Instructor Q&A with Matthew Hartman
Wilderness Therapy. AYA Colorado. Hoods in the Woods. Made me realize that teaching outdoors can have a profound impact on students, but also me personally. I had worked before for some summer programs, but that was when I really decided to do it year round.What is your favorite course to teach?
I like teaching winter courses because it makes every other course type I have worked seem easy. It makes students very tolerant and respectful of the mountains. It also gives students a chance to experience mountains in a time of year that they likely won’t see again.
Give me your best backcountry recipe.
The “Matt Zone” is a calzone that is the size of you face. Mix white and wheat flower and baking powder. Do not measure anything. Guess and you get whatever you get! About and pound of flour total will make 3 “Matt Zones”. Pinch a little baking powder. Add water till you have a dry, hard dough. Cut into three even pieces, then half those pieces and roll then flat and thin with a nalgene. Remember, they must be thin and the size of you face. Mix tomato sauce, either paste or powder, cut cheese (pepper jack is my favorite), fry sausage from the wind river meat packing plant, and then make your calzone. Place all ingredients on one flat dough piece and cover with another. Use oil to roll ends together, put oil in frybake and fry, flipping after five minutes. Then walk around and brag that it is the size of your face.
What is your favorite piece of outdoor gear?
Jared Spaulding and Scotty Palmer—-ropeguns.
What music/food do you think about when in the backcountry?
I think every day about buffalo wings.
What is your single greatest accomplishment related to the outdoors?
Ski descents in the Mt. Zirkel Wilderness in Colorado. There were no guidebooks, just topo maps and ideas. My partners and I have skied a dozen or so long technical back there, more than a few are likely first descents. It was the product of determination, suffering and skill all together.
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