ANCHORAGE — This time of year, when the sun doesn’t edge over the mountains until midmorning and starts to sink only a few hours later, this city feels a little like one big, icy strip-mall parking lot with a tremendous mountain view. It’s so cold that the steering wheel hurts to touch. Life plays out under streetlight instead of daylight, and the rest of the world seems twice as far away as it did when the leaves were green.

Talk to anybody and the conversation veers into two intertwined ideations: vacation and food.