Meet Our Cook

By Emily Reed, field school student from the University of Connecticut

Excavating the Dinwiddie site has been exhausting. With the sun beating down on us constantly while we pick-axe and shovel into the hard ground, we are all drained by the end of the day. Our thirty-minute ride from Dinwiddie back to Mule Creek usually proves to be a quiet one, with most of conking out in the van. With our energy so low at the end of the day, we tend to be quite ravenous. The main thing we look forward to, besides a shower, is the always-delicious dinner that our cook, Julie Gierhart, makes for us (as well as the playful greeting we receive from her dog and clean-up assistant, Molly).

Julie’s interests in food started at a young age. Julie grew up in Hutchinson, Minnesota, and was the oldest of three. She helped her mother out and cooked many of the meals for her family. Julie got her bachelor’s degree in Home Economics at the University of Minnesota. In the 1970s, Julie moved to Drummond, Montana, to begin teaching Home Economics. In Drummond, she taught kindergarten through 12^th grade. Julie spent the beginning of the 1980s teaching in England to students in middle schoo,l which she said was one of her favorite jobs. When she came back from England, she decided to change things up and work as a paralegal in Montana. She now resides in Cliff, New Mexico, and teaches at Cliff School as an administrative assistant.

Cooking has always been Julie’s love. When she was given the opportunity to cook for our field schoo,l she liked the idea of getting back to it —“I like to cook and I like to eat!” Her favorite food is dessert, and she is known for her carrot cake. I think it is safe to speak for everyone when I say that we have been spoiled by Julie’s incredible cooking.