Her Homemade Desserts Sell Out Everyday

Hey friend, climb on in the backseat and ride along with us; we're going somewhere unique. At the edge of the town of Crossnore, NC, tucked into one of those tight mountain curves that scares the heebie-jeebies out of the outlanders, sits Jennifer Pinter's specialty dessert shop.

"When we opened the shop twenty years ago, all the locals laughed at us," said Jennifer. "Nothing had ever made a go of it in this curve, but I think that curve was a blessing for this place."

I can't argue. That curve becomes so sharp so quick that drivers find themselves almost at a stop. That's the first time you find yourself wondering if you went through a time tunnel, because sitting directly in front of you is the Linville River Mercantile and Bakery, and it just beckons you to pull over.

Now, friends, I must confess: the first time I was in Jennifer's parking lot, it was on a foggy afternoon, and when I walked through her doors, I was spooked. It looked like 1929, and I half expected Rod Serling to walk out of the back and say, "Welcome to the Twilight Zone." But the smell of Jennifer's freshly baked goods sent those thoughts scampering away.

Jennifer isn't just a baker, though. She's a designer, a collector, and a woman who's spent thirty-some years cultivating her sources. The whole place is intended to make you forget the constraints that today's lifestyle puts on us. If you love history and antiques, you'll want to pitch a tent and camp out in her store.

When I sat right down at the turn-of-the-century round oak ice cream table that rested four feet from a 1920s soda counter and saw a stack of fluted ice cream sundae dishes, my mouth started watering. I was about to make my order when I noticed a short hall that ended with a wall of mirrors. Pointing at it, I asked Jennifer, "Anybody ever think the hall is twice as long and run into themselves?"

Jennifer grinned. "One day a woman went down that hall and politely excused herself to the oncoming lady. When she got no answer, she came back and told me she'd just met the rudest woman in Avery County. The whole store was snickering, so I had to break the news to her."

But let's get to the reason we came: the baked goods. When she first opened the mercantile, the cooking was a side venture, and before she knew it, she had a full-fledged bakery. "Everything is made in that kitchen, every single day, and sells out by the end of the day," said Jennifer. And yes, you guessed it — this is the only place you can get her goods.

Cheesecake, key lime pie, coconut custard pie, pecan pie, and that's just on the top shelf. Look one shelf lower and you'll see a mouth-watering plantation pie, a sweet cream custard with chocolate, coconut, and pecans. Don't you dare reach for that cast iron skillet pineapple upside-down cake, or there's going to be a fight. Every day there's a cobbler, and the day we visited it was mountain berry — strawberry, blueberry, blackberry, and raspberry all together. Let me sum up the dessert case this way: Granny Smith, who's your mommy now?

Jennifer's clerk and friend followed us outside to tell us about the peanut butter tort. "This one is serious business," she said. "Chocolate cookie crumb on the bottom, a light peanut butter mousse with a little cream cheese worked in, and chocolate ganache over the top. It sells quick, so if you want one, you'd best come first thing in the morning."

My response was, "I'm not touching the stuff. It sounds like it could be illegal."

Before we headed back to the car, we stopped by Henry and Gloria's table. The Mercantile was their last stop before heading home to Florida. Jason asked Gloria to rate the place on a scale of one to ten; she looked him straight in the eye and said a twelve. His follow-up question — "What's your favorite part of the store?" — was answered with no hesitation. "Jennifer," she said. "She is the kindest, sweetest person and the best baker we've ever known." When somebody keeps coming from Florida to your place of business, year after year, you don't need my recommendation.

"The shop was gathering dust for a while after my husband died this past December," said Jennifer. "But I am ready to get back to our dream."

It's a dream that's been unfolding in that curve for twenty-plus years, so the next time you find yourself easing around that curve in Crossnore, pull in and sit at the ice cream table — or get the peanut butter tort — and tell her the ride-about guys sent you.

Click here to ride along with us and meet Jennifer at the Linville River Mercantile.

Subscribe to ride along with us every week.

From Nashville Back to Avery County: The Story of Fiddler Alan Johnson

If you find yourself in Avery County on a Sunday afternoon, stop on by the Pineola Inn and watch Alan Johnson sawing away on the fiddle. He may be the busiest musician in the High Country. Ask him how many bands he plays in, and he might say, "I don't know." 

When Jason and I sat down with him, it turned out this local fiddle player has a Nashville connection.

"I had a brother ten years older who wanted to play rock and roll, and a daddy who played the fiddle," said Alan. "So growing up there was every kind of music in the house. I picked up the fiddle around age nine and have never really put it down." Today he plays with the David Wiseman Band, the Johnson Brothers and a group known as Woody and the String Band.

But for many years, Alan lived and played in Nashville. "I moved there at age twenty-nine chasing a dream." Grinning, he says, "I handed out my card left and right; they called it the Nashville handshake. That's when you shake a person's hand and palm them your card. It took six months to get my first call, and I promise you, I was about ready to pack it in and come home.

But, for some reason, John Hartford, writer of Gentle on My Mind, was in Alan's corner. "He befriended me when I first arrived in Nashville," said Alan. "Almost exactly six months to the day I arrived in Nashville, the phone rang, and it was Hartford." He had called to make sure Alan hadn't given up. Within a week of that call, Alan had three gigs, and the rest is history. Alan smiled when reminiscing about how he and Hartford would often sit in Hartford's house playing their fiddles just for the pleasure of it.

"I am not the greatest fiddle player in the world," said Alan. "Those guys sit and practice all day long, the way a golfer hits a thousand practice balls a day. That's just not me." But Alan had a gift. When growing up, he heard something one of his heroes, like Doyle Lawson, played. He could instantly play it back note for note.

So why does a working Nashville fiddler end up back in Avery County playing at the Pineola Inn on Sunday afternoons? The best reason I can think of. A little boy missing his daddy. "When it came down to the music or the boy, there was really no contest," said Alan. It's been forty-six years since he picked up that first fiddle, and he's still playing. That sounds like a man at peace with the trade he made.

Watch the video to hear Alan tell the Hartford story himself, to catch a rare old clip of Alan and his family picking at the Hampton store years ago, and to hear what Avery County's fiddle player sounds like on a Sunday afternoon.

Watch our ride-about to meet Alan Johnson, Avery County's fiddle player.

Climb into our backseat — subscribe and ride along with Alton & Jason every week.

Learn to Play Music or Leave the Family

Hey, Jason, what is Kid Rock doing in Pineola, NC? Cathy Sheely knows better, and so do we, but lots of folks are dead-certain David Wiseman is Kid Rock. Over the years, he has learned to just smile—and when people ask for an autograph, he tries to accommodate. But here’s the trick: he never reveals the name he signs! David’s lineage goes back to the original Sweethearts of Country Music, the legendary duo Lulu Belle and Scotty Wiseman.

Have I told you lately that I love you?" Whoa buddy, get that starry look out of your eyes — I was talking about one of America’s bestselling songs! That simple question, whispered by Lulu in Scotty's ear while he lay in a hospital bed, turned into their biggest hit. It was so popular it was later recorded by a few "lesser-known" artists like Gene Autry, Bing Crosby, The Andrews Sisters, and Elvis Presley. Legend has it the song has been sung on half the front porches in America.

David shared how Lulu (from Boone, NC) was paired with Scotty (from Spruce Pine, NC) back in mid-1934 on Chicago's The National Barn Dance. They fell in love on the air and were married by December of that same year. Together, they made seven Hollywood pictures—sharing the screen in one with an up-and-coming actor named Roy Rogers. But after all that fame and fortune, they came right back home to Three Mile Road in Avery County. Lulu even went on to serve two terms in the North Carolina House of Representatives!

Preserving the Legacy

They say you never know where an interview is going to go. We originally came here to talk to David and Cathy about their band, but the traditional music they inherited touches the very soul of High Country culture. What could be more American than hitting it big, coming home to serve your neighbors, and leaving a musical legacy for the next generation? (Oh, and in case you thought I forgot—yes, Scotty did buy the rights to Good Old Mountain Dew and reworked it into a major hit!)

Click on one of the links to our YouTube channel and learn more about the Wisemans' musical family, including David's cousin and the fiddler in their band, Alan Johnson.

Oh, in case you thought I forgot — Yes, Scotty did buy the rights to Good Old Mountain Dew and remixed it into a major hit.

Watch our ride-about to meet the Wiseman family and hear The David Wiseman Band.

Climb into our backseat — subscribe and ride along with Alton & Jason every week.

The Remarkable Avery County Cooperative Extension Office

When Ken Walters suggested Jason and I document the duties of Jerry Moody and his staff at the Avery County Cooperative Extension Office, it quickly brought back memories of my failed tomato crops — that is, if two tomato plants a year can be called a crop. “Ken,” I said sarcastically, “all the green bled out of my thumb many years ago. I don't think Jerry can help me.” That said, as we interviewed Jerry, we learned he is a man with many irons in the fire. In fact, he may be the busiest person in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

For more than a century, Avery County was known for apples, cabbages, potatoes, and ornamental shrubs. But during the 1960s, the county's agricultural economy began shifting, and Fraser Fir trees led the way. Today, North Carolina produces about 25 percent of the nation's annual Christmas trees, and Avery County farmers produce close to a million of those trees. But don't let the Christmas tree statistics fool you — the county still grows those other crops, and Jerry has a whole team of agents and technicians helping him coordinate the different programs they administer.

His staff operates a germplasm collection of heirloom apples so that a few years from now, if a person wants to grow a Red Sheep Nose or a Summer Banana apple, they can take a graft off one of the county's trees and grow their own. For Avery County children who do not have a safe environment for learning and playing in the summer, the extension office coordinates nine weeks of a 4-H Day Camp called WOW.

Have you ever heard the term agritourism? Well, it is a real thing here in Avery County. It lets a tourist experience some of the county's most spectacular high-elevation scenery during a hayride on a private farm. Whether it is a choose-and-cut Christmas tree farm or a U-pick apple orchard, it will be an experience you will not soon forget. You will probably be offered a glass of fresh apple cider — but if not, swing by the extension office's annual Apple Cider Pressing event and they will help you press your own. And if pressing apples is too sloppy for you, head over to Apple Hill Farm in Banner Elk and watch them shear an alpaca.

Are you old enough to remember when people touched produce before they purchased it? News flash, you still can. If you go to one of our tailgate markets you can squeeze produce to your hearts content. They start in early summer and rotate through every major Avery County once a week. But the biggest agritourism event of the year is the Avery County Fair, held every September at the fairgrounds in the Heritage Park Complex, adjacent to the Extension Office.

OK, click on the photo or the link below and join us on our ride-about to watch as Jerry Moody gives us a tour of the Heritage Park Complex.

Watch our ride-about to Heritage Park with Jerry Moody of the Avery County Cooperative Extension.

Climb into our backseat — subscribe and ride along with Alton & Jason every week.

MEET KENNY LINDAHL, THE BARBECUE MAN OF LINVILLE

In this article and the YouTube video that accompanies it, you will meet Kenny Lindahl. He is not from the High Country, but now that he is here, he's not leaving. He started life in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and at age fourteen began hanging around commercial kitchens. Twenty-five years ago, Kenny married a woman from Whiteville, North Carolina, moved there, and opened a restaurant. “That's a tough way to make a living,” said Kenny. “So when I needed to clear my head, I would ride my motorcycle up to the High Country and spend a couple of nights.”

Now, I know Whiteville, and it is a traditional down-east North Carolina town. Like all good Southerners, the people in Whiteville love family reunions. But no decent down-east family reunion would be caught without a whole smoked pig waiting on a grill to be picked apart — and it would be customary (mandatory, really) for it to have been basted all night in a vinegar and pepper sauce. That left Kenny with no choice but to learn how to smoke pork the traditional down-east way, low and slow. So he devised his own technique and created his own recipe.

The centerpiece of our visit was his smoker. I lived in eastern North Carolina for twenty years and have seen many pig cookers, but this one tops anything I can remember seeing — two whole pigs fit inside. It has a clever design: two doors on opposite sides of the firebox and two smokestacks result in smoke being evenly distributed across the meat. The craft of smoking that makes an outstanding pork dish lies in controlling the temperature. Kenny's rule: “The first two or three hours are for smoke. After that you back off to a slow, low 225 degrees and hold it there. Keep feeding wood the whole time and you'll over-smoke the meat, turn it bitter, and kill it. Slow and low, that's the whole religion.”

I asked Kenny what he'd set in front of me if he invited me to supper. “It's pulled pork, baby back ribs, and extra-gooey fried macaroni and cheese — dipped in beer batter and frozen, then dropped in the fryer so you bite through a crisp shell into creamy pasta. Smoked baked beans. Sweet, fluffy hush puppies. And slaw, shaved fine and made sweet, on purpose, to cut the bitter of the vinegar.” Now, as the old saying goes, I'd walk a mile for that dinner.

Listen to Kenny tell how “many of my friends' homes went down the river entirely. That's a hard thing to come back from.” Yet Kenny's answer was to rebuild, get his kitchen certified with the county, and start cooking again. He is throwing a grand-opening pig picking for the whole neighborhood in September, and we will be there for a follow-up video. Click on Kenny's photo and watch the video to see that two-ended smoker up close.

Watch our ride-about to meet Kenny Lindahl, the barbecue man of Linville.

Climb into our backseat — subscribe and ride along with Alton & Jason every week.

BRIAN AT HUMP MOUNTAIN PRODUCE IN ELK PARK, NC KNOWS IF A CANTALOUPE IS MALE OR FEMALE

Before I tell you about Brian’s produce market, I need to tell you about my first encounter with inflation. Yesterday, while filling up my car with gas, I went inside the store to get a Coke. I reached inside the cooler and grabbed a $2.89 Coke. I am guessing the young man at the counter thought I was a little touched in the head when I smiled at him and said, “You know these things used to be 5 cents.”

I walked back to the car and realized I had not mentioned to him that the 5-cent Coke was in 1958, when I was eight years old. In my formative days, my mom gave me a 10-cent allowance every Saturday. I guess, gave, is the wrong word because I had a list of chores that had to be completed before she put that dime in my hand. But, the point is, a Coca-Cola really was five cents in those days, until one Saturday they were six cents. It hit me real quick that if I paid the shockingly high price of 6 cents for my Coca-Cola, I would not be able to also get my usual 5-cent popsicle or my alternative 5 pieces of penny candy. I am fairly sure that at age eight, I had never heard the word quandary, but I sure was in one. As most eight-year-old boys would do, I streaked home in a panic. But without a Coke, a popsicle, or any candy. My solution was simple: find my mom and demand more money for my allowance.

“Sure,” my mom replied. “But more money comes with more chores.” Imagine my shock at that statement, but I quickly decided I could deal with the situation. Looking back, I guess she took the opportunity to sneak a life lesson in on me.

Now, you already know I took my first quarter and zipped as fast as I could to that same store. I grabbed a Coca-Cola, a popsicle, and all the penny candy I could carry, plus a cookie. When the lady behind the counter said I owed her 21 cents, I stood there dumbfounded because I had not spent my entire quarter. I started pointing and asking, “How much?” But no matter how hard I tried, I could not get my total to 25 cents. After a few minutes, the lady behind the counter said, “Son, you don’t have to spend all your money here today.” Now, friends and ride-about partners, that thought had never once crossed my eight-year-old mind.

About that same time in my life, my dad decided we needed to go on a trip to the mountains. But in those days, a trip to the mountains was different. By that I mean crooked roads. I am talking about old-time crooked, with every other curve a hairpin. A hairpin curve bent back so hard you could see your own taillights, and, oh yeah, no side rails. That called for slow going, and mountain folks knew it, so they set up roadside stands and sold fresh farm produce. Of course, there were also jars of jelly, fresh-out-of-the-oven apple pies, and, at harvest time, there were bushels of corn. They called themselves peddlers. They are mostly gone nowadays, but we found a farmer named Brian, and he comes from a long line of peddlers who sold what they grew straight to the public.

Nowadays, fancy culinary magazines call it “from farm to table.” Here at Hump Mountain Produce, Brian does things just like his uncle, his great-uncle, and his dad. In fact, Brian is well schooled in the art of peddling; his school bus dropped him off at his uncle’s roadside stand. Today, he farms and operates a produce market inside this brick building at the base of Hump Mountain. For about fifteen years, he has been making a living giving below-market prices to his customers.

A couple of years back, my wife and I hit the jackpot when we drove up to Brian’s produce market as he was unloading corn that was pulled an hour earlier. My wife insisted we grab a half dozen ears and head straight for the house. Being born and raised in the city, I had never experienced eating what farmers called “same-day corn.” That means the ear of corn was pulled and eaten the same day. Two weeks later, when we found out he was going to pull corn the next morning, we met him at his produce stand and snagged thirty-six ears. We invited a bunch of friends over to sit on the front porch to shuck, grill, and eat some same-day corn. Check out Brian’s video to learn about some other long-forgotten produce secrets.

Brian’s produce building is filled with his blue-ribbon pickled products that you will never find in your grocery store. And yes, that includes pickled corn. And yes, they are pickled in a state-certified kitchen.

“Farming is tough in the high country,” says Brian. “Nothing can start to grow until the soil hits sixty degrees. Even with that you are likely to get a late frost and have to replant.”

Here is the part you should know about Brian: when the season winds down, Brian carries his excess to Feeding Avery Families, so nothing goes to waste. As Brian put it, that’s the good thing about Avery County: your neighbors are going to help you, and you are going to help your neighbors.

Now, here is the part that took Jason and me aback. Both of us being city boys, we were speechless when Brian told us there was a difference between a male and female cantaloupe. And when he said you could use a broom straw to tell, well, I just wandered over to the watermelons. So, chew on that for a while or watch his video.

Just before we wrapped up the video, Brian told us a mountain farmer can feel the shucks on an ear of corn and tell how cold the upcoming winter will be. ???, yep, that is what we both said.

Watch our ride-about to Hump Mountain Produce — same-day corn, pickled everything, and the cantaloupe question.

Climb into our backseat — subscribe and ride along with Alton & Jason every week.

TRAVIS PROCTOR LIVES OFF THE LAND LIKE IT WAS THE YEAR 1750

Jason and I pulled off the Blue Ridge Parkway, turned down a gravel road, and drove straight to Travis Proctor's log cabin. If I had woken up on his front porch, I would swear I'd gone back in time to the year 1750. Travis is a gardener, hunter, and hiker, and he has spent forty years learning to live off his land. I feel for him on his occasional grocery store trips — at $40 a week, I don't know how he affords to get back home.

His eleven acres are tucked between the Parkway and a National Forest; nobody will ever build close to him. It is as remote and peaceful a place as you will find anywhere. For those folks who yearn for serene surroundings, eat your heart out. And if you love history, Travis will gladly hike you through ten miles of pure wilderness down Lost Cove Creek — but once you start, there's no meeting a road, not even a dirt one.

The cabin started as a kit. Travis watched as each individual log was hoisted into place by a crane, but after that it was all Travis. Living down in the basement for two years, he plumbed it, wired it, and chinked between every log himself. In his video he walks us through a root cellar dug back into the earth — a natural refrigerator that runs ten degrees cooler than the air outside, where potatoes and apples stay good and edible right up until spring planting. Now you will probably say something like: Come on man, you are pulling my leg. But don't forget, he lives at 3,500 feet, where the temperature might reach 75 once or twice in August . It's exactly how the pioneers survived the winter, and it still works today.

In the video, Travis explains how his apple cider press works. Load the apples in the top, the gears turn and crush them into pulp that we put in a sack. If you squeeze that sack hard enough the juice seepes out — and in no time you get a gallon of apple cider.

One time I heard a man say, "I am not about to pay for something the good Lord gives us for free." Travis must have talked to that same man. For forty years, a spring on his property has kept his six-hundred-gallon reservoir full of water — for free — and Travis drinks it every day. He tests it regularly for bacteria, and it always comes back clear. The spring house keeps that water at a steady fifty-five degrees year-round; even in the dead of winter when the temperature is below-zero the spring never freezes. For seven years, he ran a solar rig that heated five-hundred gallons of water 130 degrees and warmed his whole house. But some of those fifty miles an hour mountain winds put that operation out of business. 

That's right, things aren't always serene off the parkway — Mother Nature flexes her muscles now and again. Ice storms and other harsh weather elements can send bears and other hungry creatures looking to rob his root cellar. Travis lost over three hundred fish after the last hurricane came through the High Country. The storm washed the river otters' food away, and those otters — reintroduced across the Catawba Valley — followed Lost Cove Creek right up to his ponds and cleaned him out of fish. Now, otters look harmless and are fun to watch playing in the river, but Grandfather Mountain, which keeps them in its wildlife habitat, calls them one of the most dangerous animals there. Their powerful bite can snatch any slippery fish underwater in a heartbeat. Cute, and a killer, all at once.

For all his homesteading, you might think Travis has no time for a hobby. But he is quite the artist with wood. In the video he shows us a table of ash framed in walnut, a bowl turned from hackberry, and walnut slabs where he'd filled the natural holes with epoxy to let that beautiful grain shine through. Every time I step into his living room, I notice something I missed the visit before.

We have only scratched the surface, and are already scheduled round two — so keep an eye on the blog for Travis Part II. But chew on this question until then: how does a man drink untested spring water for forty years, lose three hundred fish to a pack of otters, and still call this the most rewarding life there is? The answer is all through Travis's ride-about.

Watch Travis Proctor's ride-about — the cabin, the root cellar, the spring, and the otters.

Climb into our backseat — subscribe and ride along with Alton & Jason every week.

THE QUILTERS OF AVERY COUNTY AND THE BET THAT MADE US GO THERE.

Now let me tell you how this ride-about got started. Jason and I had ourselves a genuine dispute. I spent years in the antique business selling quilts, so I know good and well which pattern folks asked for the most. But, of course, Jason did not believe me. There was only one way to settle it: put the question to the women who'd know for certain.

So we went to see the Avery Riverwalk Quilting Guild. Now let me tell you, that was a room full of talented women! I know, because my wife used to be one. Our contact was Cindy, and let me tell you, that woman is a little ball of fire. When Cindy puts her energy into something, it comes out first-class every time. She'll run a raffle you'd figure might raise two or three hundred dollars, and doggone if she doesn't pull in two thousand.

Right fast, after we walked in, it looked like one of those ladies was wearing her quilt. But when she stood up, it turned out to be a unique pair of quilted overalls. She confessed she didn't make them — but declared she sure could have, if she decided to put her mind to it.

Karen gave us the grand tour. She walked us past a patriotic sampler. Every block was different, but similar enough to come together into something beautiful. She named the patterns in the sampler, so check the video to see how they blended together into a fabulous quilt.

I had to cover my eyes when she pointed out the Ohio quilting star. I mean, come on, Karen — North Carolina has a quilting star! And what the heck is a "wonky star" set on an angle? (Turns out "wonky star" is an actual industry term. Who knew?) She also showed us a wall hanging the guild presented to the New Christian Church for hosting them every month.

Karen let us in on how quilting has changed, too. In the old days — before Jason's and my grandparents — women would gather around a big table with needle and thread, bring food, talk all day, and stitch a quilt together by hand. The guild sort of keeps that tradition alive. They meet at ten in the morning, have a program, share a potluck lunch, and then sew individually in the afternoon on programmable machines. Oh yeah — the talking? This old boy don't say nothing about that!

Here's something our ride-about partners might not know: folks have been quilting for over 3,000 years. We have quilts in our own home that my wife's mother made sixty years ago, and they kept us warm again this past winter.

But I haven't forgotten the bet. Jason and I drove all the way to Avery County to find out, once and for all, which quilt pattern reigns supreme — and one of us walked away right, the other one wrong. I'm not going to spoil it here.

Watch the ride-about to find out who won the bet — and meet the quilters of Avery County.

Climb into our backseat — subscribe and ride along with Alton & Jason every week.

YIKES, WHAT IS MARY MORGAN DOING?

Hey friend, you need to get over here and listen up. If all the bees disappear, mankind would have four years to live. Lots of folks claim Albert Einstein said that. Fact or fiction, I cannot say — but by clicking on the image of beekeeper Mary Morgan, you can learn why the bees' pollination work matters to all of Mother Nature's children, humans included.

WHAT IS AN APPALACHIAN AMERICAN? ASK HISTORIAN MATTHEW HITECHEW

Click on the image above to go on a ride-about with Alton and Jason to hear Matthew Hitechew speak about the language and culture of Appalachia. Matthew is the Dean of Arts & Sciences at Mayland Community College in Spruce Pine, NC, and a historian of Appalachian Studies.