Page 12 November 1984 Cassiar Courier fp SAFETY = by J. Gilpin September, in some ways, was one of the safest months on record for Cassiar. Not many years ago we had from 30 to 50 accidents to employees per month. In September we had only one accident. Congratulations to all for making this almost an accident free month. At the mine a couple of rather bizarre equipment accidents occurred, During a recent blast a stray fly rock from the blast hit a drill almost a thousand feet away. Normal blasting procedures were followed with all personnel under cover. So there was no threat to individ- uals. The rock caused minimal damage. A couple of weeks later a Euclid haul truck lost a wheel and came to a tilted stop. The driver was unin- jured, but rather startled when, without warning, the wheel and tire just fell off. Fortunately he was going quite slowly, preparing to dump his load at the crusher, The wheel fell off due to bearing failure. The reason for this failure is under investigation. Routine mainten- ance and examination had not shown any fault and drivers had not noticed any peculiar handling of the truck before the accident. No other trucks appear to have any problem with their bearings. Hopefully this riddle can be solved. A hearing protection program was instituted on October 1. Over the past two years we noticed that an inordinately large number of employees were suffering hearing loss. Noise sampling of various work areas and personnel samples revealed that many people are exposed to sufficient noise during a regular eight hour shift to have permanent hearing loss if they don’t wear hearing protection. Therefore, in order to halt this hearing loss, the company has decided to make the use of hearing pro- tection mandatory in certain areas, The mill and mine garage are two areas in which noise sampling indicated that hearing protection was warranted, These areas have been designated as mandatory hearing protection areas, The monitoring program is ongoing and additional changes will be made according to future testing. We encourage employees to also consider off-work noise exposure and to use plugs or muffs for noisy activities such as target shooting and using a chain saw. PORTRAITS, PASSPORT PICTURES EVENTS, B.& W DARKROOM FINISHING 71/5 Malozemoff 778-7345 DOOR PRIZES ros PhO MORTIFEE MUNSHAW DEALER FOR COLOR & ENLARGEMENTS, FILMS, CAMERAS & ACCESSORIES FOR SALE, CAMERA REPAIRS, WEDDINGS & SPECIAL | Our Lady of Lourdes Annual Tea, Bake-Sale & Bazaar will be held on Saturday Movember 24th at Ske Shee Centre 1-3p.m. RAFFLE 1ST PRIZE — DOLL HOUSE 2ND and 3RD PRIZES TO BE ANNOUNCED TICKETS — $2.00 EACH SPECIAL TABLE FOR CHILDREN DONATIONS OF HANDICRAFTS — KNITTING, SEWING, CROCHETING, OTHER CRAFTS AND BAKING WILL BE GREATLY APPRECIATED’ FOR FURTHER INFORMATION PHONE JOAN HABJAN AT 778-7363 Sojourn in the North In the hustle and bustle of our ordinary lives we sometimes fail to notice the beauty around us. Printed below is Part 1 of a four part series written by a visitor to Cassiar. The images he recorded are all well known to us. By reviewing them through his eyes we can perhaps see them again in a new and brighter light. Her mountain, as her husband called it, was obscured behind a veil of softly. falling snowflakes drifting down silently from a grey void. Its bulk normally filled the kitchen window and she often craned her neck to peer up at its bold outline etched against a brilliant blue sky. It was so close and it rose so steeply. Phalanx after phalanx of pine trees advanced up its lower slopes, thin- ning to echelons and serried ranks and finally losing momentum with only thin scouting parties, sometimes in single file, creeping randomly up to the snow line. As yet the snow covered only the upper third of the mountain, more like frosting on a massive cake. Nothing grew at this height, not even the mosses and grass which greened the guliies briefly when the snow finally suc- cumbed to the summer warmth and disappeared in a cold melt to nourish the gushing, foaming streams which combined to form the rivers and lakes of the region. Yesterday, it had not snowed and she had gazed entranced at her mountain. Such colour! She wished she could express in paint the superb panorama, the kaleid- oscopic tumult of rich greens, of russets, gold, copper, red, orange: an infinity of shades for which her colour vocabulary was hopelessly inadequate. Here and there a ray of sunshine, like a powerful searchlight, speared through a gap in the clouds and bathed areas of her mountain in a sparkling diffusion of splendour. It was fall, or autumn as she used to know it; it had crept upon the landscape and had wrought its magic almost overnight. She had just become used to the variety and wealth of greens when seemingly without warning she was dazzled by a variegated opulence of colour which defied description. She had undertaken this trip, spanning August, September, and early October, with some trepidation. She and her husband were visiting their younger daughter and son-in-law who, with their children aged two and four, were living in this small, friendly asbestos outpost in British Columbia near the Yukon border. They would baby-sit their two grandchildren while their daughter was having her third child in Vancouver, a thousand miles to the south. Now she was glad she had come. Now she ° studio ig could understand those who said they would not live where they could not experience the annual glory of the fall sketching its vivid splashes of colour among these trees and shrubs whose ancestors had clung to these granite slopes since the glaciers disappeared. She and her husband with their daughter and son-in- law had driven north to Whitehorse along the Alaska Highway, south to Tatoga, west to Telegraph Creek and east up rutted roads and trails to isolated one-room log cabins, one of which belonged to their daughter and her family. Sadly these cabins are uninsurable as the vast tracts of surrounding forest are swept from time to time by monstrous, racing flames devouring the foliage on the trees and leaving behind stark, bare, pallid stems, mute skeletal testimony to the ferocity of the superheated assault upon them brought about so often by the careless flick of a burning cigarette into the dry undergrowth. This is a sparsely populated land of mountains, pine forests, flaming fireweed, cold lakes and rushing streams. | It is beautiful and remote in its splendour, awesone in | its primeval grandeur, ever-changing in its moods, Here roam the moose and the caribou, the black bears and the grizzlies, the wolves and the porcupines. Here the rivers and the lakes yield rainbow and lake trout, grayling and dolly-varden. Here the eagles nest and the black crows scavenge. Strangest of all, the mosquitoes, large and voracious, are scarcely deterred by. the most powerful repellants. In thirty years in Africa she had not encount- ered their like. : But today, it is still snowing but more gently now. Not this time would it lie- and bank and hang fragile traceries along branches and leaves, which the squirrels would disturb in their darting, busy, almost frantic search for nuts and acorns. In the days ahead the snowfalls would thicken and — the temperatures would drop from zero to —40°. The cross-country skiing would start and the battle to keep paths, driveways and main roads open would commence. A soft white blanket would gradually muffle all sound and bury lawns, flower gardens, shrubs and fences in its cold embrace. By then she would be in Florida, a much warmer land but flat and featureless by comparison. There the fabulous sunsets over the Gulf of Mexico might remind her of the fall colours of Cassiar and perhaps fill her with nostalgia for the majestic beauty of its surrounding scenery. ——-—A.J.S. Postalk CHRISTMAS MAIL DEADLINES DESTINATION AIRMAIL Small Packets & Parcels Great Britain & N. Ireland Rep. of Ireland France Germany Netherlands CFPO’s 4 Dec 6 Dec 6 Dec 6 Dec 6 Dec 6 Dec 1 Dec 1 Dec 1 Dec 1 Dec 1 Dec 1 Dec 6 Dec 6 Dec 6 Dec 30 Nov 30 Nov 1 Dec 1 Dec 1 Dec 23 Nov 23 Nov Japan Hong Kong Switzerland Sweden Poland U.S.S.R. Australia New Zealand Phillippines Singapore 30 Nov 30 Nov 30 Nov 30 Nov 30 Nov 23 Nov 23 Nov 23 Nov 23 Nov 23 Nov Other Countries In Europe 30 Nov Asia 30 Nov South Pacific 30 Nov 23 Nov 23 Nov 23 Nov Africa South America Caribbean 30 Nov 30 Nov 30 Nov 23 Nov 23 Nov 23 Nov SURFACE MAIL (Packets, Parcels, Unsealed Greeting Cards) November 1st — Great Britain, N. Ireland, Rep. of Ireland, France, Germany (Fed.), Netherlands, C.F.P.O.’s, Switzerland, Sweden. November 2nd — Hong Kong November 9th — Japan DID YOU KNOW? ASBESTOS: the unquenchable stone. The Greeks and Romans made napkins out of asbes- tos. They didn’t have to wash them at all; when the nap- kins were dirty the users simply threw them into the fire and pulled them out again with their pearly whiteness all restored. Asbestos was also used for lamp wicks. An eternal light was kept burning in the Temple of Athena and, of course, the fire-resistant wick never burned out. The real Greek name for this incombustible fiber was amiantos lithos or ‘‘undefiled stone”, but, by mistake, the Roman naturalist Pliny called this mineral fiber asbestos, from a-, “‘not’’ and sbestos, ‘‘quenchable”’. Cassiar Courier November 1984 Page 13 | Thoughts on Food Cassiar is fast becoming renown for the fabulous meals our chefs prepare for visiting dignitaries. Recently the B.C. Minister of Mines, Energy and Petroleum Re- sources, Stephen Rogers, the B.C. Minister of Transport- ation and Highways, Alex Fraser, and the mine managers of six northern mining properties all were served del- icious delicacies prepared by the very talented people . at the Cassiar Cookery. On this page we have included the menu and recipes | from the dinner served at the Northern Mine Managers _ Meeting. Hats off to the chefs for bringing this bit of elegance | f0 our northern outpost!! MENU Mousse De Truite Aux Champignons | Trout Mousse with Mushrooms Creme D’Asperges au Crabe Asparagus Soup garnished with Crab Salade Cuite sur Salade Crue Lettuce and Spinach with Hot Bacon and Walnut Dressing Supreme de Poulet Saute a la Perigord Chicken Breast with Truffles and Madeira Wine —_—_———- Granite de Gamay Beaujolaise Wine and Fruit Sorbet Cotelette D’Agneau a la Maison Lamb Cutlets stuffed with Pate and wrapped in Pastry Pommes Parisienne Small round potatoes in meat glaze Choux-Fleurs Italienne Cauliflower with Italienne sauce glazed with cheese Courgettes Menagere Zucchini stuffed with forcemeat a Poire Bartlett au Sabayon Riesling Poached Pears with Riesling wine Sabayon Fromage Various Assorted Cheeses Cafe / CREAM OF ASPARAGUS SOUP WITH CRAB ; Serves 4 2 lbs. fresh asparagus I medium cooking onion, finely chopped 3 Tbsp. butter 3 Tbsp. flour ‘| 4 cups chicken stock ‘| 1 tsp. nutmeg 1 cup 35% cream Salt and pepper to taste Cut tips of asparagus from stalks and set aside a few for garnish. In large skillet, melt butter and ,| sauté remaining tips with chopped onion. Add ‘| flour and stir. Add stock, nutmeg and salt and pepper as desired. Stir over medium heat until smooth. Pour into blender and puree. Strain through sieve. Put remainder of asparagus stalks into blender ¢ and puree. Mix together with strained soup. Serve . garnished with blanched asparagus tips and crab meat. . SALADE CUITE SUR SALADE CRUE Head of red lettuce Spinach : 1/3 cup chopped walnuts | large shallot minced ‘| 7 oz. bacon cut in cubes . 4 Tbsp. white wine vinegar 2 Tbsp. Dijon mustard ‘| I] tsp. walnut oil ,| Salt and pepper to taste : Combine lettuce, spinach, walnuts.and shallot. \ Fry bacon until golden, but not crisp. Drain on « paper towels. Stir in vinegar to deglaze pan. Blend » in mustard, Whisk in oil until well emulsified. Sea- | son-to taste. Pour over salad.and serve. MOUSSE DE TRUITE CHAMPIGNONS Serves 6 Trout Mousse: 1 % pounds fresh trout fillets, skinned and boned I egg 1 egg white 1/3 cup half and half Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg 1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature % tsp. freshly grated nutmeg Salt and pepper 2 to 3 cups whipping cream 2 Tbsp. butter Cut fillets into cubes. Puree in processor with egg, egg white, half and half and nutmeg until smooth, scraping down sides of bowl. Press through fine sieve a little at a time. Scrape mixture from bot- tom of sieve into metal bowl. Set bowl in larger bowl filled with ice. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate 2 hours. Wash and dry processor bowl; refrigerate 2 hours. Transfer fish puree to processor. Add % cup but- ter, nutmeg, salt and pepper and mix until smooth and homogenous, about 2 minutes, scrap- ing down sides and up bottom of bowl. Add 2 cups whipping cream in a slow steady stream, scraping down sides of bowl. Poach 1 tablespoon mixture in small amount of barely simmering salt- ed water 4 minutes. If texture is firm and free of fibers, mousse is ready, If not, blend in up to 1 cup additional whipping cream in 3 batches, test- ing mousse for desired texture after each ad- dition. Preheat oven to 325°F. Butter six 6 oz. ramekins with 2 tablespoons butter. Divide mousse evenly among ramekins. Tap sharply on counter to elim- inate air pockets. Cover with parchment. (Can be prepared 24 hours ahead to this point, covered and refrigerated.) Arrange ramekins in shallow roasting pan. Add enough simmering water to come halfway up sides of molds. Bake until parchment lifts easily from mousse, about 15 minutes. ; ee te Mushroom Sauce: 1 Tbsp. unsalted butter 1 pound button mushrooms ¥%2 cup fish stock or clam juice ¥% cup dry white wine 1 medium onion, finely chopped 2 medium shallots, finely chopped 2 garlic cloves, mashed 1— %x 1% inch lemon peel strip _ Bouquet garni (parsley, thyme, bay leaf) %2 cup unsalted butter, cut into tablespoon-size pieces ; 2 Tbsp. minced fresh parsley 1/3 teaspoon saffron threads, crushed. Fresh lemon juice Lemon Slices Italian parsley bouquets Melt I tablespoon butter in heavy large skillet over medium heat. Stir in mushrooms; season with salt and pepper. Cover and cook until all moisture is rendered, about 4 minutes. Strain liquid into small bowl. Increase heat to high and toss mushrooms to dry. Transfer to another bowl. Boil reserved mushroom liquid, fish stock, wine, onion, shallots, garlic, lemon peel and bouquet garni in heavy medium saucepan until reduced to 1/3 cup. Remove from heat and whisk in 1 table- spoon butter. Place over low heat and whisk in re- maining butter 1 tablespoon at a time, incorpor- ating each before adding next. If thickened sauce breaks down at-any time, remove from heat and whisk in 2 tablespoons cold butter. Strain sauce into clean saucepan. Blend in mushrooms, parsley and saffron. Season with fresh lemon juice and salt. and pepper. Run tip of sharp knife around edge of mousse and invert onto plates. Spoon some of sauce over. Garnish with lemon slices and parsley and serve. POULET SAUTE A LA PERIGORD Season the pieces of chicken and brown them in butter. Add 200 g raw truffles, trimmed olive shape, cover with a lid and cook together gently in the oven. When cooked, arrange the chicken and truffles in a deep dish. Deglaze the pan with Madeira, reduce lately. and add % cup sauce demi-glace. Finish away from heat with 1% oz. butter and pour over the chicken. ; GRANITE DE GAMAY BEAUJOLAIS ¥ Serves 4 — 6 1 bottle (750 mL) Gamay Beaujolais Juice of one lemon Juice of one orange I cup sugar 1 cup water % stick cinnamon Place wine and fruit juices in a metal or glass con- tainer that can go into the freezer. Meanwhile, put sugar, water and cinnamon Stick in a pot over a medium heat and cook until the sugar is dissoly- ed. Remove and let cool. When cool, remove cinnamon and pour mixture into the wine. Freeze for about 24 hours, Stirring occasionally as the bottom and sides freeze quick- ly. Serve in chilled glasses or miniature mugs with a twist of orange or fresh mint. COTELETTE D’AGNEAU A LA MAISON 4 lamb loin chops, approximately 24% oz, each 3 oz. fresh or processed fois gras Freshly ground salt and pepper 10 oz. puff pastry 1 egg beaten with 2 Tbsp. water for egg wash Cut a pocket in each lambchop. Puree fois gras and fill the pockets. Season with salt and pepper ° and set aside. Roll out puff pastry to form a rectangle 5x15” on a floured surface. Lay each chop proportion- ately along the pastry so that the edges will meet when cut and folded over each chop. Brush the pastry with the egg wash and fold pastry over and mould it around each chop. Place seam side down on baking sheet and brush with egg wash again. Place in 400° F oven for 12 - 14 minutes until pas- try is glazed and brown, and lamb is medium rare. POIRE BARTLETT AU SABAYON RIESLING Serves 6 Poached Pears 6 pears with good stems 3 cups water 1 Tbsp. honey ¥% cup sugar 3 oz. Riesling wine 3 whole cloves Zest of lemon Put all ingredients, with exception of pears, in a pot on medium heat until the sugar is dissolved. Meanwhile, peel and core pears, leaving stems in- tact. As each pear is prepared, rub it with lemon juice or drop in cold water mixed with lemon juice to prevent discoloration. When sugar is dissolved, place pears in the pot of syrup for approximately 20 minutes or until done when tested with fork. Remove from heat and let pears coolin syrup. Sabayon de Riesling 6 large egg yolks J cup sugar 1% cups Riesling wine 1 oz. Poire William eau de vie Put egg yolks and sugar in the top of a double boiler or metal bowl over a very low heat and whisk until foamy. Gradually beat in the Riesling and continue to cook until ‘ribbon stage’’ has been reached. To test for proper consistency in “ribbon stage’, lift sabayon with whisk. It should flow back to the bowl in a thick ribbon. When whisking, the sabayon should follow the whisk away from the sides of the bowl and be visible before blending right back into mixture. To serve, drain pears and place on a paper towel. Spread a ladle of sabayon on each chilled plate. Dip each pear into remaining sabayon and place in centre of each plate. Place a leaf of fresh mint at base of each stem for garnish. Serve immed- bay 7