain in the same way I appreciate the simple, authentic food at the Cowboy Dinner Tree.
No Morton's of Chicago is this. For $23.50 you get either a steak or chicken dinner. Sound mundane? Just wait. The steak is an aged top sirloin that is portioned into a true Cowboy Cut of 26 to 30 ounces. Twelve to 24 hours before it is served, the steak gets a special dry rub. What has now become your dinner steak is cooked over an outdoor barbeque to medium rare once you're seated.
Posted inMusic
Yeah, We Called it
Empty Space Orchestra: Pre-snow shovel jam.Not trying to brag or boast (or eat French toast), but Sound Check's prediction for what was to go down last Saturday night was pretty much dead on. Yup, nailed it!
As forecasted on the Our Picks page last week, we said that folks would start up the night at the Silver Moon for the gutted version of Larry and His Flask, and so they did. Music fans rocked the moon as the increasingly wacky yet acoustic members of LAHF tossed their bodies around the room. The band then offered up praise for Hillstomp, the Portland gritty blues duo playing across the street at the Domino Room and instructed its fans to head over to that show as they wrapped up their own set.
Posted inMusic
Taking the Music to the People: When Brad Tisdel isn’t helping others enjoy music, he’s playing
Relax, Mr. Tisdel. You've earned it.Editor's Note: This profile was originally slated to run in our Local
Heroes issue, but was inadvertently omitted. Better late than never, eh?
The
fact that Sisters has about 10 times as much musical energy as a
typical American town of its size is not an accident. While some of
this is due in part to the vein of creativity that seems to run through
the center of the cowboy town, a good deal of recognition also should
be handed to Brad Tisdel.
Posted inMusic
Liner Notes: Feeling Grouchy?
GROUCH: OUT TO STEAL YOUR CHRISTMAS.At the rate that hip-hop shows - both indie acts as well as
bling-and-boast rappers-are stomping through town as of late, it seems
we need a whole space dedicated to hip-hop music in this paper. While
we don't exactly have real estate reserved for that purpose quite yet,
we will give you a de facto column with this update on the Grouch and
Eligh show coming up at the Domino Room on Monday night.
Posted inMusic
Leif James 2.0: He’s back with a new band, a no-booze policy and a disdain for fake cowboys
New band, new hat, same duct-taped guitar.The last time I formally interviewed Leif James, it was a strangely
warm spring day in 2007. The article was about James' career as a
street performer and the quick rise to local notoriety of his then
band, Poor Bastard's Romance. After the interview he propped up in the
breezeway connecting Wall and Brooks streets and began strumming for
some extra beer money.
Last week, on the day after Thanksgiving, it
was a different Leif James sitting at a café table lining Bond Street.
First off, James is now married with his first child on the way.
Secondly, his Poor Bastard Romance days are long behind him, the band
having broken up in 2007, and now he's either playing his acoustic rock
songs solo or as a locally grown act he's dubbed Leif James and the
Struggle. And there's no longer any strumming for beer money.
Posted inOpinion
Congratulations, Jodie – and let’s set the record straight.
As I have already told Jodie Barram, I am happy for her and I think she will do a good job in filling Bill Friedman's council position. I have worked on the Bend Planning Commission with Jodie for many years, and have found that she takes a cautious and reasoned approach to her decisions. I look forward to working with her in some capacity with the City in the future.
However, I want to address some "misrepresentations" of my positions in Eric Flowers' article "One Way or Another: After losing election, Barram wins council appointment." First, while I do disagree with the current vision of Juniper Ridge, I have never said that I want to dismantle the City's Juniper Ridge Economic Development Plan. I believe there should be more industrial land and less research park. It will be the industrial land that will help create family wage jobs for all segments of the population. I have stated publicly that it is time to let the Juniper Ridge Management Committee do its task of guiding the future of Juniper Ridge. I wouldn't stand in the way of that process.
Posted inCulture
Our Picks for the Week of 12/3-12/11
Leif James & The Struggle
wednesday 3
We profile the new
reinvention of Leif James in the Sound section. Read that, then
immediately head to the Moon to see him and the Struggle rip it up with
an all-out acoustic rock show. 8pm. Silver Moon Brewing Co. 24 NW
Greenwood Ave.
DJ Barisone
thursday 4
Yeah, we've
spilled a lot of ink about DJ Barisone over the last year, but our
prolificacy of writing on this man is worth it - he throws some of the
best (if not the best) parties in town whenever he's behind the wheels.
So, spend your Thursday with Barisone for some worldly jams and healthy
amounts of funkalicious party music. 10pm. Bendistillery Martini Bar,
850 NW Brooks St.
Posted inNews
Back To the Drawing Board: Homes for acres deal at Skyline hits the wall
A proposed deal that has divided conservationists about the best way to
preserve a large chunk of undeveloped forest land just west of Bend has
been shelved by the property owner as it weighs its options.
Fidelity
National Timber Investments, which owns the 33,000-acre tree farm known
as Skyline Forest had planned to ask the Oregon legislature to sign off
on an unprecedented plan that would have allowed the company to
essentially donate most of the forest to the Deschutes Basin Land Trust
in exchange for permission to build several thousand homes on the
remaining acres between Bend and Sisters. But at this point, the
company has essentially pulled the plug on the proposal because of
state planning hurdles and a lack of local support for the deal.