The trouble with spending weeks in a hotel boils down to just one thing: what to do for dinner. I am the kind of person who might base her whole day on dinner – the purchasing of the food, the cooking of the food, and, sometimes most importantly, what to drink while eating food. I would rather be stuck half-dead in a swamp than have dinner without a decent cocktail, especially after a long day of working in subzero weather. Make no mistake, my friends: in adverse conditions, it is dinner – not breakfast – that takes the crown.

I don’t want to misrepresent the area where we’re filming, because this place is seriously amazing in ways that I can’t begin to describe. But that’s for a post with pictures, which will also be woefully inadequate. What I’m talking about, here, is food.

Across the street from our hotel there’s a McDonald’s, a Pizza Hut, and a Quiznos. Further into town, there’s an establishment that my boss dubbed “the worst restaurant ever”, and during my last film with him I got an order of cheese quesadillas that tasted like old fish, so I’m not about to test his theory. Across the 4-lane there’s The Ranch”, which is actually a very nice place, but we’d eaten there for the last two nights, and the price range could blow our budgeted per diem in six months flat. We’ll be filming here for the next three years. Clearly, we needed to find somewhere new.

Tonight, we ventured past the boundaries of the known roadways seeking a mystical place called “The Cove”. It came highly recommended by a friend, so, at 8pm, the four of us headed down the 4-lane, across a 2-lane, then down a 1-lane, and wound up… basically, in the lake. Thankfully, it was frozen solid. “The Cove” is an essentially unmarked restaurant boasting a reasonably priced menu, amazing walleye (google it, you lazy assholes, I’m not about to go there), mediocre desserts, and the best Irish coffee I’ve ever had in my life. Huge bonus? SMOKING BAR. I can’t tell you how awesome it was to enjoy a cigarette without worrying that I’d lose a finger in the process.

I’ve often said that I don’t think I could realistically live without a good Korean restaurant, but if I had to survive in this town? With the negative temperatures? The Cove just might keep my head out of the oven – at least until I got my period.