IT'S NOT JUST THE SOUP

The Little House on the Mountain

By Rose Boyer, 12-15-06

	Photos by Rose Boyer.

Marion and I walked towards the log cabin across the road from Mountain Haggin Nordic Ski Area, 11 miles outside Anaconda. We were both sweaty and exhausted after a morning and afternoon of gliding through the woods along the base of the Pintler Mountains. As we got closer to the cabin a humming sound drew our attention to the windmill that stood alongside the building. The wood-carved sign on the door said “Soup Shack.” We walked in the door and the smell of bread fresh out of the oven immediately kindled the feeling of home. Not the home most people grow up in, I guess. But the home that you read about in Laura Ingalls Wilder books.

The Little House on the Prairie theme continued as a motherly woman wearing jeans and a sweater and a bearded man in overalls walked out of the kitchen carrying bowls of soup and homemade bread to a group of Patagonia-wearing young men sitting at a long pine table. Fat chunks of butter were scattered all over the little restaurant, waiting to be spread on the warm slices of bread.

Suddenly realizing our hunger, we sat down and ordered a bowl of soup. I chose the crab and corn chowder, Marion ordered the chili verde, and the bearded man brought the steaming bowls to the table before we had time to peel off our jackets. As we ate the soup and bread, neither of us said a word. The warmth of hot fluid entering our bellies, the heat from the woodstove and the yellow glow of lamplight on the all-wood interior put us in a comfortable daze until we had devoured every last drop of soup. It was the perfect ending to a wonderful day.

And just a half hour earlier we had been expecting to munch on cold peanuts and raisins on the drive back to Missoula. The last thing we had expected was to find ourselves in the warmth of somebody else’s home on the edge of the Pintler Wilderness.

That was my first Soup Shack experience. Since then, I have returned, and tried different soups, all of them as satisfying as the first. And I’m not the only one who’s hooked on the Soup Shack. Their tables are always filling up, and business gets better every year. Last year at least 70-80 people came through every Friday, Saturday and Sunday during the winter months, which is surprising considering the restaurant’s remote location.

“Skiers got us started and then word spread to the townspeople, the snowmobilers and the snow-kiters,” said Jean Rankin, who, with her husband, Keith, runs the soup business.

The couple moved to the area in 2001, fulfilling a dream they both shared to someday run a cabin getaway that was not a resort. Keith, an experienced builder, began erecting their new home from scratch, and then added three rustic cabins to rent out to guests. “We started the soup business to advertise for our cabins,” Jean said.



The Rankins’ next project is to build a lodge that they can rent out for bigger events.

With no electricity available, all of the buildings on the Rankin homestead, including the Soup Shack, are off the grid. They get their power from a combination propane, wind and solar energy.

“Once we got past the frustration of our own ignorance, we really enjoyed living off the grid,” Jean said. With only an 80-amp system, less than half of what most people have in town, Jean no longer uses a hair dryer, and she only uses a microwave occasionally for the restaurant. Conserving electricity has also been an educational experience for her cabin guests, she said.

When I asked Jean what she thought it was that made the Soup Shack so successful, she told me she thinks it’s a package deal. “It isn’t just the soup, or just the bread. It’s the whole experience that makes it good – being in the cold, having a winter experience, and then coming in for a hot bowl of soup,” she said.

She’s right. Montana is full of good cross-country skiing, and good soup. But there aren’t very many places where you can get them both in the same place, and feel as warm and content as if you were a character in a Laura Ingalls Wilder book.

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