By Mike Weland
We’re still waiting for the official data to define this year’s Boundary County Fair, but if the response to one small plea is any indication — and experience says it is — this was a fair to remember.
There’s no question that it’s been a rough and unpleasant several months for the Bonners Ferry Senior Hospitality Center, and no question that a little good news would be as well received as a fall of rain after a desert drought.
Before the fair opened, kitchen manager Amy Leach asked for a little in return. Not for herself, but for the people who need and rely on the services offered by the center, one being regular meals. After all the hullabaloo of late, the center’s larders were thin, her freezer near bare.
Not really expecting much in the way of a response, she posted a short blurb on Facebook asking the community’s help.
Few people blessed to witness a desert bloom ever forget it … though many spend a lifetime wondering if what they think they saw is really possible.
Clouds form and move fast in the desert, and they’ll pass quickly over a sere brown landscape, seemingly all but lifeless, dumping a torrent in mere moments before the sun returns. Then, as if by magic, the desert floor transforms into swaths of stunning colors as plants long dormant, refreshed, burst suddenly into bloom.
In the wake of Amy’s request came a desert bloom of sort … or perhaps a Boundary County Fair bloom would be more accurate. From a torrent of donations, the barren freezer blossomed with freshly cut and wrapped packages of meat, all processed at Woods Meats and USDA certified as required for serving at the Senior Hospitality Center.
Co-op and H&S Unlimited each donated a sheep. Sugar Plum Floral, Houck’s Farm and Bonz Inc. each pitched in a pig, H&H Engineering donated two.
And some donors didn’t wait for the fair. Randy Ross donated a pig and pledged half a beef in February, with E.L. Internet NW donating the processing fee.
Folks at Accurate Northwest Autobody, Panhandle Towing and the Bonners Ferry Rotary went in together to donate $1,900, which will buy a half pig, half beef meat package Woods Meat Processing, Sandpoint, as there are no longer any USDA certified processors in Boundary County.
That much meat, Linda said, will last most of a year, and the only meat still needed is chicken, and if anyone would like to donate, the meat once again must be USDA approved; live chickens processed at Wood’s Meats, 482169 US-95, Sandpoint, or another certified USDA facility or cuts purchased at a grocery.
Which brings up the next big items on the Senior Center needs list — a replacement commercial stove and commercial grade pots and pans.
Not that anyone is complaining. The meals cooked and served by Amy the kitchen magician are proclaimed by many who enjoy them as the very best, both tasty and visually appealing, though most don’t know she makes her magic for a whole roomful of happy diners using one eight-inch frying pan and a single saucepan on an old stove with two burners and no oven.
“I watch what she does to make do and I still don’t see how she does it, day in and day out,” Linda said. “She is amazing. Just imagine what she could do if she had a proper kitchen!”
The stove they’re looking at has an oven, six burners and an interchangeable grill, which would open whole new vistas of culinary possibilities.
The unit they’re looking at is right around $10,000 delivered and installed, and so far, $1,500 in donations have been earmarked for the stove and Elk Mountain Farms has pledged $5,200, leaving just $3,300 to raise.
Being that close, Linda is already putting together a list of volunteers to help when out with the old day arrives to help with a deep cleaning of the kitchen before in with the new, likely on a Thursday to avoid disrupting the meal schedule.
To donate, volunteer or learn more, stop in at the Bonners Ferry Senior Hospitality Center, 6635 Lincoln Street between 8 a.m. and 3 p.m. Monday through Friday or call (208) 267-4421.
And it wasn’t just the senior center to benefit from the generosity of buyers at the 2024 market animal sale; Hope House received one animal, three went to the Shriners, four to the food bank and eight to the Restorium!