Jeyson, Stephanie, Elijah, & Audrey

Jeyson, Stephanie, Elijah, & Audrey

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Something to Chew On

I LOVE that as missionaries part of our "job description" is focusing on people and reaching out and making an impact. And of course naturally, spending time with people and food go so well together.

I LOVE bringing people food as a way to show we care and build a bridge. The other day our next door neighbor suddenly and unexpectedly passed away (he was only in his 50's too). We had the chance to reach out to the wife by stopping by with some apple cake a few days later. She insisted we come in and even allowed us to pray with her.

I also LOVE having people over: neighbors, people we know in the community, other missionaries or people from church, small groups, etc. But since we've been expecting, I've noticed that I have been dragging my feet a bit about having people over. It just seemed like so much work to entertain. But then, one day I was on Amazon.com and glanced through a book by one of my favorite cooks named Pam Anderson. I read one of her books (How to Cook Without a Book) before coming to Brazil and it completely changed my perspectives on cooking and allowed me be flexible to cook in a place where you never know what you're going to find or not find at the grocery store!

Anyway, I saw a book of hers that I had never seen before called Perfect Recipes for Having People Over. Although I knew I wasn't going to buy it (I would love to but shipping to Brazil is way too high!), I skimmed the first few pages of the book on Amazon.com




And it completely refreshed my thinking about cooking for others. The premise? Stop entertaining and start having people over to share a meal. I really can't do it justice though, so if you're needing some encouragement in this area of life, click here and read the intro from pages x-xii


Since then, I've had so much more fun and we've had so many more people over - neighbors for chili, groups of friends for blts and oven fries, and much more. This weekend we're planning to get together with some people for some very casual made-at-home fondue and a pile of things to dip in it. It should be fun!

1 comment:

Danielle said...

Wish we could come for dinner!!