Backcountry Best

In Their Kitchens

Story by Ewan Nicholson

Welcome to Skoki Lodge, a view with a room – and a kitchen. Only this one has no electricity or running water Skoki Lodge and Katie Mitzel are a rather delicious combination. Katie is Skoki’s chef and her kitchen wizardry in this backcountry haven is adding to the lodge’s legend. Skoki, constructed in 1930, was the first backcountry ski lodge in the Rockies and has been linked to many of the Rockies’ renowned pioneers.

Katie has worked at Skoki since 1998, and was promoted to chef in 1999 after winning a cook-off: her competition cooked the first night and she cooked to victory on the second. “It was my bread that clinched it for me,” she confides, a wry smile breaking across her face. Lodge managers since 2003, Katie and her husband, Leo, clearly relish the responsibility of taking over the reins at Skoki. Their philosophy, that guests “deserve to have the best of the best,” is wowing new visitors and inspiring others to return.

Katie’s genius in the kitchen is important to Skoki Lodge’s clients, as they typically arrive very hungry. They access the lodge by crossing the 11 kilometres, two passes and 500 vertical metres that lie between Skoki and the shuttle bus drop-off at Lake Louise Mountain Resort’s Temple Lodge. Summer hikers and winter snowshoers or skiers arrive at Skoki tired and hungry from their three- to five-hour trek. Katie and her staff make a point of rewarding their guests’ investment in calories, perspiration and the occasional blister. It’s a reward that I had the opportunity to appreciate.

Standing on top of Deception Pass, with Skoki Lodge nestling in the valley below, I’m tired and definitely peckish. With my 60-pound pack pressing me on, I zoom scarily down to the lodge. I’m greeted by a cheery Katie, who provides me with a fantastic mid-afternoon tea of hearty Alberta butternut squash soup, bread and baked goodies. I dive in, confident that after my 2,530 calorie, 225-minute odyssey I needn’t worry about spoiling my appetite for dinner.

At 7 p.m., the food bell rings and I join 14 other guests, assembling in the rustic dining room for dinner. Katie’s description of the meal elicits a spontaneous round of applause – two thirds of our group ate here last night and so have an inkling of what’s to come.

Each Katie Mitzel dinner follows a basic menu of meat, two vegetable dishes, a starch, a large salad, fancy bread and a dessert. But there’s nothing basic about the food. Katie prefers not to follow recipes and is constantly recreating her dishes; her meals are truly original and mouth-wateringly exquisite. Our tarragon chicken with oven-roasted vegetables, rosemary potatoes, Katie’s squashakopitas, coarse salt and hearty caraway bread meets with universal approval. Dessert is chocolate cake, a confection of whipped cream, sugar and Bernard Callebaut chocolate.

After dinner, Leo introduces three other staff members and recounts stories of the lodge’s history and colourful characters. Then he introduces Katie, and she’s met by standing ovation. Later in the evening, a fellow guest remarks, “I don’t know that I’ve had a restaurant meal that was better.”

Comments like these don’t go to Katie’s head. “I just believe people deserve the best,” she says. “And that’s what I try to accomplish every day.”

Katie’s culinary achievements are more remarkable when you consider that she’s the sole chef in a kitchen 11 kilometres from the nearest road. There is no running water here, and only occasional electricity. An emergency trip for supplies is a minimum three-hour round trip.
If the weather’s bad, the journey can take eight hours – or not happen at all. In the winter, Katie does her grocery shopping every Sunday by calling Sysco, the Resorts of the Canadian Rockies food supplier. Her order is delivered to Lake Louise Mountain Resort on Monday morning, and loaded into insulated containers for the snowmobile trip to Skoki. In summer it takes longer; the groceries arrive by horse.

“It’s planning,” she explains. “I have to stay one step ahead.” Water is supplied the traditional way – hauled from the river, 20 gallons at a time. Before work, Katie prepares wash water, as she can’t turn a tap to clean her hands. She whips, whisks, blends and dices by hand. The supply of solar electricity is limited, and she avoids using the generator for fear of disturbing Skoki’s get-away-from-it-all atmosphere.

Even 33 days into what will be a 40-day stint, Katie is endlessly upbeat and full of energy, keen to ski and play with her children (Grayson, 4, and Isabella, 2) on her afternoon break. It seems she never tires.

Later that night, at 10 p.m., I find her in the kitchen. She’s chatting and laughing with her staff and a couple of guests who’ve poked their heads in, and there’s music playing. “Cooking music is important,” she says. She pauses, and surveying the kitchen around her, says, “I prefer to cook here and adapt, than to be anywhere else.”

Maybe on her days off she’ll get a chance to start work on that cookbook she’s been contemplating – with encouragement from Skoki’s guests. While Katie rarely follows a recipe, the rest of us could learn a lot from her inspiration. When it comes to baking, she says, “Always obey the golden rule of bread: love your bread and it will love you back.”

After contemplative whiskies by the fire, I walk up the creakiest stairs in lodge history to the haven of my simple room. It has a small window and battery-powered lantern. The skiing, food, nightcap and quiet ensure a deep sleep.

The remainder of my stay is a blur of wonderful food, skiing and fireside banter. Highlights: triple-A Alberta beef tenderloin and an exhausting ski tour to Merlin Ridge.

After an extraordinary egg soufflé for breakfast, it’s almost time to pack up. I find Katie in the kitchen, of course, starting prep for dinner. A bunch of hungry skiers is scheduled to arrive this afternoon.

Pushing some errant dark blonde hair from her forehead with the back of her wrist, she tells me she’s making pork tenderloin, the very dish that she prepared for the head-to-head cook-off to become Skoki’s chef. 

After I’ve readied my gear, Katie comes out to say goodbye, standing in the snowy entrance of the lodge. I ski off and, looking back, I catch a last glimpse of Skoki Lodge and Katie Mitzel, a delicious combination.