By First cutting done and stacked. The weather held and the hay is good and the barn has the smell that means the summer is already worth what it cost in early mornings and aching arms. Dad and I walked the bale stacks Saturday and he ran his hand along the top row and said: That's good hay. That's the equivalent of a standing ovation from Patrick Gallagher. I accepted it the same way he offers it: without fuss.
Posted a piece about haying this week — specifically about the solstice haying, the longest day of the year spent in an alfalfa field. About the solstice as a marker and the work as its own marker and the intersection of the two being more than the sum. Someone in the comments said I wrote about manual labor the way other writers write about prayer. I sat with that for a day. I think it's close to accurate, though I'd say work and prayer are the same thing for a person who doesn't separate them.
Linda Owens is coming to Montana in August. Her sister Margaret too. She wrote asking if they could visit the ranch — she'd like to see where I live, she said, the place I write about. I said yes immediately, and then sat at the kitchen table for a few minutes thinking about what it would mean to have Linda Owens on the ranch. The woman whose son I was present at the death of, standing in the kitchen, seeing the kitchen table and the workbench shelf and the framed landscape I bought in Livingston the first summer of sobriety. I'd like it. It feels right. Some things need to be inhabited in physical space to be fully real.
Made cold-brew coffee for the first time — a quart jar, coarse ground, water, twenty-four hours in the refrigerator. The gentlest cup I've made. Good haying week beverage.
That quart jar of cold-brew got me thinking about the whole category of slow, gentle things — the ones you set up and walk away from and come back to when the work is done. A banana bread smoothie is in that same family: simple ingredients, nothing fussy, and the kind of reward that feels proportionate to the effort of a good haying week. I’ve been making this on mornings after long days in the field, and it sits right alongside everything else that made this week worth it.
Banana Bread Smoothie
Prep Time: 5 minutes | Cook Time: 0 minutes | Total Time: 5 minutes | Servings: 1
Ingredients
- 1 large ripe banana, frozen
- 3/4 cup cold brew coffee or cold brewed coffee, chilled
- 1/2 cup milk of choice (whole, oat, or almond)
- 2 tablespoons almond butter or peanut butter
- 1 tablespoon maple syrup or honey
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1/2 cup ice cubes
Instructions
- Prep your banana. Peel and freeze a ripe banana overnight, or at least 4 hours ahead. A frozen banana gives the smoothie its thick, creamy texture and natural sweetness — the riper the better.
- Combine ingredients. Add the frozen banana, cold brew coffee, milk, almond butter, maple syrup, vanilla extract, cinnamon, and nutmeg to a blender.
- Add ice. Drop in the ice cubes on top of the other ingredients. This helps the blender pull everything together smoothly.
- Blend until smooth. Blend on high for 45–60 seconds until completely smooth and no banana chunks remain. If it’s too thick, add a splash more milk and blend for another 10 seconds.
- Taste and adjust. Taste for sweetness and spice — add a touch more maple syrup if your banana wasn’t very ripe, or another pinch of cinnamon if you want more warmth.
- Serve immediately. Pour into a tall glass and drink right away. Best enjoyed after a long morning of work, sitting somewhere quiet.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 380 | Protein: 10g | Fat: 14g | Carbs: 54g | Fiber: 5g | Sodium: 95mg