A Visit to Amish Country

Hi everyone! Jan here, with a trip to Amish Country where the food is fabulous!

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Last week I told you about Ada, the heroine of my story in the collection, An Amish Christmas Kitchen. 

This week we'll learn a bit about the hero of the story, Matthias Yoder. 

Matthias is a quiet young man, a skilled wood worker, and the newest employee at Ada's family's business, Heritage Amish Furniture in Shipshewana, Indiana. Of course, the business is fictional, but it is based on the many family owned furniture shops in Indiana's Amish Country.

Matthias remembers Ada from their days together at school, but his family moved to Wisconsin soon after they both graduated from the eighth grade. Now that he is back and living in Shipshewana again, he is becoming reacquainted with the old neighborhood. He especially is happy to learn to know Ada again.

Ada's father sees Matthias' talent, and gives the young man more responsibilities. He takes Matthias along on a visit to a customer's house, and then to lunch afterward.

If you're familiar with Shipshewana and the many fabulous restaurants there, you might be surprised that they went to a little nearby town - Topeka, Indiana - to a restaurant that isn't as well known among the tourists.

Tiffany's is usually busy. There are some four-top tables, but most of the tables are long, with at least fifteen chairs on each side. Groups sit where they can, and often strike up conversations with the folks sitting nearby - strangers or not.

To do a lunch at Tiffany's justice, you need to start with the salad bar (it comes with your meal!) Matthias did, and filled his plate.

Next is the main course.

Matthias ordered roast beef and mashed potatoes. The last time we were there, I ordered the chicken and noodles while my dear husband got a turkey Manhattan.

Both are delicious!

And you can't leave without pie. You just can't!

You can choose from a dozen kinds, made fresh each day. We chose pecan...

...and custard.

You know the pie is good when your plate ends up looking like this!

Matthias enjoyed lunch at Tiffany's with his employer. He came away from the meal with...well...I better not tell you. I don't want to spoil the story!

But there's a problem when you write a scene during a meal for your characters...I've been craving a Tiffany's lunch ever since then! We haven't stopped in Topeka during our last couple trips to Indiana.

What about you? Do you think you'd enjoy an occasional Amish style meal? I know I do!

Jan Drexler spent her childhood dreaming of living in the Wild West and is now thrilled to call the Black Hills of South Dakota her home. When she isn’t writing she spends much of her time satisfying her cross-stitch addiction or hiking and enjoying the Black Hills with her husband of more than thirty-seven years.

A Spring Visit to Amish Country and a Cover Reveal

by Jan Drexler

We spent the past week visiting family in Michigan and Indiana, and of course we included a tour through Amish Country!

Indiana's Amish Country is full of farms and seemed a bit crowded compared to our wide open prairies in South Dakota! But at the same time, it's home.

It was also Ascension Day, so the Amish families were spending the day observing the holiday with family. We saw several farms with many buggies parked in the drive.

Since it was a holiday for the Amish, it was a day of rest for the horses, too!

Another bonus? We saw babies of all kinds!

This mama was watching over two sleeping foals in this pasture. These are draft horses - huge horses! The day before this, we saw a farmer plowing with a team of eight of these horses, four in front and four behind. There is a lot of power in those muscles!

There were also plenty of lambs, kids, and calves with their mothers, too. But the cutest was this little guy:

There is nothing better than a passel of baby animals to welcome spring, is there?

And now it's time to reveal my new cover!

Order this book here!
Due to be released Sept. 18, 2018

"The Sound of Distant Thunder" is the first in my new series from Revell, The Amish of Weaver's Creek. The series is set in the Holmes County, Ohio Amish community during the American Civil War.

Here is a little bit about the story:

 Katie Stuckey and Jonas Weaver are both romantics. Seventeen-year-old Katie is starry-eyed, in love with the idea of being in love, and does not want to wait to marry Jonas until she is eighteen, despite her parents' insistence. So much can happen in a year. Twenty-year-old Jonas is taken in by the romance of soldiering, especially in defense of anti-slavery, even though he knows war is at odds with the teachings of the church. When his married brother's name comes up in the draft list, he volunteers to take his brother's place. But can the commitment Katie and Jonas have made to each other survive the separation?

From the talented pen of Jan Drexler comes this brand new Amish series set against the backdrop of the Civil War. She puts her characters to the test as they struggle to reconcile their convictions and desires while the national conflict threatens to undermine and engulf their community.

Revisiting Amish Country

It's deadline time for me - I have a book due on Tuesday, and I still have several thousand words to write. So I'm sharing this post from almost five years ago when I took a trip to Indiana's Amish Country.

One interesting thing about that trip was that I was beginning to work on "Hannah's Choice" and I knew I wanted to make a series out of the three books I was planning. I didn't have the series name yet, but after visiting Pretty Prairie, I knew I was on the right track. So The Journey to Pleasant Prairie was born. :-)

Another fun thing about this post is that I'll be making another trip to Amish Country next week, and yes, I have a list for E & S Sales. I can hardly wait!

Meanwhile, enjoy your trip to Amish Country!

* * * * * *

Hi everyone!

Jan here, finally back from my week-long trip east to visit parents and in-laws.

And yes, I did squeeze in a couple days of research, too!

This is the headstone of my 4th great-grandfather, Christian Plank. He was born in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania in 1793 and died in LaGrange County, Indiana in 1881. It was important to find his grave because he's the one whose story I'm basing my next book series on.

This is the area where he lived and raised his family. It's called Pretty Prairie. Isn't that the greatest name?

One of the fun things about looking for Christian Plank was that my Dad came along - the family historian - and he got to learn a few things he didn't know, either!

(How many times do you get to teach your Dad something?)

In all that driving around in northern Indiana, I still managed to fit in a visit to my favorite store: E & S Sales in Shipshewana, Indiana. 

Notice the buggy parking on the left side of the building!

Shipshewana rivals Lancaster, Pennsylvania and Holmes County, Ohio as an Amish tourist destination…

(By the way, that’s a destination where tourists go to see Amish, not a destination for Amish people who want to be tourists. They go to all the same tourist places the rest of us do.)

…except that Shipshewana is smaller. More manageable. And there are still stores at the edge of town where the locals shop. 

 (We managed to find some pie, and some Chicken 'N' Noodles...)

Since my Dad is a local, he told me about E & S Sales several years ago, and now it’s a regular stop whenever we’re in the area.

The Shipshewana area - in fact most of eastern Elkhart and LaGrange Counties in northern Indiana – has been home to the Amish since 1841, when the first four families from Somerset County, Pennsylvania came to the area to establish a new community. Other Amish families followed (Christian Plank and his family arrived around 1850), and now the area is the third largest Amish settlement in the world, after Holmes County and Lancaster County.

The Amish prefer to be farmers, but when families grow and there are a limited number of acres of farmland, people either have to leave the community to go where land is available, or find another kind of work. That’s what the Eash family did a generation or so ago.

They started selling goods in their front yard along State Road 5, a half mile south of Shipshewana. They were in a good location, and people liked the furniture and other things they made, so they were doing pretty well. They’re still there at that location: Eash Sales.

But as the next generation came along, someone decided to get into the bulk food business, and E & S Sales was born. They built a pole barn next to the original location and started selling re-packaged bulk foods. They take the huge amounts of flour, sugar, salt, spices, candy, cereal, noodles, etc. and break it down into family sized packages and re-sell the goods at a phenomenal price. 

As the business grew, they started carrying seconds, overstocks and Amish-made foods – still at rock bottom prices. 

On my first visit there, I bought 150 pounds of wheat, and now I’m addicted.

It’s my stock-up store. And I live 1000 miles away :(

We go every six months or so – whenever we’re in the area. This time I focused on spices. Because the owners of E & S buy in bulk, they sell at those prices. I bought all these spices for what I would have spent on a few small containers at the grocery store. 

I’ll put them in my freezer and replenish my smaller containers when I need to.

I’m not sure I’ll ever have to buy spices again…

And, by the way, the next generation of Eash’s has started another business right next to E & S – Ben’s Bakery. Don’t get me started on that one!

* * * * * * *

One fun thing about this post is that I'm still using that stash of spices almost five years later!

Enjoy your week!

Jan Drexler lives in the Black Hills of South Dakota with her husband and growing family. When she isn't writing, she loves hiking in the Hills or satisfying her cross stitch addiction.

You can find Jan on Facebook, Jan Drexler, author, or her website, Jan Drexler.com.

Jan's Amish Three-Bean Salad

Jan here, just back from a trip to Amish Country. Oh, the scenery! The simple sound of trotting horses along country roads! The simpler, slower pace of life!

The food!

I have to admit, I love food in Amish Country. Not souse so much, as you can see in the following post, but mush, scrapple, chicken pie, chicken and noodles, three-bean salad... All foods I grew up on!

Don't forget the pie!!!! 

Since I've been traveling for the past ten days, you get a re-run of a post I wrote after a visit to Amish Country four springs ago...

Jan's Amish Three-Bean Salad

Jan here, home from a week long trip to visit family back East in Amish Country.

Now some of you might think Amish Country is in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, or even Holmes County, Ohio. And while there are large Amish settlements in both of those places, real Amish Country is in LaGrange and Elkhart Counties in northern Indiana.


Of course, when you visit Amish Country, you have to eat. And yes, we went to the best restaurants and had the best soups, mashed potatoes and PIE!!!

But I thought you'd like a look at my dad's refrigerator. This is the kind of stuff he keeps on hand for lunches....

These are the meats for sandwiches.

On the left is turkey...the kind normal people buy.

The top center? That's Lebanon baloney. Pure heaven. Oh my. I can taste it now, just looking at that slice....

But the other stuff? Souse.

Souse is made by taking all the leftover pig stuff after you're done butchering, adding in some onions and peppers, adding some good, rich broth, putting it all in a loaf pan and letting it solidify into a block of...this.

I tried it. I won't be making any at our house. I'll let your imagination figure out what parts of a pig would be leftover after making ham, bacon and sausage.


And now the cheeses.

Clockwise from the lower left: Colby from the Amish cheese factory out near Middlebury, Baby Swiss from Holmes County, smoked Gouda, New York Cheddar packaged by Yoder's Market in Shipshewana, and a bit of Muenster.

When you make a sandwich with wheat bread, spicy mustard, turkey and some of that Baby Swiss, you've got yourself a good sandwich!

Here's the final thing to round out a good, Amish Country lunch - Three Bean Salad.

Dad buys his from Das Dutchman Essenhaus (just the best restaurant in the area. Take a look at it here), and it's the tastiest commercial Three Bean Salad I've ever had.

My mom used to make it quite often in the summer, and several years ago I developed my own super simple recipe.

Jan's Three Bean Salad

Ingredients:

1 can green beans, drained
1 can yellow (or wax) beans, drained
1 can kidney beans, drained
1/2 small onion, sliced thin and separated into rings
1/4 cup green pepper, cut in 1/2" chunks
1 cup Italian salad dressing or use this recipe for a more traditional dressing:
- 1/2 cup vinegar
- 2 Tablespoons oil
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- pinch black pepper

Combine all the ingredients and refrigerate for at least 90 minutes. Drain the excess salad dressing before serving.

Now you're all set for an Amish Country lunch!

Don't forget! Naomi's Hope is coming out next month! You can pre-order your copy by going to my website and following the link to your favorite on-line retailer! www.JanDrexler.com

Despite growing pains in her 1846 Amish community in Indiana, Naomi Schrock has settled into a comfortable life in her parents’ home with her adopted son, Davey. Surrounded by family and friends, she tries not to think about the fact that she’s not at the top of any man’s list of potential wives. Yet when Cap Stoltzfus moves into the area and befriends Davey, Naomi finds herself caught between the plans she has made for her future and the tantalizing thought that Cap might be part of a life she never dared to hope for.

When a couple shows up claiming to be Davey’s true family, Naomi and Cap must unite to make the decision that will determine the boy’s future as well as their own. How can she relinquish him to these unknown relatives? And can God somehow bring wholeness to her heart?

Jan Drexler loves her family, her home, cooking and just about anything made by hand. But she loves her Lord most of all.

Stop by Jan's website to learn more about her books: www.JanDrexler.com

Reveling in Amish Quilts!

If you remember last week, I shared a rerun recipe because I was on the road. I'm still on the road this week, but I thought you'd like to see a little bit of what I'm doing.

On Tuesday, I was with my aunts. If you've read "A Mother for His Children," you'll recognize their names: Martha, Waneta and Nancy. Mary was also there - not one of the sisters, but an in-law who is a blessing to the family and my Uncle Jim...and providentially missed growing up in that crazy family :)

Uncle, aunts and a neighbor in their younger days.

On this trip to Middlebury, Indiana (the heart of Indiana's Amish Country), the aunts and I spent some time at The Quilt Shop @ Essenhaus. If you love quilts - especially Amish quilts - this is the place to go!

The proprietor, Roz, was very helpful as we all poured over the antique quilts Nancy and Mary had brought. She helped Nancy choose two of hers to sell in the shop as consignments.

After oohing and aahing over the antique quilts (sorry, no pictures - I was too busy oohing and aahing - but I wish I had taken some!), we browsed through the shop.

Beautiful quilts hang from the rafters of the shop. These are locally made and quilted. And yes, by hand. Gorgeous!

Smaller items like wall hangings are also offered for sale.

Roz and her crew also carry a full line of quilting supplies.

It was a fabulous visit, and made me wish I still had time for quilting!

Someday....someday.....

If you're ever in the Middlebury/Shipshewana area, be sure to stop by Roz's shop. Or you can visit on-line! www.EssenhausQuiltShop.com

Quilts, Pieces and Memories

I wanted to call this post, "Among the Things I Used to Do."

Our lives have seasons. Times change, circumstances change, people change. And the seasons turn from one to another.

One of the things I used to do in another season was quilt.

I love quilting! Everything from designing the quilt top, to selecting the fabrics, to cutting out the pieces with as little waste as possible, to measuring out each length of thread.

I'm an old fashioned quilter. The fewer machines that touch the fabric, the better.

The quilt I'm working on now I was working on before I signed my first book contract is a reproduction of a Civil War era quilt that uses tiny pieces, all hand stitched.

I wonder sometimes if I'll ever get back to it....

But I come from a long line of quilters.

This beautiful quilt was made by my great-great-grandmother, Eliza Mummert Sherck. The pattern is "Mariner's Compass." I mentioned it in my book, A Mother for His Children - it's the quilt Ruthy's mother made for Waneta's future wedding.

A quilt is a legacy of love, passed from one generation to another. Every hand that works on a quilt leaves a little bit of the quilter behind, and every quilter lives on in the quilts that are treasured for years after they pass on.

It's this love of quilting that makes my feet slow down when I pass the quilting room at Greencroft, the Mennonite home where my dad now lives. Go here if you want to learn about this fabulous place.

Down the hall from Dad's apartment is this place where quilters meet. Since we're usually there in the evening or early morning, I don't often see the quilters at work, but I've admired the quilts through the window.

The quilters, all Mennonite and Brethren ladies, with a few Methodists and Baptists, etc. thrown in, always have a quilt in the frame. Most of them are made by ladies in the community who bring their quilts in to be stitched.

The quilters all donate their time, and the money they earn goes to charity.

They stitch everything from quilt tops to wall hangings, and sometimes even a quilt one of their group has pieced.

Stitch by patient stitch.

With a lot of visiting going on around the quilt frame, too!

Before we left Goshen on our last visit there, I peeked in the window of the quilting room, and one of the ladies was already hard at work! It was a pleasure meeting Velma Plank and visiting with her about the Greencroft quilters.

Of course, a double pleasure, since one of my great-great-grandmothers was a Plank, and in Mennonite and Amish Country, that means we're definitely related :)

Velma spoke of the other quilters in the group, some planning to drop by a little later than her 8:00 starting time. But others, she said, gesturing to the photos on the wall with her needle, "have passed on."

Gone, but not forgotten in the quiet conversations around the quilting frame where past memories and present stitching weave through the hours.

It makes me hope that maybe - sometime in the coming years - I'll actually finish all the quilts waiting for me. Someday, when life is slower and friends are even more precious.

Do you quilt? Or is there some other "thing you used to do" that you may take up again someday?