This Alaskan town is a crucial stop on the Iditarod—for its pie
It all began back in the 1970s when Jan Newton, who ran a local restaurant, began cooking for mushers coming through town. (Jeff Schultz/SchulltzPhoto.com /)This story originally featured on Saveur.In the shadow of Alaska’s Kuskokwim Mountains, nestled in a valley along the banks of a winding river, there’s a town called Takotna with a population of a mere 49 hearty souls. Each March, this cozy hamlet doubles its numbers as mushers racing the Iditarod Trail come here for their mandatory 24-hour rest. On a course that traverses just under a thousand brutally cold and snowy miles from Anchorage to Nome, the racers and their dog teams have gone about a third of their journey when they reach Takotna. So what makes this place their stopover of choice? Pies.“It’s basically our Super Bowl”Weeks before the competitors set off from Anchorage, the folks here start preparing for what is without question their...