Traverse Northern Michigan, April 2025

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WILD AT HEART A SPRING WOODLAND FEAST

+ SECRETS OF TROUT CAMP + THE (FARM) FIELD OF DREAMS

INSIDE

Northern Home & Cottage

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features 14

04.25

“Gentlemen, It’s Going to Happen.”

DISCOVER MORE ABOUT UP NORTH PEOPLE, PLACES, FOOD AND EVENTS.

On the eve of the Hendrickson hatch, a group of lifelong friends gather to relive their hook-and-bullet glories of the year past, and toast the beginning of a new season.

BY DAV E K A R C Z Y N S K I

/ 22 22//

Wild at Heart

Sometimes a meal is a gift. A plated notion of love from chef to recipient. And other times, a meal is a rebirth that sparks the perfect ember of hope and resilience.

BY L I SA B L A K E

PHOTOGRAPHY BY C O U R T N EY K E N T

30// / 30

photo by Arek Kubale

Field of Dreams

When a family with a love of food and hospitality reimagined the vacant land adjacent a corporate office, an unusual little farm was born. The resounding question: Can you grow a legacy of connection?

/ 35 35// SPECIAL SECTION:

Northern Home & Cottage Venture inside a modern A-frame within the towering woods of Leelanau County; plus, a family restores a classic log cabin on Torch Lake.

BY CA R A M C D O N A L D

PHOTOGRAPHY BY L E A H R E N E E MARCH 2025

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Traverse

NORTHERN

MICHIGAN A MyNorth Media Publication

Vol. 44 | No. 1 1

EXECUTIVE EDITOR

Cara McDonald

MANAGING EDITOR

Carly Simpson Allison Jarrell Acosta

ASSOCIATE EDITOR

59

departments 07 | Editor’s Note 09 | Up North

Meet “Survivor” star Kyle Ostwald, a Cheboygan local who resonated with viewers across the country; plus, the secret finds our editors are loving this month.

photos (top) by Todd Zawistowski; (bottom) by Allison Jarrell Acosta

13 | Outdoors

A volunteer-led campaign takes root in the U.P. to protect the Porcupine Mountains.

55 | Culinary North

At Elder Piper Beer & Cider in Petoskey, the possibilities are quite literally endless.

59 | In the Kitchen Delicate lavender infuses this classic crème brûlée.

60 | Love of the Land Smell that green, garlicky aroma floating on the forest breeze? Wild ramps are here.

Caroline Dahlquist

PROOFREADER REGULAR CONTRIBUTORS

ART DIRECTOR PRODUCTION DIRECTOR

Lissa Martin Meagan Francis Tim Hussey Theresa Burau-Baehr

ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR, SPECIAL SECTIONS

Rachel Watson

DIRECTOR OF SALES

Lisa Froning

ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES

Mike Alfaro Cyndi Ludka Rachel North Erin Lutke

CIRCULATION MARKETING COORDINATOR

Ashlyn Korienek Kayla Kennedy

OFFICE MANAGER

09 Follow Us On Social Media facebook.com/mynorthmedia instagram.com/mynorthmedia pinterest.com/mynorthmedia

Discover a Polish emporium, pg. 11

ON THE COVER A fresh spring salad

by Chef Betsey Wild Photo by Courtney Kent

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Periodicals class postage paid at Traverse City, MI 49684 and at additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Traverse Northern Michigan, 415 Cass St., Traverse City, MI 49684. Advertising rates available upon request. Subscription rate: $39.95 for 12 issues. Single issue price: $6.50.

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Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.

4 T R AV E R S E N O R T H E R N M I C H I G A N

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Editor’s Note

THREE SNOWS

T

his week, we went from 20ish degrees and flurries to 50 degrees and sun in 24 hours.

After three months wrapped in unrelenting snow, we felt the sun come out one day and shine so brazenly it split the ice on my roof. The icicles began dripping in a frantic staccato. Shortly after lunch, a log-sized chunk of melting ice calved off my roof, taking all my gutters with it.

I’d been on a bender of mishaps and miniature disasters that week. A scorch mark on my counter, a cracked window, a stuck drawer, a clogged pipe and some other assorted setbacks. It felt like these small but annoying problems were hurling themselves at me, crying, “fix me.”

In order to bring my heart rate down, I looked to my better angels, reframing my thoughts: Maybe it wasn’t personal, just the exploding energy of the thaw leaking out everywhere, after the stillness of the freeze.

In psychology, “thaw” is a term used to describe what happens to the human heart after trauma, which causes us to fight, flee or freeze. Freezing puts a complete stop on the world, a way to retreat into immobility instead of mustering up the energy to fight or run. In winter, freezing invites us to yield to something so much bigger—to leave the car parked in the driveway, cancel school, maybe pull the big fleece blanket around us on the couch and nap. In our hearts, it kindly lets us press pause on whatever mental movie is wildly playing and just peace out for a minute. Or two. Or years.

But after the freeze, we eventually have to feel. When the feeling comes back to numb hands on a cold day, or love comes back to a heart that hasn’t felt it in a while, the first shooting sensations are painful.

When I was a child, my parents planted a forsythia bush along our property line, near the spot where the neighbors took their dog out to go to the bathroom—a flowering barrier that redirected the focus from bleached out spots of grass and petrified poop to the fountain-like branches coated in yellow blooms. Each spring, just when tempers were shortest, the grass the most matted, skies the grayest,

my mom would cut an armload of forsythia branches and bring them inside to a big, groovy, green-glass vase on our kitchen table.

They were a tiny act of defiance against the gloom, blooming even before the hardy tulips dared to.

But any Michigander, any owner of a soft and vulnerable human heart, knows that no freeze ends so simply, and that thaws are a sometimes-painful process.

There’s an old saying: “Three snows after the forsythia blooms.” No matter how convincing that initial splitting of the ice, no matter how the crackling sound unzips something locked up in us, thawing is a process that stops and starts. We’re pulled back into cold and snow when a spring storm comes roiling back through. We try to be brave, but then overthink it, retreating. We hold back a confession. We withdraw from something hoped for in case the not-getting might freeze our tender buds to the core.

I’ll share a secret: Each spring, I travel with garden shears in my car. I look for neglected old forsythia bushes by alleyways and dumpsters, near parking lots and office complexes, and snip a few branches to put on my kitchen table. My own tiny rebellion. A reminder that change comes hard sometimes—one step forward, two steps back, with a hesitancy to launch into the next season. But it is coming.

Although traditionally April is when the magazine celebrates food and the bounty of our region, this issue’s foodie stories also have baked into them tasting notes of setbacks and failures mixed with triumph. Whether it’s about the slowly fruiting dreams of NanBop Farm, the raucous joys of the first fishing trip (and feast) of the year or a heart-lifting story of friendship, food and recovery, they remind us to stay connected to the seasons and to each other. To splash through the puddles of snowmelt into the triumph of a brave new chapter.

Cara McDonald, Executive Editor cara@mynorth.com APRIL 2025

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Up North

local buzz · nostalgic finds · travel inspo

“

Each spring, like the burgeoning flora along the forest floor, we bend toward the light— stretching our limbs and breathing in the heady aroma of fresh flowers, finally in bloom.

—ASSOCIATE EDITOR ALLISON JARRELL ACOSTA

SURVIVOR STAR KYLE OSTWALD P. 10

EDITORS’ PICKS: SECRET DISCOVERIES P. 11

THE PORKIES ARE AT RISK. HERE’S WHY. photo by Allison Jarrell Acosta

P. 13

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Up North Buzz

TRUE TO HIS ROOTS

by CARLY SIMPSON

B

orn and raised in cheboygan, kyle Ostwald feels deeply connected to the North, where he lives now with his fiancée and their two young children. “I love the bond people have,” he says. “Regardless of your outlook on life, if you need something, people here step up.”

During his 20 days on “Survivor,” Ostwald was open about his childhood and growing up in a family that battled financial insecurity and addiction, as well as years spent in foster care. For Ostwald, a construction worker, the million-dollar prize represented a chance to provide his children long-term financial stability—and he was a fierce competitor, winning four consecutive immunity challenges, just one short of the “Survivor” record.

He never stopped “going a buck twenty.”

“Life is hard. Even at its best times, there’s a lot of weight you carry,” Ostwald says. “To put 120 percent of yourself into something, you have to pull from things that inspire you to allow you to take a step farther. That’s where you get your buck twenty—the people you care about.”

When Ostwald went to Los Angeles for an interview during the casting process, it was the first night he ever spent away from his fiancée, Shania. The duo traveled the country for six years living in a van together, an experience that Ostwald says made him comfortable with the uncomfortable—helpful when you’re sleeping in bamboo huts huddled together for warmth with people you just met.

“One of the greatest lessons I took away from ‘Survivor’ was the humbling vision of how simple life needs to be for me to be happy,” he says. “I’ve been with Shania for almost twelve years now. Every single morning, every single night, through the years of traveling in the van, building our house and living in the camper.

“You don’t realize how much you take for granted with somebody, in these daily situations when you spend so much time with them. And when you’re removed from those situations, it forces you to find your own direction and resort to yourself. I got to stand toe-to-toe with myself and really check myself in life a few different times.”

Ostwald proved Midwesterners are nice, but throughout the season, he revealed our might, too.

photo by Robert Voets

Michigan native Kyle Ostwald might not have won Season 47 of “Survivor,” but his unwavering dedication to his family resonated with viewers across the country.

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Up North Curiosities

Spin Zone

At Mitchell Street’s new cozy Malted Vinyl listening lounge in Petoskey, the music is loud.

And that’s the point. Patrons order up a craft cocktail (the N/A list is stellar), select an album from the shelf, attach a sticky note requesting A or B side, and slot it in a bin to wait its turn. You’ll listen through the entire side of an album to get to your pick, a mandate from owners Jesse Leverett and Missy Hundey-Leverett—experiencing the work as the artist intended it. – C.M.

EDITORS’ PICKS

The secret discoveries we tell our friends about.

Dark Skies

Last April, I buckled up, requisite road trip Twizzlers in hand, for a seven-plus hour drive from Traverse City to the Keweenaw Mountain Lodge. I was heading north to attend the three-day Upper Peninsula Dark Sky Festival (April 24–26, 2025). Reasons you, too, should go: You can stay onsite in a rustic 1930s log cabin, gaze at the Milky Way until 2 a.m., get expert tips on aurora viewing, learn about everything from light pollution’s effect on migrating birds to nighttime photography tips, and meet nerdy, nature-loving friends. – C.S.

photo by Chris Guibert (above); Allison Jarrell Acosta (right)

A Waking Forest

Looking for a dreamy spring retreat?

Grand Traverse Regional Land Conservancy is hosting a series of guided wildflower hikes at one of my favorite spots for floral ephemerals: Pete’s Woods in Arcadia Dunes. Led by longtime volunteer Paula Dreeszen, the first two hikes are set for April 23 and May 7. Later in the season, on June 18, Paula will also lead a guided tour of Baldy Trails, highlighting blooms along the Lake Michigan coastline. Space is limited; register ahead of time! – A.J.A.

Emporium of Delight

Yes, as a traveling photographer, I am indeed blessed with the gift of procuring unique and often bizarre souvenirs for my two girls back home. Post-hug, I am expected to cough up these excavations from afar within minutes of my return. As a week on the road nears its last leg, a bead of sweat sharpens my focus.

Stopping for gas in the hamlet of Cedar, I roll the dice on whether this will be a standard “Starbucks and ye olde fudge shoppe” vibe or the “greasy spoon and deserted antique market” schtick. But, lo, what’s this? A Polish Art Center filled with meticulously handcrafted goods? Painted Easter eggs (pisanki)? Baltic amber jewelry?

This symphonic oasis of color, texture and family heritage shines as bright as the welcoming smile of owner Kathleen Bittner Koch. I left confidently with two nesting dolls (matryoshka), painted with black cats instead of babushkas, duh. – T.H. APRIL 2025

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Up North Outdoors

THE FIGHT FOR THE PORKIES

by CARLY SIMPSON

A volunteer-led campaign, Protect the Porkies, reminds us that the Porcupine Mountains and Lake Superior don’t belong to any one town or county. “They belong to all of us, and they belong to themselves.”

THE MISSION

To educate and mobilize the public to resist the development of the proposed Copperwood Project. Highland Copper, a Canadian company, plans to mine next to Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park. The Copperwood Project would be the closest metallic sulfide mine to Lake Superior in history.

RECENT SUCCESS

The Protect the Porkies campaign, founded by Tom Grotewohl, a resident of Wakefield Township, was able to mobilize petition signers (there are more than 460,000 and counting) and supporters to put pressure on elected officials to reject a $50 million taxpayer-funded grant to the mine. “We were successful in convincing the Michigan Senate to block the grant twice in 2024,” Grotewohl says. “The petition has been an important tool in getting legislators to take our cause seriously, but even more powerful were the tens of thousands of people writing and calling their lawmakers nonstop for weeks.”

CURRENT CHALLENGE

Protect the Porkies has been successful in spreading its message throughout Michigan and beyond. Now, the campaign is focusing more resources toward “changing hearts in the

immediate community,” Grotewohl says. “There is still the residual motto of ‘mining is our heritage,’ which needs to be challenged. [There is a] wealth of research showing that mining no longer helps economies but actually hurts them, and in fact, boom-and-bust enterprises—specifically owned by outside corporations who are not invested in the longterm well-being of the ecology or economy—are the very reason the Upper Peninsula has a legacy of substance abuse, poisoned waters and impoverishment.”

The Protect the Porkies website states that historic U.P. copper mines were 90 percent pure “native copper” but Copperwood’s ore grade is 1.45 percent, meaning that “for every ton of extract, only 30 pounds would be copper and 1,970 pounds would be waste, containing at least 15 toxins of environmental health concern.”

GET INVOLVED

Protect the Porkies always needs more boots on the ground. This year, Grotewohl says they’ll be challenging the company’s permit applications and will continue to fight the grant if it “rears its head again” in 2025. Join the mailing list or follow the campaign on social media. protecttheporkies.com APRIL 2025

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“Gentlemen, It’s Going to Happen.”

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On

photo byDave Karczynski

the eve of the Hendrickson hatch, a group of lifelong friends gather to relive their hookand-bullet glories of the year past, and toast the beginning of a new season.

by Dave Karczynski

APRIL 2025

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My diverse crew of sporting friends done so for four seasons running and shows no sign of relenting. It has the largest cast of characters (though not everyone attends every year) and draws from the greatest geographic area (our past two camps honored guests from Georgia and Poland, respectively). I am talking, of course, of Turk ’n’ Trout, held each May in the Kalkaska pine barrens where the Manistee river flows.

From where does Turk ’n’ Trout get its power? A big part of the answer is the food.

Turk ’n’ Trout is where we lay the prior sporting year, culinarily, on the altar of the next. More important, for many of us it’s the first time we’ve seen each other since last spring. And so we must all tell our stories of the year that was, and we do so with meat.

Antelope burgers, wedged decadently between buns slathered with wild ramp butter, tell the tale of a trip to Wyoming, where days of glassing led up to a final 300-yard shot.

photos by Arek Kubale

means I am a man of many camps. There’s hare camp, a frigid, January affair in far northern Minnesota that could just as well be called tip-up camp, since most of the day is spent tug-of-warring pike while we wait for the blue dusk of evening. There’s musky camp, a soggy expedition in the Upper Peninsula featuring such a seethe of mosquitoes I’ve begun researching DIY blood replacement (according to the NIH, home transfusion “appears to be a feasible, safe and wellaccepted procedure”). Deer camp is an October event that in its capacity to exhaust its practitioners is rivaled only by June’s Hex camp; both are really just excuses for enthusiasts of prolonged waiting in low-light conditions to get out of the house.

Then there’s another camp, one which in our ongoing Game of Camps currently possesses the throne, has

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Moose steaks come compliments of a friend of a friend’s trip to Maine, a bull moose’s largesse transcending, several times over, its hunting party’s freezers. As in a Peter Sellers movie, venison makes repeat appearances in different guises: marinated in teriyaki and OJ and singed over open flames; sitting in stew chunks atop a rosemary polenta; stealing the show in a Northwoods Coney Sauce. Not all our fare is big. A Lake Superior smelting expedition gone terribly right means multiple meals will be accompanied by a generous smattering of fish fries. And don’t forget the squirrels. A good litmus test for camp newbies is their enthusiasm for a proper squirrel breakfast, parboiled and fried and served with plenty of hot sauce beside a mountain of scrambled eggs.

The food is definitely predominant at our May gala, but then we eat pretty well any time we get together.

The other big reason our May camp is special is because it’s the only hybrid hunting and fishing camp we have mustered so far (though we regularly fantasize about a bow-and-row, black bear and musky hunting expedition).

There is, in other words, something for any mood, provided those moods are hook or bullet.

This past year the big event was held in early May, which in the river valley can mean winter, spring or both. We were lucky to enjoy exceptionally mild weather, which promised heightened activity for birds and

bugs. The first arrivals got a good morning fire going to welcome others throughout the day, much to the consternation of the dogs a few parcels over, who have not seen activity out this way since the fall. Then it’s swapping stories and getting comfortable.

The fire is last fed by 4 p.m., and by 5 everyone is arrived and ready for a

this time of year are so full of gobble it might only take the slamming of a truck door to get them going. I lead the dry-fly battery to my spinnerfall spot, a long section of riffle water that five can comfortably fish, though today we are only four. Or perhaps 3.5—one of our party is wielding a jar of highproof butterscotch schnapps that

casual first evening of either scouting for turkeys or casting for trout.

Just about everyone at Turk ’n’ Trout does double duty, alternating between hunting and fishing as weather and whim suggests. Everyone, that is, except me.

Though I love to hunt in the fall and winter, by the time spring arrives I have no emotional bandwidth for anything but trout fishing. Especially since May oversees my favorite hatch in the world: the Hendrickson hatch.

The turkey contingent piles into a single truck to spend a few hours driving the logging roads. They’ll stop at intervals to hoot or yelp into the pines in an attempt to pinpoint a few roosting toms, who

halves itself so quickly I consider lashing him to a cedar for safekeeping.

Waiting for bugs beneath the bankside cedars, we squint, we sniff the air, we prognosticate. They will fall tonight. They never fall on the first night.

Did you hear that bittern? There’s a rise, 2 o’clock. Don’t bogart that schnapps. At intervals one of us will wade out into the river for a few steps to study the sky, hoping that the mayflies gathering above the river corridor will mate, expire on the river’s surface, and activate the river’s larger trout for the first time this year.

During my second observation my heart tightens. There are definitely Far left: An honored guest from across the Atlantic enjoys the choicest seat in the truck.

Above: Mornings are for stalking birds, afternoons for hunting trout. Left: The wild turkey, like the brown trout, is an animal of legend and lore.

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This, I theorize, is a fish worth presenting to. It’s on a piece of prime real estate and showing itself at just the right time of the evening, when the air in front of your face has just started to turn blue.

photo by Tom Hazelton

more bugs than during my initial reconnaissance. And while most of the insects are still just gangly spindles, more than a few are starting to couple up. You can tell because their silhouettes get stouter and change shape, looking like little saxophones, or cigarettes stubbed out after only a few drags.

“Gentlemen, it’s going to happen.”

We grab our rods and disperse to battle stations, giddy, even a little nervous. There will be other spinnerfalls, but there will be no other first spinnerfall of the year, no other chance for your rawest skills to be pitted in a contest of greatest consequence. It’s during this hatch that you might lose a fish that will make your soul wince for the rest of the year.

I see one fish rise, but I know from its timing (still plenty of daylight) and location (exposed in the center of the river) that it’ll be a middling fish, and decline to cast. This abstention isn’t snobbery, but strategy: I know that tonight there will generally be time to spot, stalk, catch, admire and release one good fish.

Some minutes pass, daylight drops to a knee, and from the corner of my eye I see a gentle disturbance near the far bank, like a single snowflake melting into the film, again and again. At first, I think it’s nothing. Then something. Then nothing again. It couldn’t be. Could it? Fishing and hunting are full of these liminal expressions, and I’ve been at it long enough to know that decoding them correctly can be the difference between going home full-hearted or empty-handed. When we use the word experience in the sporting arts, what we’re often talking about is a rare and esoteric literacy in things barely espied.

This, I theorize, is a fish worth presenting to. It’s on a piece of prime real estate and showing itself at just the right time of the evening, when the air in front of your face has just started to turn blue. I wade into good position, or what must pass for good position during high spring flows. The For Michigan dry fly anglers, there’s no light like last light.

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cast will need to be long, and my slack will have to be managed against more conflicting currents than I would like—a challenging presentation any time of year, but downright precarious for one’s first fish of the season. But then it wouldn’t be a good fish, or a good fish story, if there weren’t some semblance of the impossible baked into the encounter.

My first presentation is a calibrating cast, by design much too short.

The second’s a little closer as I feel out the currents. Now I’m ready to go for it, to try to ride my fly for a few drag-free seconds in the tight pocket

of slow current where the fish is feeding. My first drift is perfect but the fish, for whatever reason, doesn’t rise; it elects to eat a natural just a few inches behind my offering. My next cast is good but not great. I fear my offering will start to drag while still in the zone. It does, and the trout eats the fly just as it starts to skate. I set the hook, feel nothing, and pray the fish didn’t get pricked—in which case game over. After an extra-long interval, the snowflake falls again. I have another shot.

Against my better instincts (I may have some butterscotch on my

breath), I take one more step, feel the small cobble shift beneath my feet, and lean upstream into the current for balance. It’s in these types of flows that the wading angler is grateful for any and all extra poundage they may be carrying. I’m now close enough to see that the fish is holding in a scour caused by some maple roots. I take a deep breath, dry my fly, apply desiccant. This next presentation will be identical to the ones that came before it, only a little shorter, which is the usual dry fly repetition. If the musky is the fish of a thousand casts, the brown trout is the fish of one—your

photo by Tom Hazelton

Turk ’n’ Trout is where we lay the prior sporting year, culinarily, on the altar of the next. More important, for many of us it’s the first time we’ve seen each other since last spring. And so we must all tell our stories of the year that was, and we do so with meat.

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photos (top and middle): Arek Kubale; (bottom) Tom Hazelton

best—over and over again.

I make a good-enough cast—I’d score it 7 out of 10—and squint into the dusk. The fish eats, the rod flexes, the hook holds. My hands, having lost their ability to divine the size of a trout after a long winter, one moment tell me I have a very small fish, then the very largest fish I have ever hooked on a dry fly. The truth turns out to be somewhere in the middle: an excellent trout to start the season with, though not one that will be remembered with a Sharpie on our Big Fish Board.

When there is no longer any light to speak of, I hear sloshing upstream and down. One other fish caught, one lost, one skunk. Pipes are produced and a second jar of schnapps is carefully unlidded. Peepers peep, bitterns blump, one large trout rises in the dark. Then from across the river an exceptionally forceful owl sequence startles us all. The hoots come again, and a few minutes later we see truck lights through the pines on the far bank, our suspicions confirmed—one of the turkey contingent is a dead ringer for a barred owl.

We turn on headlamps and walk the long winding trail through the cedars back to the truck, the first of many such hike-outs this year. It was all there in front of us, turkey and trout and the full bug parade, sulfurs and mahoganies, isos and brown drakes, and yes, the Hex. There’d be grouse and woodcock and white-tail, maybe an elk, very likely an antelope.

Muskies to round out the year if I got a good deer early enough, steelhead if I didn’t. We cross a bridge and do a head count—all present. Off in the distance, from a spot where I once shot a doe in a blizzard and lost my phone in the snow, another barred owl calls out. This time, it’s real.

Dave Karczynski teaches writing at the University of Michigan. His latest book, Calling After Water, was published last fall.

Far left: A trusty lantern makes an excellent warming lamp. Top: The author prepares to roll out a plein air breakfast hash. Middle: VIP visitors are lodged in “The Chateau.”

Bottom: Dawn breaks on a lucky bird hunter.

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WILD

at

HEART Sometimes a meal is a gift. A plated notion of love from chef to recipient. And other times, a meal is a rebirth that sparks the perfect ember of hope and resilience.

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by L I S A B L A K E / photos by C O U R T N E Y K E N T

S pring’s promise clung to the golden forsythia and recently unearthed radish sprouts sprawled along the wooden farm table tucked into a wooded ravine behind a sweet A-frame cottage.

Garlicky fennel and sausage aromas wafted from the white wine pasta, mingled with asparagus and pea shoots sprouting from the spring panzanella salad. Betsey Wild drizzled chili and ramp oil over her soon-tobe-famous deviled eggs while her friends poured craft cocktails. The outdoor spring feast was almost ready.

All around them, the maple and cottonwood trees were popping with mouse-ear new leaves in an impossible shade of green—spring green, the color of hope and renewal and come on, it’s go-time.

It was a dinner the likes of which Wild, a private chef, hadn’t made in a long time. To the casual observer, the black turban she wore might seem like only a chic accessory. Not like a reminder of the three rounds of chemo, the fight for her life.

The Traverse City native and 39-year-old ovarian cancer survivor is the founder of Wild Dinners, a boutique high-touch outdoor dinner curation service that takes foodie-focused meals and Instagrammable tablescapes

Previous spread: To sustainably harvest ramps, take just one leaf from the plant, leaving the bulb and roots in the ground. Find more tips on page 60.

This spread: Wild’s famous deviled eggs—and yes, she shared the recipe with us. Flip to page 28.

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“No matter the occasion, a home-cooked meal is such an expression of love.”

Clockwise from left: Wild's friends—like Layna Buthker, Amber Jaeger and photographer Courtney Kent—pooled their talents and resources to help her relaunch her business.

to the next level. But eight months of medical leave had paused her business. Her girls were not about to let it stall.

So, they pooled their creative talents—styling, interior design, hospitality, photography—with a heaping dose of love and encouraged Wild to stage a comeback, one they’d document, share and use to promote her talents to the wider world.

The five-course seasonal-menu bestie dinner in the woods at East Grand Traverse Bay’s Holiday House served as a springboard to a successful business tangent. Wild’s comeback dinner wound up being the first in a series of outdoor parties that pairs Northern Michigan’s plethora of produce with its striking farmland and beachfront landscapes.

In august of 2023, Wild was experiencing a prolonged dry cough so intense she thought she’d pulled a stomach muscle.

A trip to urgent care resulted in a CT scan that revealed a large mass on her ovaries. She was referred to a gynecologist who was booked out for the next two months. Wild expedited the process and headed to a downstate cancer center. On Halloween, doctors removed a six-pound mass (she and her family named the unwanted visitor “Glub”), performed a

hysterectomy and a bowel resection, and eventually diagnosed Wild with bi-lateral ovarian cancer—a form of cancer typically seen in women over 65. Though her dad had fought and beat prostate cancer, there was no family history of ovarian cancer and no previous reason to screen for it, Wild says.

She waited 17 days for pathology to affirm the mass was actually cancer, all the while recovering from surgery and canceling private chef gigs or transferring parties to other area chefs willing to take on her client load.

During the surgery, one of her ovaries ruptured, which initiated surgical menopause. And, during her January and February 2024 rounds of chemo, she was forced to, begrudgingly, sit and rest—not an easy feat for the self-described type-A doer.

“I feel really grateful that the journey from ‘you might have cancer’ to being cancer-free was just six months,” she says. “Now I’m feeling exhausted, but good, and I’ve learned to set boundaries.”

Eight months of recovery left Wild feeling restless and frustrated. She missed creating menus, planning and prepping, and designing beautiful dinner parties for hungry Northern Michigan clients.

“It makes me so incredibly happy to put together a meal for someone with ingredients I know they like and have them enjoy it,” she says. “No matter the occasion, a homecooked meal is such an expression of love.”

Outside of assisting her Polish mother with pierogies, cabbage rolls and holiday fish dishes, Wild is a self-taught chef. A college fascination with the culinary travel series Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations spiraled into cookbook deep-dives and ingredient experimentation.

Post-college, Wild took a job managing a gym in Grand Rapids. A lack of healthy lunch options nearby meant Wild would heat up her homemade meals, spurring gym guests and employees to inquire about the delicious aromas. That led to Wild providing healthy grab-and-go options, stocking the gym cooler with simple chicken-and-rice dishes and eventually offering meal prep services for personal training clients.

Things took off from there, and Wild is now in her twelfth year of cooking for private parties. A preferred vendor for Traverse City private home rentals, Wild meets peak-season demand—when it’s next to impossible to snag a large group dinner reservation—with regionally sourced summertime menus.

Part of wild’s draw lies in her unfaltering ability to take what’s in season, gathering goods from the Sara Hardy Farmers Market, Lakeview Hill Farm and other go-tos, and transforming them into a hyper-local farm-to-fork experience. Harnessing Michigan’s hardcore agricultural

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“Being back in the kitchen and having all my girls there to support me made the first Wild Dinner extremely special. It’s probably the event I am most proud of.”

Wild’s recipes are seasonally inspired by local abundance, like this asparagus Brie soup with violet and nasturtium garnish. Her panzanella gets a spring twist with radishes and pea shoots.

Spring Panzanella (Makes 4 servings) This vibrant, spring salad is an easy throw-together that brings lots of color and texture to the table. Easily adjustable for larger groups and specific tastes, just omit or add ingredients as your heart desires.

scene and catering to sophisticated and wellrooted palates, Wild finds herself plating snap peas, wild ramps and asparagus in the spring, tomatoes and peaches in the summer, and squash, mushrooms and beans later in the year.

“Truly, just walking around the farmers market and grabbing whatever catches my eye is such a luxury for a private chef,” she says.

Wild has stepped back from meal prepping and now specializes in Wild Dinners—35 guests and under is her sweet spot. Thanks to a tight circle of creative friends, who supported her throughout cancer treatments and then pooled photography, mixologist and property rental resources to pull off the April 2024 Wild Dinner, she was able to come back after her eight-month hiatus stronger than ever.

Friends lugged a long wooden table through the forest in the spring rain, Wild made her famous deviled eggs and signature asparagus and Brie soup, florals and linens harmonized, and the women sat down to toast a new beginning.

“Being back in the kitchen and having all my girls there to support me made the first Wild Dinner extremely special,” she says. “It’s probably the event I am most proud of, especially with it being my first dinner post cancer treatment.”

The photos from that inaugural Wild Dinner inspired 30 people to email Wild within 24 hours to create their own boutique dinners in unexpected locations. “At every party, I stop and breathe in that gratitude,” she says. “It’s so amazing to me that this is my job.”

Lisa Blake is a writer, foodie and adventurer and the author of several books for children and adults, including her most recent, Rooted: A Journaling Space for Growth & Reflection.

Courtney Kent specializes in wedding and lifestyle photography. She loves exploring Northern Michigan with her husband and young son. courtneykentphotography.com

1 cup snap peas, julienned ½ cup shaved Parmesan 3 mini cucumbers or half an English cucumber cut into rounds 6 asparagus stems cut thin on bias Handful of radish, shaved 2 1-inch slices of multigrain loaf cut into squares ¼ cup sunflower seeds Handful of pea shoots for garnish

Basil White Balsamic Vinaigrette: .5 ounce basil, chopped ¼ shallot, diced 4 Tablespoons white balsamic ½ cup olive oil 1 Tablespoon honey 1 garlic clove 1 teaspoon salt Black pepper to taste Toss the squares of multigrain bread in olive oil, salt and pepper and bake at 400° for 10 to 12 minutes. Whisk all vinaigrette ingredients together in a bowl.

Combine salad ingredients in a separate bowl. Add bread. Toss salad and bread together in vinaigrette, finish with pea shoots and sunflower seeds for garnish.

Serve right away.

Deviled eggs with ramp oil and chili crisp (Makes 24 deviled egg halves) A party favorite with a fresh spring spin, these creamy, perfectly seasoned deviled eggs deliver a leveled-up pop with vibrant Northern Michigan ramps and crunchy, spicy chili crisp.

12 hardboiled eggs, peeled and yolks separated from whites ½ cup Hellman’s Mayonnaise 1 Tablespoon dijon mustard 1 teaspoon white vinegar (or pickle juice) 2 shakes Worcestershire sauce 3 shakes hot sauce of choice ½ teaspoon garlic powder ½ teaspoon salt Black pepper to taste Favorite jarred chili crisp, chives, dill and sliced cornichon to garnish Ramp Oil: 1.5 cups chopped ramps (or greens of scallion if off season) ½ cup avocado oil Pinch of salt

1. Prepare oil: Blanch ramps for 30 seconds. Remove from water and place in ice bath. Squeeze out any excess water and transfer to high-power blender, adding oil and salt. Blend ingredients until oil turns bright green, about 2 to 3 minutes. Strain oil mixture through cheese cloth. Transfer to airtight container.

2. Prepare deviled eggs: Combine all ingredients, including the egg yolks that were set aside, until creamy and pipe into egg whites. Drizzle ramp oil and chili crisp onto eggs and garnish with chive, dill and cornichon right before serving.

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“Truly just walking around the farmers market and grabbing whatever catches my eye is such a luxury for a private chef.”

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FIELD OF DREAMS

WHEN A FAMILY WITH A LOVE OF FOOD AND HOSPITALITY REIMAGINED THE VACANT LAND ADJACENT A CORPORATE OFFICE, AN UNUSUAL LITTLE FARM WAS BORN. THE RESOUNDING QUESTION: CAN YOU GROW A LEGACY OF CONNECTION?

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by Cara McDonald

cellar of NanBop Inside the Farm’s processing

photos by Leah Renee Photography

building, it’s warm and dry and quiet. Rows of grow lights shine close on a tiny sprouting regiment of greens. Even though snow is swirling outside, seeds have already been planted for spring starts to sell at local markets—the first of the season so far are artichokes and eggplants. Soon will come tomatoes, cucumbers and squash.

But there’s no farmhouse on a hill nearby, no stone barn with its creaking boards and field mice nests in the walls. In the distance, a steady hum—not birdsong or crickets or farming machinery, but the drone of traffic just a few hundred yards away on Highway 115.

This unlikely farm sits on 60 acres of commercial property that just a few years ago was an empty lawn flanking a large white building, the former home of 9&10 News operations (910 Media Group is the parent company of MyNorth.com and Traverse Northern Michigan). To any passerby, it could be just … land. Open space, a buffer between a building and a road. But there’s no such thing as viewing land as “just land” in Northern Michigan anymore. It may be wild. It may be a refuge.

A playground. A home. A vacation property. It may lure

development. Or it may be something else entirely, something uniquely precious here: It could grow things.

Lots of things.

Michigan is one of the most diverse agricultural regions in the country, second only to California in the sheer variety of crops this soil and our coastal microclimates can yield. Cherries, yes, but also cucumbers, dry beans, squash, asparagus, sugar beets and dairy cows and hogs—more than 47,000 farms and 10 million acres of farmland. And while not all of its soil is good for growing, the glacial till left behind from the massive bodies of ice gave birth to a loamy mix of sand, silt and clay that, when managed properly, can coax all manner of things to life.

Including, it seems, a community.

At least that is the hope of farm owners Pete and Jolie Iacobelli. Pete’s family motto—passed on by his parents Mario and Jane Iacobelli, a.k.a. Nana and Boppy—has always been that any conversation that takes place over food is always better. It wasn’t long after 910 Media Group purchased the building and property, 13 years ago, that Pete began thinking of

illustration by Tim Hussey growing more than the broadcast business. “I started asking myself, ‘What if this empty land could become something more?’” That “more” took shape in his mind: A community hub. A portal for education. A spot to share joy, with live music and weddings and children chasing chickens and tasting carrots out of the garden.

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The challenge of course, as with any farm, is not the dream.

It’s growing and nurturing the vision into reality—and inviting other growers and families and locals and foodies along for the ride.

Imagine a memory that smells of the sweetness of strawberries, that tastes like the sour punch of rhubarb. This is what Iacobelli remembers from his mother’s garden—a classic kitchen plot, brimming with herbs and tomatoes and zucchini that seemed to reproduce themselves almost overnight in the heat of late summer.

“I saw these things transform into the foods we loved as a family—strawberry rhubarb pie, zucchini bread, spaghetti sauce,” he says. “It gave me a reason to spend time in the kitchen with my mom and grandma.” It taught him something no storebought food could do: To savor.

It’s a lesson he passes on without words; through, of all things, the perfect simplicity of an egg.

NanBop is a nascent farm—woven from part memory, part vision, part idealism and part pure, human hunger. The name is an homage to Iacobelli’s parents. On the farm’s logo stands a lone proud hen. “I want us to be known for eggs,” Iacobelli explains. “Because they mean so much to me as a dad, to us as a family.”

It happens now less than it used to, as Iacobelli’s kids grow and leave the nest; but one thing he knows for sure is that he can pull them in close with the sizzle of a frying egg, the scent of toasted homemade sourdough. “I’m not a great cook, but I make a great egg sandwich,” he laughs.

Whenever they had a cold ski practice looming, a tough day, or just needed the comfort that kids and teens crave but can’t always ask for, the Iacobelli children could always count on the soul nourishment of a simple egg sandwich with their dad.

It’s this notion of not only warmth, but also the conversation, “the civility,” Iacobelli says, that he finds beautifully compelling about creating and sharing simple, wholesome food.

“Gardens give you perspective,” he adds. “You work so hard to pull something out of the ground, that you really give thought to what you’ll do with it. You plan for it.

And I think that’s a pretty cool way to live.”

But it’s a far cry from a kitchen garden to a fully operational farm.

“Oh, we went into it pretty naïve, I know that now,” he admits.

The team started from zero, with soil that had never been farmed. For founding farmer Andrea Bushre, that was part of the excitement.

That first two years was a flurry of initiation. Planting the fruit trees. Welcoming the first flock of baby chicks. Constructing hoop houses to grow flowers and vegetables. “The beauty of this property was that there was nothing here to fix. There were no prior farming practice mistakes to undo,” she says.

Not that it was all smooth sailing. Weather is unpredictable. Drought or extreme rain can weaken plants and bring to life molds and fungus and send micro-organisms out of whack. And the chickens? As we’ve all come to learn this year, a flock can be a vulnerable thing.

“Failure is part of it,” Bushre says. “That’s how you learn.

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[Farmers] fail all the time and have to pivot to do something different. People think if one thing fails that means they can’t do it; it doesn’t work for them. But that’s not true and that’s not gardening or farming in general—things will fail. You just try something different. Farming means keeping an eye on the long term.”

For its first two years, the farm was in experimental mode, finding not only what the ground would yield, but also what the community needed.

As soon as outbuildings were completed, NanBop began processing herbs, flowers and veggies to create Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) shares, where locals could buy in for weekly bags of produce as well as loaves of local bread baked nearby in Cadillac.

With those first early yields, Iacobelli and the farm team started putting out feelers as to how NanBop would fit in with the community. The answers weren’t obvious at first.

“We’re the new kids here,” Iacobelli says.

The obvious first focus was sharing those early yields. In 2024, the team hit the farmers market circuit in earnest, offering eggs, tomatoes, squash, bundles of fresh herbs and a bucket of abundant sunflowers. Their CSA offerings also took off, bringing farm fresh produce options to both the Cadillac and Traverse City areas.

NanBop also partnered last summer with the Northwest Food Coalition’s Farm2Neighbor program to provide fresh eggs and produce at fair market wholesale prices to area food banks. The farm has a point of purchase onsite in Cadillac, too, where customers can pick up produce and eggs.

There’s hope that the farm and others like it can help soften the impact of food insecurity and food deserts—regions with a lack of easy access to healthy, affordable food—which affect rural areas in Northern Michigan.

Last year the farm also hosted visits of hundreds of area school children, as well as family events events and seasonal festivals, and educational workshops like wreath-building

“I STARTED ASKING MYSELF, ‘WHAT IF THIS EMPTY LAND COULD BECOME SOMETHING MORE?’”

and creating planters of cocktail herbs or salad greens.

Where once grass just rolled to a distant highway, there’s delicious diversity being coaxed from the ground.

But last year’s veggies and flowers are just the beginning of a farm journey that’s unique—and one where good company will be welcomed along the road.

Outside the two modern-looking farm buildings, two lone goats swagger in the driveway. Peg (because she’s white with one brown leg) and Amelia (because she’s

“flighty”) roam around, sussing out visitors and looking for head scratches. The two are, at the moment, some of the only signs of farm life on the property.

NanBop doesn’t feel like a farm in the traditional sense, because it isn’t. A feeling compounded by the chill in the air and banks of snow left from a once-in-a-decade winter.

But inside the farm ops building—a sort of multi-purpose space for planting and picking and washing and packaging—there is already an air of awakening energy.

Buckets are gathered for tapping the stand of maple trees that blanket the property. Down in the cellar, grow lights glow over soil-filled trays as the first seedlings of the season uncurl. The new farm director, Jason Abraham, who took over after Bushre, uncurls paper plans on a long white folding table. Aerial photographs of the farm are unrolled and stacked, marked with lines and circles showing where the pasture is thriving and where it’s not. Where there will APRIL 2025

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“THOSE CHICKENS HANGING OUT IN THE COOP?” ABRAHAM SAYS. “THEY ARE GOING TO GO TO WORK. WE WANT THEM OUT IN THE PASTURE.” be lavender and bees. Where a field of wildflowers will provide color and pollination.

The distance from idea to fruition feels shorter, now.

“Those chickens hanging out in the coop?” he says.

“They are going to go to work. We want them out in the pasture.” The big project, he says, will be the addition of a flock of Suffolk lambs, a breed known for its meat yield.

Abraham explains the lambs will graze in temporary fencing that moves around the pasture; once the lambs graze and move on, the chickens will arrive to forage for worms and bugs in the manure. Eventually, there will be pigs, who use their snouts as natural tillers to aerate and loosen the soil and uproot unwanted vegetation.

“I don’t necessarily believe that you have to be an organic farm to be a good farm,” Iacobelli says. “I don’t want to use pesticides and herbicides, but I don’t think organic certification should be the only or the ultimate goal, because being organic does not necessarily equate to good soil. Our question is, how are we going to have the tastiest, healthiest vegetables and food?” The answer is to follow some organic guidelines, but focus on regenerative practices, which incorporates two-legged and four-legged animals in the process.

According to current estimates, fewer than 2 percent of U.S. farms are considered regenerative. The beauty of regenerative farming—the flowers and pigs and lambs and maple trees and mushrooms and chickens—is that farm life takes on a seasonal rhythm, a symphonic hum. As the plots, pastures and crops are planned, what’s taking shape is a polyculture farm that is more traditional in scope, with simultaneous production of multiple crops that benefit each other and the land. To wit: the orchard will be flanked by rows of lavender, to draw pollinators and repel pests like flies, moths and wooly aphids. The lavender will be offered as U-pick, harvested eventually for products—not just soap and lotion, but also for teas, salves and culinary use.

But the longing right now, simmering under the excitement, is for NanBop to find community. Not just with

neighbors and customers and school kids and food pantries, but with other like-minded farmers looking to lean on each other—for ideas, events, a shared audience, even just a shared meal.

“We’re in our infancy, and we’ve opened up the door a little bit to other farmers,” Iacobelli explains. “We have so much to learn and so many relationships to build.” But anyone who’s ever grown something knows: many, if not most, feel like they are inventing it all as they go. But there’s nothing more soul affirming than the shared wisdom, hopes and victories, gardener to gardener. Farmer to farmer.

This, new lambs aside, is one of the most exciting adventures Iacobelli hopes to embark on with the farm team this year. “I’m hopeful to find ten, twelve other small farmers to share resources, where they could be comfortable on the farm,” he says, adding that in an ideal world, he’d find like-minded, community-forward farm folk who could come together and use the space to offer education and classes, to process and package, and engage with a shared customer base—hopefully over a farm-to-table meal or just a really good beer.

Farming is about making a living in one of the most pri-

mal and grueling and beautiful ways, but it’s also, as Iacobelli says, a mission. “I love being excited about what we all do; about being so good at producing certain things, and being able to share that with the world. That to me is just so freakin’ cool.”

He envisions community farm dinners and weddings, tucked in the birch and maple grove. Sure, egg sandwiches.

And grab-and-go salads. Maybe vintage campers, where folks can have an immersive farm stay or just host their guests for a really kicked-back, kick-ass event. Local music.

The clink of glasses. Laughter. The bleat of a faraway lamb.

The contented chortle of chickens settling in for the night.

One long ongoing conversational hum lasting deep into the night, as the sound of passing cars falls to the background and the headlights fade, summer stars washing over the Northern night sky.

Cara McDonald is the executive editor and Tim Hussey is the art director of Traverse Northern Michigan.

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northern home & cottage FOR THE WAY YOU L I VE UP NORTH

“There is something about this place that is special and difficult to put into words.”

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MODERN A-FRAME IN THE WOODS P. 36 A 1930S LOG CABIN RESTORATION P. 48

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I

n 2019, Ellen Fred, a land conservation attorney who works remotely, was looking to build a small dwelling tucked into the side of a hill in the Leelanau County woods that could be her office and eventually her home. It was more than serendipity that she connected with Marc O’Grady and Dwayne Johnson, who had just launched their home design company, beag+haus.

“Beag” means small in Gaelic and is a nod to both O’Grady’s Irish heritage and the partners’ mission to design homes that emphasize efficiency over size and fit into the Northern Michigan landscape.

“There is something about this place that is special and difficult to ON A HILLSIDE IN LEELANAU COUNTY, A MODIFIED put into words,” Johnson says. “You A-FRAME WITH DIMINUTIVE SQUARE FOOTAGE have to experience it—words and REACHES FOR THE SKY IN TANDEM WITH THE photos cannot begin to bring jusTREES THAT SURROUND IT. tice to the natural beauty.”

When she found out about

By L I S SA M A RT I N beag+haus, Fred knew immediPhotos by ERIN ATTWOOD / DUNE LIFE PHOTOGRAPHY ately that their philosophy jibed perfectly with her own. Likewise,

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Previous page: In true rustic-modern style, Fred mixed plain cement board siding and a red front door with repurposed old-growth redwood siding on her home’s exterior. This page: An abundance of windows and outdoor living areas make the small home live large.

she loved the choice of nine moderninspired home plans, running from 192 to 1,000 square feet, that O’Grady and Johnson presented. Fred chose the two-bedroom, one bath, 762-squarefoot plan called Punkt but opted to add a couple extra feet on each side of the original design’s square footage, plus a primary suite off one side of the initially rectangular plan, making room, among other things, for a second bathroom. The design is a modified A-frame, meaning that the facade rises from the foundation to peak in a triangular shape, while the actual roof does not reach the ground inside—adding dimension to the A-frame while solving the beloved style’s inherent issue of never enough vertical wall space to place furniture or cabinetry.

The home’s not-quite 1,300-squarefoot space lives much larger thanks to expansive custom windows that usher in the wooded view that drops into the Leelanau County lowlands. And generous outdoor living spaces include

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Photo by Beth Singer

“Architecture should speak of its time and place, but yearn for timelessness.”

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front and back decks and a balcony that looks over a little ravine and maple forest from the upstairs loft..

But it’s Fred’s own very special touch that really sets the interior apart. Just as she was about to begin the construction process, she came across a treasure trove of old-growth redwood used in the 19th and early 20th centuries for cherry-brining casks, wood that had been stored in an Old Mission Peninsula cherry orchard barn for decades. Fred discovered it for sale on Craigslist and bought the lot, using it in numerous artful ways throughout the home— cladding areas of the ceiling with it, as well as the statement wall that rises to the loft and the backside of a seating niche in the kitchen. The age-old wood sings in a singularly modern way as symmetrical slats in the railing across the open side of the loft. The redwood provided a particularly sentimental nod to Fred’s

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The upstairs loft houses the television. Note the asymmetrical railing that Fred had her carpenters build from the load of reclaimed old-growth redwood she purchased. The railing style, which she found on Pinterest, allows a view through the slats and out the great room windows with their soaring views of the Cedar Valley. The redwood was also used in the bedroom barn-style door, and to clad the back of a reading nook in the kitchen.

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history, as she had grown up surrounded by cherry orchards on Old Mission and had also lived many years among the redwoods in Northern California and has now spent decades working to protect both landscapes and others in her conservation law practice.

There was even enough of the redwood to clad part of the home’s exterior facade as well as a portion of the adjacent shed-roofed garage/guest loft that beag+haus also designed. With their simple soaring lines, the two buildings look as though they’ve grown up on the hillside as organically as the trees—just as Fred, O’Grady and Johnson envisioned they would.

The primary suite looks out on the gloriously wooded slope behind the home.

resources Designer: beag+haus Contractor: Jenema Builders Kitchen Design: Heather Neal Design Railing Welding: Ace Welding

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CABIN FEVER

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HOW FALLING MADLY IN LOVE WITH AN OLD LOG CABIN CHANGED ONE FAMILY’S PLANS FOR LAKEFRONT LIFE.

By L I S SA M A RT I N Photos by DIONEL LAKE / THE MITTENTOG

B ob and Jennifer Haadsma’s search for a buildable lot on Torch Lake took an unexpected turn when they came across a dilapidated log cabin next to a vacant lot. What seemed like a no-brainer to the couple—restore the log cabin to live in while building a home next door—was not so obvious to their children who, says Jennifer, were actually scared of it at first sight. “It was in dire need of some TLC,” she recalls. “Everything needed to be redone, from the windows, to the roof, to the chinking, to the floors. They were not very excited about us buying it.”

The family soon discovered the cabin had a background of unexpected pedigree. It was designed in the 1930s by E.E. Roberts—a contemporary of the more famous Frank Lloyd Wright who, like Roberts, had an architectural firm in Oak Park, Illinois. Roberts was enamored with the Prairie School style that Wright popularized, making his own mark with Oak Park’s Scoville Square building, which is one of the only commercial Prairie School–style buildings ever constructed. The Torch Lake cabin was a miniscule project in comparison— more Northwoods classic than Prairie Style— designed as a summer getaway by Roberts

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for well-heeled clients in Oak Park.

Delighted by their cabin’s history, the Haadsmas rolled up their sleeves and put together a restoration team headed up by AMDG Architects, based near the couple’s home in Ada, and J. Peterson Homes in Traverse City. Over the next three years, the team renovated the home inside and out. The experts at M&M Log Home Care power washed the logs, dug out the old chinking and replaced the foam insulation before re-chinking and sealing them. Next, the dilapidated cedar-shake roof was replaced with new highly durable, low-maintenance synthetic shake and new insulated Pella windows that replicate the originals.

The interior received much-needed electrical and lighting upgrades as well as a new vintage-style kitchen. Conspicuously lacking from the interior design is a television. “We wanted to honor the history of the cabin,” Jennifer says.

The pièce de résistance to the entire project is what the Haadsmas call the pavilion, a rustic modern space that juxtaposes with the cabin, definitively preserving its historic context, while serving as a visual transition to

Previous page: The pavilion is clad in an insect- and weather-resistant wood. This page: The pavilion opens up on two sides: to the lake and bonfire pit and to a common green-space that will be flanked on the other side by the Haadsmas’ new home. While completely redone, the kitchen retains its vintage aesthetic. Jennifer, who owns her own interior design firm, opted to keep some of the original furniture (specifically a huge dining table with benches that seat 16) but replace others, including the more comfortable sofa shown here.

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Building and Renovating Northern Michigan’s Finest Residences

joel@joelpetersonhomes.com • 516 E. Front St., Traverse City • 231.994.2168 0425 NHC_Peterson.indd 52

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The Haadsmas love their wooded location on a shallow nook of Torch Lake. All buttoned down, the pavilion shows off its cubist-style.

Jennifer selected all the textiles and new furnishings including the intimate and comfortable settee that echoes the fieldstone fireplace in shape and shade.

the contemporary/modern home that will be built on the adjoining lot. The pavilion, only nominally connected by six inches of wall to the cabin (to satisfy a zoning requirement), offers no egress into the cabin and functions in a much more up-to-date way. With a modern glass-paned garage door that opens to the lake, a fire pit and picnic patio, the pavilion is directly connected to the outdoors. Inside, the room is outfitted with a mini-bar, pizza oven, game and puzzle tables and yes, a television. “It tends to be the louder, kid-hangout area, and the quiet book-reading people tend to be in the log cabin,” Jennifer says. All of which means, of course, that the couple’s children, who once dreaded the project, are now crazy about it.

resources Architect: AMDG Architects Builder: J. Peterson Homes Interior Design: Jennifer Huyser Haadsma Landscaping: Drost Landscape Log Repair: M & M Log Home Care Windows: Pella, Andersen Windows Roofing: Eikenhout Electrical & Lighting: WPF Engineering, LLC Cabinets: Stillwater Custom Cabinetry Pavilion & Garage Siding: Delta Roofing & Siding Supply Furniture: Cabin: Klingman’s; Pavilion: Williams-Sonoma

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Photograhpy Credit - James Yochum Photography - jamesyochum.com

Photograhpy Credit - James Yochum Photography - jamesyochum.com

info@omw.tc I 231-947-2120 I oldmissionwindows.com

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The Cu l i nary North

“

local restaurants · craft drinks · seasonal cuisine

Fresh eggs are nature’s perfectly executed nourishment.

—CONTRIBUTOR EMILY TYRA

Bake a dessert to celebrate spring on page 59.

PETOSKEY’S NEW NEIGHBORHOOD BREWERY P. 57

CRACK INTO CRÈME BRÛLÉE P. 59

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The Cu l i nary North New in Town

DEFINING MODERN FERMENTATION At Elder Piper Beer & Cider in Petoskey, things keep getting curiouser and curiouser.

photos courtesy of Elder Piper Beer & Cider

T

by CARLY SIMPSON

race and eeva redmond spent a decade working for some of the best breweries in the country—Founders, Highland, Sierra Nevada—before returning to Eeva’s hometown with their own business plan in hand.

At the core of Elder Piper Beer & Cider is a love for exploration. Trace has developed hundreds of recipes throughout his career, playing with herbs, spices, bark, coffee and fruits. But at distributing breweries, consistency is key. “They sell six-packs in stores, so you have to hit a certain price point and volume. Since our business model is direct to consumer, it allows us flexibility,” he explains. Eeva, a certified cicerone and international beer competition judge, calls it their Island of Misfit Toys, a home for the many ideas they’ve jotted down over the years.

The name Elder Piper comes from a genealogy project; borrowed from one of Trace’s ancestors from the 1800s. “We really like the way Elder Piper inspires curiosity,” Eeva says.

“It makes you ask, ‘What’s that about?’ And that’s the way we want people to approach us—with curiosity.”

Tucked half a mile outside of downtown Petoskey, the 24-tap brewery sits within the laid-back Old Town Emmet neighborhood. There’s a baseball field a stone’s throw away and a trailhead just around the block leading to the North Country Trail. It’s housed in a quirky 1930s cinder block building that was once home to a Bell telephone switchboard. Two large garage doors open to a small beer garden, where some days you’ll find Stiggs Barbecue Wagon slinging smoked wings, plates of brisket and a panko-crusted catfish sandwich that’s exclusive to Elder Piper.

SIP: The Beach Grass Helles Lager

and Apple Blossom Cider are simple, elegant and approachable.

CELEBRATE: Elder Piper turns 1 the

weekend of June 6. Stop by Friday– Sunday for special releases and community activities.

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LOCAL TICKE T S .

ONE PLACE .

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The Cu l i nary North In the Kitchen

SPRING’S SWEETEST GIFT

by EMILY TYRA

Delicate lavender infuses this classic custard dessert.

F

resh eggs are nature’s perfectly executed nourishment. And as an ingredient, they’re amazingly versatile— delicious when fried sunny-side-up, whipped into billowy white meringue or whisked with cream to make a rich custard. As spring’s warmth returns, chickens begin laying more and, at a time when eggs are especially precious, this sweet recipe is a celebration.

^

Lavender Crème Brûlée Serves 6 8 lavender flower stems, fresh or dried 2 ½ cups heavy whipping cream 8 egg yolks ¼ cup granulated sugar 3 Tablespoons superfine or confectioner’s sugar for topping 1) Preheat oven to 350°F. Pull lavender flowers off their stems and place in a saucepan with the cream. Slowly bring the cream almost to a boil. Remove from heat and let stand for 30 minutes to allow the lavender to infuse with the cream.

photo by Todd Zawistowski

2) Use a whisk to mix the egg yolks and granulated sugar in a bowl. Re-heat the cream, then gradually mix it into the yolksugar mixture, stirring continuously.

Place six heatproof ramekins in a baking pan and strain the custard into the dishes.

3) Carefully pour water around the ramekins to make a water bath and bake at 350°F for 20 to 25 minutes, until the custards are set.

4) Transfer cooled dishes to the refrigerator and let chill for three hours.

Before serving, sprinkle the custards with sugar and caramelize with a butane torch.

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Love of the Land

get there

photo by Allison Jarrell Acosta

SPRING’S WILD RAMPS Pick pretty much any hardwood forest to trek through over the next couple months, and you’ll find long, leafy bunches of ramps popping up through last season’s leaves. As tempting as it may be to pluck a few of these wild alliums while you walk, it’s illegal in Michigan to harvest ramps from state-owned lands.

So how does one partake in this spring delight? If you’re lucky, you might have ramps growing on your own property. (If not, this is a great time to make new friends!) Just remember that to harvest sustainably, it’s important to take only one leaf per plant, leaving the bulb/roots and second leaf to continue growing. And it’s best to harvest only a small amount from large, wellestablished colonies.

If a friend does have ramps on their property, they may be open to letting you transplant some bulbs to your own yard. They’ll take a while to establish, but the wait is worth it.

For a quicker fix, keep your eyes peeled for seasonal ramp specials at local restaurants and check your favorite farmers market for certified foragers peddling pungent bundles of these garlicky greens. –A.J.A.

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