Buttery Cornmeal Cookies & Badlands NP (Day 6)

It’s the half-way mark on this cookie cruising train! Day 6 brings us to the land of “Great Faces, Great Places.” South Dakota! And what a many great places there are in The Mount Rushmore State to visit!

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Were you expecting a photo of Mount Rushmore too? Oh, okay, if you must ask…

If you’ve been going on and off the rails on this crazy blogging train, chances are you’ve read about South Dakota already. In Fry Bread Taco Trifecta, there were the fluffy fried bread wonders from the WoodenKnife Family. (I also admitted how much of a glutton I was.) The Spring Bing Cherry Bars post recalled the 1989 South Dakota Centennial, a contest-winning cookbook and a cherry confection found within its pages. (That reminds me, I probably should make those for the holidays.) And lastly, many visits to Wall Drug, eating their delightful donuts, inspired Old-Fashioned Pumpkin Spice Donuts. (Okay, maybe I really am a glutton…and maybe a little obsessed with South Dakota.)

But today we’re clearly badlands bound…Badlands National Park. According to the Badlands Natural History Association, about one-million excited hikers, campers, and drive-through visitors make BADL a travel destination each year. Which means it’s a pretty well-known park on the route to the Black Hills and beyond to Yellowstone National Park.

Visitors admire the wide open prairies and skies…

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The landscape eroding away in rugged crevasses and canyons…

And the amazing park wildlife.

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There’s one animal, however, that elicits wild west nostalgia and raw majesty. The American Bison (Bison bison bison), commonly called a buffalo.

In prehistoric times, an estimated 30 to 60 million bison roamed across North America, stretching from Alaska to Mexico, and the Appalachian Mountains to the Great Basin. Native peoples relied on our enormous national mammal for food, shelter, tools, fuel, clothing and spiritual importance. Manifest Destiny, masses of European settlers heading west, and hunts encouraged by the Northern Pacific Railroad in the 1800’s drastically diminished and decimated herds. By 1884, roughly 325 wild bison remained in the United States, with 25 of those living in Yellowstone National Park. Yellowstone bison are considered the most genetically pure to prehistoric bison. Yellowstone’s landscape naturally confines and limits their cross-breeding with cattle from neighboring ranches. National Parks Traveler has an interesting article on this subject.

Through careful wildlife management, enforced protection, and monitored federal and public breeding programs, bison numbers have steadily risen. By the 1990’s, according to Fish and Wildlife Services, national public herds totaled between 20,000-25,000 bison, with around 250,000 bison held in private herds. In 2019, through the Bison Resource Stewardship Plan and donations, Badlands National Park increased its resident bison range by 22,000 acres. Bison now graze over 80,193 acres of the park’s total 244,000 acres. Approximately 1,200 bison call Badlands National Park home.

One aspect of this bison management program the general public seldom sees is when these thousand-pound plus animals are rounded up every few years. When the folks and I lived in BADL, we experienced this amazing event first-hand.

Every couple of years, the bison in Badlands’ herds were rounded up for health checks. In 1988, the bison liked to hang out around Sage Creek in the Pinnacles District of Badlands’ North Unit. Gathering them up in this rugged country wasn’t an easy job. Park employees tried to bring in as many bison as they could, but a few stragglers always escaped. Officials definitely didn’t go out on horseback. Using four-wheel-drive pick-up trucks only worked so well. These frantic beasts rammed and crushed the park vehicles like soda cans. So to move them into the holding corrals, front-end loaders were used. It sounds barbaric now, but was necessary then. These are 2,000-pound wild animals, capable of charging at sprinting speeds of 35 miles-per-hour.

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After a resting period, the bulls and cows were moved down wooden alleys into squeeze chutes. Imagine standing next to a bull bison with a hump towering over your head! Each animal was tagged, weighed, and blood-tested for brucellosis by a park wildlife biologist or veterinarian. Afterwards, they were released back into another holding corral for sorting and final release.

Brucellosis is a bacterial disease affecting pregnant bison, cattle, and elk, in which infected animals abort their fetuses, reducing herd populations. Human can acquire it by direct contact with infected wildlife or cattle, through the air, or ingesting raw or unpasteurized dairy products from affected animals. If left untreated, brucellosis can be fatal. My Grand-Dad’s second wife died in 2013 from brucellosis. She came into contact with sick elk near her home on the Yellowstone NP outskirts.

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In the late 1980’s, Badlands NP’s bison herd was capped at approximately 250 total animals. Neighboring indigenous tribes, such as the Oglala Sioux, accepted excess bison to restore their tribal land herds. Today, the InterTribal Buffalo Council, a collaborative of 69 federally recognized tribes in 19 states, works with federal agencies to continue this restoration. Over the years, the population size of public bison herds has risen. The Bison Conservation Initiative now recommends locations like Badlands NP should contain 1,000 or more bison for long-term herd vitality. Cool!

If you’re still curious about bison, the Department of Interior features “15 Facts about Our National Mammal.”

Don’t worry. Today’s cookie concoction, Cornmeal Cookies, does not contain buffalo, bison or meat of any sort. The recipe was gifted to me by a Badlands National Park employee. Bill Matthews worked for my Pop in the Buildings and Utilities division. He also knew I loved to bake. In return for a few dozen cookies, he shared his mother’s recipe with me. Mrs. Matthews’ cornmeal cookies were Bill’s childhood favorite.

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After baking batches for Bill, word spread through the maintenance division. Another great guy named Lyle was a cookie monster too. He was the park’s Roads & Trails Foreman, a local rancher, and still is a genuinely cool dude. Lyle loved his cookies burnt…almost to charcoal briquette status. It always seemed wrong to burn cookies, but that’s the way Lyle like them.

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When I bake Cornmeal Cookies now, I don’t burn them unless there’s another special request (Or if I see something shiny and loose track of what I’m doing!). These golden rounds are deliciously crispy and crunchy. Dried fruit, like the added sweetened dried cranberries, give an added pop. There is no leavening like baking powder or soda, so the cookies have a consistency like buttery shortbread. Bill’s mom added raisins to her recipe, but over the years I’ve taken them out. Feel free to substitute another dried fruit, or leave it out all together. Cornmeal Cookies are yummy both ways!

Say cheese! Day 7 heads us south to the North Platte River, where a young bullwhacker became a well-known park photographer. Get your camera ready!

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