Upcountry Cranberry

In this collection of 44 recipes, accompanied by poems and stories, illustrated with more than 80 photos from kitchen and forest, Mary Odden and Kari Odden chronicle their love of one of the north's most important and delicious natural foods, the wild lingonberry.

Lingonberries, commonly known in Alaska as "lowbush cranberries," have as many names as the cultures who gather them in forest and tundra all around the top of the world. Long valued by western and Indigenous healers for their antioxidant and anti-bacterial properties, lingonberries stubbornly thrive across fire-tapestried hillsides and leverage themselves against pollutants. Lingonberry is an iconic foraged food. The berries ripen after a few frosts, arriving on the table just in time to brighten fall harvests of vegetables and meats. Tart berries and sauces are delicious with salmon and squash, in curry and coleslaw and savory casseroles -- as well as baked into sweet combination with their classic partners, oranges and chocolate. In these pages you will find sweet desserts including orange cranberry bread and lingonberry cheesecake, joined by lingonberry takes on meringue pie, carrot cake, bon bons and biscotti. Forager and cooks will follow a delicious trail to unique hearty toppings, main dishes, and soups that will become favorites at gatherings and family meals. s well as side trips through the natural history and health benefits of the wild lingonberry. Lyrical stories and poems are scattered through Upcountry Cranberry, a reminder that wild foods are not separate from their places, and a day spent in September woods is also nourishment saved for winter.

Mary Odden has lived and worked in rural Alaska places as a wildfire and aviation dispatcher, counselor, small newspaper owner, writer, and teacher. Her memoir pieces and essays have appeared in the Georgia Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, Alaska Magazine, Cirque, and About Place journal.