The Great Green Buff Road Trip: Day 1, Part 1

I am a native Oklahoman, but I definitely haven’t experienced everything this state has to offer. So when Green Girl Jessica suggested we take a road trip to explore the western part of the state, I was excited to dive into all the eco-travel opportunities found in Red Carpet Country and Kiamichi Country.

We climbed into our fabulous minivan (the only way to travel, right?) and headed north from Oklahoma City to our first destination, the Turtle Rock Farm Retreat in Billings. The drive only took about two hours, and on the way we stopped to stretch our legs in Guthrie. Since it is only a 30 minute drive from downtown OKC, Guthrie is a perfect getaway for a girls’ dinner or a family brunch. With its blocks of pristinely preserved buildings, it captures the essence of the early days of Oklahoma.


Guthrie once held the title of Oklahoma’s capitol, but it now holds the distinction of being the largest urban historic preservation district in the United States. The Western era is alive and well, with carriage rides, staged gunfights and plenty of food worthy of a cowboy-sized appetite. Jessica and I walked around the area while scouting the perfect restaurant. When we saw the crowds in Katie’s Diner, we knew we had found the place to lunch with the locals.

We walked back to the car after lunch (we definitely needed the exercise after eating dessert), and made tracks for Billings. If you get anything out of this post, make it this piece of advice: your GPS doesn’t know everything. We got slightly lost, but after traipsing down a few dirt roads and enjoying the Oklahoma scenery along the way, we finally arrived at the Turtle Rock Farm Retreat in Billings.

This farmhouse, where Ann and Pat grew up, is over a century old and now houses guests of the farm.

Turtle Rock is the ultimate oasis for those who want to explore the spiritual side of sustainability. Owners Ann McFerron and Pat Hoerth offer workshops and seminars centered on the reasons to go green. While Jessica and I didn’t experience any classes, we did take time to pet all the farm animals and to step inside the farm’s teepee. We also enjoyed the peacefulness of the straw bale hermitage, a small cabin constructed from materials found on the farm. No matter where you stay on the farm, the hospitality of the McFerron and Hoerth will make your trip memorable.

What farm visit would be complete without petting the animals? These sweet goats loved the attention.

The straw bale hermitage kept its cool through 18 inches of straw insulation.

Homemade, Local and Did We Mention Downright Sinful?

When was the last time you ate at a restaurant that made their own butter? Or tasso? Or andouille sausage? My guess is most of us would answer, “Never.”

Well now you have the opportunity to change all that. Step into Lunabread, a sweetly cozy six-table eatery specializing in Cajun and Metro cuisine on 15th Street in Tulsa’s Cherry Street District. Everything on their menu is made-from-scratch with as many local ingredients as possible.

Lunabread’s eclectic atmosphere offers plenty of spots for relaxing with a good book and some of their doubleshot French Press Coffee, cream sodas or organic free-trade tea.

Never underestimate the value of a comfortable chair beside a window in a room filled with light, art and a delicious fusion of aromas emanating from the kitchen. If the chair is colorful – even better.

Mandatory for all great eateries – a nook with plenty of room for interesting things. Lunabread passes the category with flying colors.

This is April, our very friendly and helpful waitress. She made sure we had everything we needed and patiently educated us about tasso, a spicy, peppery Cajun ham made right there at Lunabread. We didn’t taste it this go round but have added it as a must for our next Lunabread visit. Can’t wait!

And now for the main attraction … food!

My friend Ron Ferrell, sculptor and prolific gardener from Jones, Okla., ordered the cornbeef and hash with crawfish. The beef was house cured and slowly stewed with organic potatoes, crawfish and topped with eggs over easy. Mouth watering yet?

I ordered the crab cakes Benedict – poached eggs on top of ‘Nola style (a.k.a. New Orleans) crab cakes and sauce cherone. After chowing down on this, other eggs Benedict seem like pale blobs of pabulum.

Ron digs in. Like me, he excels at eating and is a connoisseur of local Okie goodness. Ron is also an expert biscuit maker and had great appreciation for Lunabread’s homemade biscuits which were light and baked just right – slightly crunchy on the outside, flaky on the inside.

Paired with Lunabread’s homemade butter – well holy cow doesn’t even begin to describe it. Let’s just say any time you are within 200 miles of Tulsa, make nabbing homemade biscuits and butter at Lunabread a priority.

Meet Chris Foster, Lunabread’s owner, baker and dessert maker. We loved Chris’ hat and serious passion for local food. He was born in New Orleans and together with his business partner, Paul Wilson, who lived and trained in New Orleans, they head up creating the good eats at Lunabread. That commitment to New Orleans jazzes the taste and style of much of the menu and kicked the dishes we feasted on into Cajun heaven. Delectably sinful!

Part of Lunabread’s secret is those local ingredients. There’s just no replicating the taste of fresh – and once your palette acquires that knowledge, you never want to go back. Just a few of Lunabread’s sources: The yogurt in Lunabread’s dishes is produced by Wagon Creek Creamery near Helena; wheat comes from John’s Farm & Cattle Tracks near Fairview; beef from Natural Farms in Tulsa. Chris buys his pigs whole from Pork & Greens near Broken Arrow and uses every part of the pig – that’s where the homemade tasso and andouille sausage come from.

Ron and Chris discuss the finer points of biscuit making. My mouth was too full to add much to the conversation and I’m a biscuit-making novice anyway.

The board shown here highlights some of what’s on the menu, which is small and changes often according to what is available from season to season. The day we visited some of the other luscious goodies we had a hankering to try but didn’t (we didn’t want to be gluttons) were housemade andouille sausage, white gravy and pork fat biscuits, and Southern eggs benedict – organic stone grits topped with a poached egg, sausage and gravy. If your mouth is not watering now, you likely no longer have a pulse. We were also sorely tempted by the desserts – white chocolate bread pudding with hard sauce, organic raspberry tart with peppercorn gelato, Belgian chocolate torte royale. See what I mean – more sin!

I glimpsed the biscuits and gravy from across the room on another customer’s plate and now I can’t get that vision out of my mind. With such a serious obsession, another Lunabread experience is at the top of my must-do list. This kind of “sinning” can’t happen too soon.

A Day at the Nest: Visiting Birdie

The brilliance and beauty behind Birdie is Katie Huskerson. Birdie and Katie are almost one in the same. When you walk into Birdie it is light and lovely, just like Katie. Katie’s kindness and creativity is in every part of her store. Pieces from flea markets that I would call garbage have been given a second life, restored and placed with care to showcase her beautiful bouquets of flowers and thoughtfully selected house wares. Katie is a florist and her approach is elegant yet fresh. Her commitment to sustainably grown and locally grown flowers means her arrangements feature wildflowers, Oklahoma flowers and color schemes that go beyond traditional arrangements.

Katie’s creativity as a florist spills over to Fin and Feather the clothing side of the store where she carries items for men and women. All items have been chosen with the same care she shows with the floral side of Birdie. The clothing items are either organic, hand-made, fair trade, recycled, natural or some combination of those five. For me, the phrase “green clothes” conjures up images of faux hippies at Bonnaroo or the Jesus rope sandals I had my freshman year of college. Really earthy, not necessarily really fashionable. But the jewelry, clothes and handbags Katie picks are modern and practical yet unique and stylish. She knows the stories behind the brands and has picked them with intention.

The word “boutique” gets thrown around about as much as the word “green” so to call Birdie a green boutique would be easy but somewhat of a disservice. Rather Birdie is a true local store meaning they know their suppliers, pick their products with care and build relationships with their consumers and their community. Stopping by Campus Corner in Norman and meeting Katie yourself is a must and I guarantee you will find something truly green and special.

You will also want to mark your calendar for August 27^th for the Dustbowl Arts Market. Katie is one of the co-founders of this biannual event that sells art and handmade wares that will debunk your traditional notion of “craft show.” It is easy to buy local when the selection is this good.

Gloss Mountain State Park

Lacey and I took a trip to Gloss Mountain State Park a few weeks ago. I've been pretty tied up in the office and at home lately, so let me apologize upfront about how late this post is.

That said, Gloss Mountain is easily one of my most favorite spots to visit in the state. Located about two hours from Oklahoma City, a little north of the town of Fairview, Gloss Mountain holds its status as one of Oklahoma's most beautiful, yet most obscure parks.

I'm not exactly sure why more people don't know about this place. Granted this park doesn't offer camping, boating, fishing, cabins, or most of the other kinds of amenities associated with Oklahoma State Parks, but the scenery alone should make this a more sought after destination.

The sights and sounds of the area are pretty much right in line with what most people imagine the wild west to look like. Orange mesa cap the sky while the squawks of hawks and buzzards can be heard echoing down from the sky. The view from the top of Gloss Mountain is breathtaking, laying out miles and miles of prairie floor for as far as the eye can see.

It was pretty hot and sunny the day we visited. Absolutely no one else was at the park, which despite all my complaining above, made for a wonderful afternoon. The stillness of the day must have been hospitable for the local wildlife, because we saw a whole assortment of birds, lizards, deer, insects, and more just within the hour or two we spent walking around.

Like I mentioned earlier, you're not going to find too much in the way of camping and typical outdoor recreation at Gloss Mountain. It's really made more for an afternoon away from home. But trust me, in terms of scenery, and good ol' fashioned peace and quite, its second to none.

-Austin

Treat Your Mom to an Oklahoma Adventure

Mother’s Day 2011 is now a memory but don’t let that stop you from giving your mom special Oklahoma adventures throughout the year.

A couple of years ago our family started a new Mother’s Day tradition and gave my mother and mother-in-law a day trip to a couple of special Oklahoma destinations. To avoid the crowds we chose the Saturday after Mother’s Day for our first adventure and headed to Ponca City, known for its rich, colorful blend of American Indian, Western and oil boom history.

To fuel up for touring the ornate and historical Marland Mansion, we opted to first have lunch at Enrique’s Restaurant, a legendary local eatery self-described as “the hottest jalapeno on the runway,” so named for where it’s sited -- right next to the runway at the Ponca City Airport Municipal Airport. Having visited Enrique’s on previous trips, we knew the delights of the restaurant’s robust menu of fresh, flavorful Mexican food and of watching planes land and passengers debark and saunter into the restaurant like they would from a car.

Enrique’s puffy hand-made corn tortillas are paradoxically both crunchy and chewy, and transcend the genre, especially when paired with the restaurant’s piquant salsa, and the flavorful chicken tortilla soup was another big hit with our family.

Just down the road from Enrique’s lies the Marland Mansion, built between 1925 and 1928 at a cost of $5.5 million as the home of Oklahoma’s 10^th governor, oilman E.W. Marland. Touring the mansion was a fascinating and nostalgic trek for our mothers, who remembered the styles reflected in the historic mansion’s opulent furnishings.

Known as the “Palace on the Prairie” and built by master architect John Duncan Forsyth in Mediterranean Revival style, this palatial National Historic Landmark feels as though it could be the setting for F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby.” Lavish embellishments and artifacts glitter and sparkle at every turn in the 43,561-square-foot mansion. We had fun imagining the dinner parties held in the luxurious dining room.

Place settings that would have impressed nobility from any country.

From the imported Waterford crystal chandeliers -- the crowning the glory to the ballroom -- to the 24 karat gold-leaf mosaic domed ceiling worth more than $1.4 million in the gallery level of the mansion, each of the mansion’s four levels revealed luxurious treasures beyond imagining.

Chandelier gazing.

Intricate ceiling.

A grand hallway was stunning as were an elevator lined in buffalo skin, delicate hand-carved details in lime wood and oak paneled walls, rich tapestries and Sheffield plate wall sconces, ornate ceilings.

Everything so beautiful and intricate that at one point we all just sat down and stared at the ceiling for a good long while. The necks tend to get a little sore from all that looking up. 

And then we toured the bedrooms, many of them, ten in all.

And this beauty was one of them.

Grace at every turn.

Marland’s office.

There are 12 bathrooms scattered throughout the mansion. Lydie’s bathroom was particularly lovely. Lydie was Marland’s adopted daughter and after his first wife passed away, he later had the adoption annulled and Lydie became his wife.

So many enticing little details -  note the special shower setting for tepid.

The mansion itself is just a starting point for all there is to see. The grounds are lush and extensive and include an artist studio, oil museum, Lydie's cottage  and Lake White Marsh, named after Marland's yacht.

By all accounts our family had a grand time exploring these two Ponca City destinations, but the greatest treasure of all wasn’t found in the tasty food at Enrique’s or the lavish display of wealth at the Marland Mansion. It was the gift of time spent with our mothers, of seeing the pleasure they took in the sights, of the memories we created in our time together -- altogether totally priceless.