As Valentine’s Day approaches, our bartenders in the Saloon and Great Room aren’t content to just chill the champagne in anticipation of the celebration. They have been busy creating a seasonal cocktail menu that will give guests a taste of winter in Montana with Big Sky spirits and local ingredients. Just like Chef Drage’s menus, the cocktail menus change frequently, highlighting the holidays and activities that we enjoy. Read more…
Montanans take pleasure in foraging for seasonal ingredients. Guests who visited us in the spring might have enjoyed cuisine filled with flavorful morel mushrooms, gathered in the local forest. Now, the Flathead cherries have just been picked and huckleberry season is upon us. The recent heat wave means that the berries arrived early and will disappear fast thanks to foraging animals—bears and humans alike.
If you’re on the hunt for these elusive berries and you find a berry-rich hill, it’s a good idea to pick as many as you possibly can. We suggest reserving some for fresh uses, while divvying up the majority between preserves and freezer containers so that the sweet grape-like smell can linger in your kitchen year-round.
There are several types of huckleberries, but the two types that grow in our region of the Rockies are the black huckleberry, or Vaccinium membranaceum, and the blue Cascade huckleberry, with the fitting name of Vaccinium deliciosum.
The “A” in August must stand for “arid” because it’s the driest month on a Montana ranch resort. Ranchers don’t complain because the weather is ideal for cutting, raking and baling hay.
Soon we’ll be celebrating our all-inclusive Autumn Harvest Weekend and thinking about the fall colors, but for now, steady hot temperatures have us thirsty, conjuring up visions of the watering hole. Just like the best dude ranch vacations, the summer cocktail is all about balance—between salty and sweet, bubbly and still.
When six o’clock rolls around, Ranch guests head to The Great Room in the Granite Lodge to relax after a day of horseback riding , archery or hiking Montana trails. Cocktail connoisseurs may wonder what the world’s only Forbes Travel Guide Five-Star luxury guest ranch serves parched guests. Our bartenders craft drinks to taste, but we also offer seasonal drinks that use herbs from Chef Drage’s garden, syrupy stone fruit and foraged berries.
Here’s one of this year’s favorites—the Pintler Punch, named after the Pintler Mountain Range near The Ranch’s southern border. Read more…
