PREFACE
The mo~ h\"equenf question asked of me is how I became interested in food and drink of
the early West. Though I ve always had an adventuresome palate and enjoyed amateur
cooking， the serious beginning point came in 1962， I d bought some land in the foothills
southwest of Denver. By sheerest chance， I came across a picture of Bent s Old Fort， an historic
fur Irade fort of early Colorado. It looked like a castle， made of adobe bricks. The idea of
living in a fort fascinated me， and shortly I began construction of a full-sized replica to serve
as my home. Within a year it was completed， but， in order to pay the large mortgage， it was
decided to turn a large part of the building into a restaurant.
Jumping into the restaurant business was an education. I really had to learn to cook. This
meant cooking for several hundred persons al a time， My research into the history of Bent s
Fort and the fur trade brought me to reading over 2，000 journals and diaries of the period.
Sure enough， one of the most written-about Iacets of life in those days was mealtime. Possibly
the mosl outlandish recipe was \"mouffle7 This is boiled moose nose. I had asked my game
purveyor in Montana to save me some moose noses， for I had read about a favorite dish of the
French-Canadian trapper culled \"mouffle~ and I was determined to try it. The noses arrived，
each about three feet long and covered with thick hair. According to the recipe I d found in
Canada， the cook was instructed to put the nose on a stick and hold it over the fire until the
hair burned oil. I built a fire on the courtyard of The Fort， and that evening customers walking
by sow me roasting a long， ugly， hairy nose over the tire， The smell was hideous. Later I
brushed it clean with a wire brush and soaked it overnight in salt water to remove any burnt
hair flavor.
The moose nose was then boiled with a bit of onion， bay leaf， peppercorn and salt. It
turned out to be dull in flavor， extreh~ely bland， and somewhat like a pickled pig s toot in
consislency. I put it on the menu tar SI.50 per portion， served cold， sliced， and with a piquant
sauce. One evening a disbelieving guest wagered Sl00.00 to another that the \"boiled moose
nose\" on the menu wasn t really moose nose. He lost.
Remember too， that cooking isn t a science， It s an art lhat comes from a familiarity with
the characteristics at your ingredients combined with your own creative touch， Recipes are
only like roadmaps--how you travel and where you end up depends on you. Good luck..，
Sam Arnold
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