Holidays At Four Corners, Montana: Christmas Crack And Gourmet Meat

FOUR CORNERS, Mont. — It’s the least likely location for a Hallmark Christmas movie. There’s no charming town square, no chiming bells at the ye olde church and it’s home to the club voted the ugliest building in the area.

But in Four Corners, Montana, a host of Christmas traditions continue to play out around the major intersection between Bozeman and Big Sky, Montana. 

At the center of this rapidly growing unincorporated community are gas stations on three of the corners, and on the fourth there’s the Korner Klub, a family-owned restaurant and bar that remains the de facto town hall of Four Corners.

The Korner Klub is one of several businesses where holiday rituals begin and last, uniting residents and those passing through.

The community grew by 87% between 2010 and 2020, nearly doubling in size to around 6,000 people. That didn’t bring strolling crowds decked out in holiday-themed hats and scarves into the streets, because no one really walks in this land of four-lane traffic. 

The growth did spawn new businesses and buttress a thriving holiday celebration scene, where shoppers find hard-to-get specialty items, and the Korner Klub regulars keep a yule log of community spirit burning.  

Those Aren't Christmas Trees You Smell

As the building boom in Bozeman and Big Sky continues, Four Corners remains the hub of commercial support, where the construction trades base operations and workers live.

It’s also home to large marijuana grow operations, projecting a pungent pine-like smell onto the streets surrounding the Korner Klub. 

Most visitors passing through catch a whiff of the weed industry in Four Corners, and might stop to resupply at a dispensary.

Next door to the Korner Klub at Bloom, the dispensary sells a variety of intoxicating stocking stuffers, like joints pre-rolled using a variety of marijuana strains with names like Mimosa, Kush Mints and perhaps in an ode to the gas stations anchoring Four Corners, one called Modified Gas.

For those who prefer vape pens, Bloom sells a brand of cartridge called Unicorn Piss that reportedly tastes like tart Smarties candies. 

High End Ingredients

With well-to-do professionals commuting through and private chefs flying in to cater to wealthy newcomers living in the region’s massive multimillion-dollar mansions, Four Corners is now home to a pair of impressive meat and cheese markets. 

There’s Lone Peak Provisions and Primal Meat & Fish Market, where holiday shoppers fill out menus for families and guests with discerning tastes. 

Shane Cartularo started Primal after taking meat science classes at nearby Montana State University and growing up in the restaurant business on the East Coast. 

He agrees that with all the LED billboards, gas stations and casinos, Four Corners doesn’t compare to Montana’s postcard-quaint communities like Red Lodge or Bigfork, or even historic downtown Bozeman. But it’s still a draw, especially during the holidays. 

“It’s growing into a food hub,” said Cartularo, taking a break from cutting and prepping big cuts of beef tenderloin for sale. “From celebrities to blue-collar workers, they're all looking for the same thing. It's just good food.”

Primal caters to high-end private chefs, who beat a path to the store around Christmas when they fly in to cook for large holiday parties. 

“They’ll email a list before they land, and we can get it together. So then all they got to do is come pick it up. We try to make their life easier,” said Cartularo, who flies in fresh sushi-grade ahi tuna from Hawaii and offers a variety of hard-to-find spices and beverages. 

“You wouldn't guess you'd see it in Four Corners,” said Cartularo, trying to explain the community’s evolution into a foodie hotspot. “It’s a magical place that's not quite a destination location but becoming one.”

A Portal To Latin America

With Christmas looming, a crowd of shoppers packed into El Mercadito on Monday, shopping for items that are hard to find anywhere else in Montana. 

Many of the skilled workers building trophy homes and condos in Bozeman and Big Sky hail from Mexico, Central and South America. Some lined up to wire home money from a little service window inside the store, while others browsed aisles crowded with sweets, spices and premade salsas and entrees. 

El Mercadito is the best place to get ingredients to make festive red and green mole enchiladas or find exotic sodas from Brazil. 

As a line backed up to check out, two women bought several bags of big green leaves for making a traditional Venezuelan dish known as hallacas. These are similar to tamales and consist of corn dough filled with various meats, vegetables and spices, wrapped in plantain or banana leaves and boiled. 

Hallacas are especially popular during the Christmas season in Venezuela and are considered a national dish. The preparation of hallacas involves a communal effort, making them a centerpiece of family gatherings during the holidays — from Caracas to Four Corners. 

Christmas At The Korner Klub

Back in 1980, when Jill Ritter’s father Jerry bought the Korner Klub, it was a little log structure and a reliable place to grab a cold beer. 

In 1984, the building burned down, and Jerry rebuilt, adding an apartment where he and his two daughters lived. 

Every Christmas, locals gathered at Korner Klub, which Jerry painted bright, garish colors. He was inspired by homes and businesses he’d seen in Belize, where he now spends most of the year. 

“It’s tropical colors. It sets us apart from anybody else. We actually got voted, five years ago, ugliest building in Bozeman. We won,” said Jill, who remembers feeling honored. 

With her father happy to avoid Christmas in Montana, Jill steps up as a steward of Four Corners holiday traditions. 

“On Christmas, it is everybody trying to escape family or don’t have anywhere to go. They can come here,” said Jill. 

Patrons sit around and play Crokinol, a disk-flicking dexterity board game popular in Canada.

“You have these little pebbles and you have a hole in the middle and you try to get the pebble in the hole,” said Jill. 

For years, Christmas Eve meant drinking at the Korner Klub until “8 or 9 or 10 or whatever,” said Jill. “And I had a lot of friends who lived in the neighborhood over here and we’d all jump in the car and go Christmas caroling.

“We were drunk, and one year I had just gotten the liquor order and it was still in the back of my truck,” she added, explaining how the alcohol-induced Christmas spirits pushed the carolers well beyond the front stoop of one woman’s home. “So we went into the bathroom and sang to her. She was in the bathtub. She was bubble covered, yeah. An ‘only in Four Corners thing.’”

It’s also personal for those who make it a tradition to spend Christmas at Four Corners.

“This is my family,” Jill said. “We did have a guy, I think for 20 years, he was Santa Claus at the (Gallatin Valley) mall. He had one arm that didn’t work. He was a beautiful Santa. Real beard.”

The beard and Santa nickname stuck around all year. 

This holiday season, all the Santas who’ve celebrated at the Korner Klub are memorized by a shirtless Santa painted on a glass door at the entrance, another “only in Four Corners thing.”

Zion Gromiller, a Korner Klub regular who works at a nearby dispensary, said, “The food is orgasmic. All drinks are doubles. You can always have a good Christmas at the Korner Klub, just like sweet baby Jesus found refuge in the manger.” 

Christmas Crack

Just down the road from Four Corners is Gallatin Gateway. It’s known as simply “Gateway” to locals, and a tiny stretch of buildings on Mill Street might pass for a Hallmark movie set. 

“Downtown” Gateway includes a historic school and a community center, where second graders put on Christmas pageants under the gaze of a giant taxidermied mountain lion above the stage. It’s forever frozen in a ready-to-pounce position.

After listening to young voices butcher old Christmas standards, pageant-goers wander down the street past the old gas station and soon arrive at Stacey's Old Faithful Bar & Steakhouse. 

Stacey Crosby, who bought the bar in 1963, was a lover and supporter of all things rodeo. His bar became a popular spot for rodeo athletes and fans, and now the walls are lined with classic Wild West photos of rodeo action. One image inexplicably shows a bison launching off some kind of diving board. 

Known for country-western music, swing dancing and delicacies like fried Rocky Mountain oysters (bull testicles), Stacey’s caters to locals on Christmas with a signature drink and holiday treat. 

“Do you want some Christmas Crack?” asked bartender Chloe Garrison, holding out a bin of addictive toffee-meets-saltines treats. 

On Christmas, Stacey’s serves Tom & Jerrys, which Garrison described as, “Like an eggnog, hot buttered rum mixture famous around here. Everybody just comes in and spends Christmas together and it's kind of like the island of misfit toys and we all come hang out.

“I think we like it that way because we want it to stay a small town and we want that. I've been here for about six months, but my regulars treat me like family and that's kind of what it is. So Gateway and Four Corners,like, we're a family, and it's not like outsiders aren't welcome because I'm an outsider, but it's kind of like I came in wanting to be a part of the family.” 

So Garrison learned the local traditions. She smiled as locals showed up unannounced to decorate the bar for Christmas. She browsed gifts when Stacey’s hosted a Christmas bazaar. 

And like anyone lucky enough to nibble on some Christmas Crack, she involuntarily mutters what many feel about Christmastime at Four Corners, “So good.”

Contact David Madison at david@cowboystatedaily.com

David Madison can be reached at david@cowboystatedaily.com.