Wednesday, February 29, 2012

HONOR: AN ESSENTIAL INGREDIENT



BREAKFAST: 2 orange-berry muffins, banana and peanut butter, coffee
LUNCH: pumpkin muffin; farro salad with spinach and feta; "leap-day soup" (lentils and green things. Why this makes it leap day besides the obvious was not so obvious); apple bread pudding
DINNER: chickpea fries covered in pea tendrils with a lemon aoli, date sweet-n-sour sauce,honey fancy-schmancy something, and toasted pumpkin seeds. Veggie pot pie (mushrooms, kale, potatoes, brussels sprouts, soy chorizo). All from Nana in Bridgeport. Dee-vine. Need I say more??
DESSERT: hot chocolate and dark chocolate chips

ORIGIN OF ONE ITEM: The website of Nana offers a map of all the growers and producers they work with. I highly encourage this place as a great Chicago local food option!

THEOLOGICAL REFLECTION:

Genesis 9:12‐13.
And God said, "This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come:
I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth."


For me, sacrifice brings up ideas of animals being slaughtered on ancient stone altars. Or giving up something. You know the popular language of how we all must make sacrifices in this world to get somewhere, blah blah blah. To sacrifice is to invite suffering. But in reading Gen. 9 for today's reflection, I'm reminded of this idea of conventant as it connects to sacrifice. A sacrifice used to also demonstrate or represent the covenant God had with Israel. Though the acts surrounding covenant changed over time, the reason for performing such an act was the same: to show we honor our relationship with God.

Ellen F. Davis of Duke Divinity School has asserted that "eating is practical theology, or it should be: daily it gives us the opportunity to honor God with our bodies." In food and faith conversations, we could talk about eating healthy and locally as honoring our bodies, farmers, and the Earth. And we should. But I like Ellen's words because they remind me that at the center of all of these things, or maybe running between all these things, is God.
Ellen goes on to say in her book,  An Agrarian Reading of the Bible, that every day, "taking our sustenance from the earth and from the bodies of other animals, we enter deeply into the mystery of creation. Our never‐failing hunger is a steady reminder to acknowledge God as the Giver of every good gift."

So in our 3-times daily opportunity to honor God, there is sacrifice of others' time, labor, and resources. Which we should acknowledge. But let us not get so caught up in what we eat, who we eat with, or even how we got our food, that we forget to forge a space for honor in our minds. Neither mindless or mind-ful, how do we let God open us to experience the mystery that is our covenant with God? Is there honor at our table?

Erika

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

kamsa in the evening...


food list
breakfast: banana (chaquita, with a stick on it that said “to-go” as if a banana is ever anything else but ready to go wherever!), soy latte

lunch: tangerine, sweet potato bread (which tastes a lot like pumpkin bread), Korean noodles and lettuce

snack: blue corn chips

dinner: a tangerine (so far), salad and tea to come!

where it’s from
blue corn chips are from garden of eatin’. they are gluten-free and made with organic blue corn. they have no sunflower oil (which I’m also allergic too… how do i eat anything?!) and they’re really, really blue. garden of eatin’ is based in new york, but i didn’t figure out the carbon footprint of my bag of tortilla chips (my guess is that it would be similar to my smart dog). i am interested in whether i could make my own tortilla chips out of corn—i guess so, since i can make my own cornmeal. this will be a project for the summer/fall when real, local corn is available.

i learned today that tortilla chips are less than a hundred years old, having been invented in the 1940s in los angeles (http://kitchentraveler.com/?p=124). if you assumed that they were from some place in latin america, i would be right there with you. here’s what you learn when you research food.

reflection:
i know i talked about the blue chips above, but here i want to talk about korean food. at mccormick, a significant portion of the student body is made up of korean students. i’ve been lucky to work and study with so many of them and i’m grateful to call so many of them my friends. some of them had been friendly with me when we first met, but our relationships changed when we started sharing food together.

i have learned more about korean culture and individuals from sitting around many tables with my korean friends. i don’t like some of the food (one might only look at what food from my own culture i like!), but i like most of it… mostly for how its served. gathered around the table, we eat from common dishes. we find uncommon places of connection over bowls of kimchi and japchae and rice.

eating korean food with my korean friends might violate some of my intentions to eat locally… but it signifies for me how eating different foods builds relationships. my friends spend so much time in unfamiliar spaces using a non-native language; over a meal, i’m the one in a new space learning new words. and for a little while, i’m invited into their homes and lives and hearts.

food and eating isn’t just about what we put into our bellies. who makes our food matters too. who we share a meal with matters too. i’m mindful of all the times jesus gathered with people to eat and teach, and i’m mindful of all the time the bible records that jesus ate with other people. it mattered to jesus who shared his table (just ask the woman who crashed a dinner at a pharisee’s house in order to anoint jesus), and it matters to me who shares mine.

Monday, February 27, 2012

MEMPHIS OR KANSAS? Yes please!



BREAKFAST: boule bread, whole-wheat and walnuts. orange juice

LUNCH: granny smith apple. carrots and baba ghanouj.  a bunch of raisins

DINNER: pizza. whole wheat crust, mushrooms, olives, fresh garlic, stewed tomatoes, and frozen mustard greens (Walgreens was out of frozen spinach....). popcorn. Lots of chocolate chips!!

ORIGIN OF ONE ITEM: Boule Bread, a type of french bread baked in earthenware pots so the crust is crunchy and layered.This was from Crumb, a local bakery that you can find at several summer and winter farmers’ markets in and around Chicago. Anne is the baker, and she’s fabulous. She also does loaves like spicy cheddar and grilled onion.

THEOLOGICAL REFLECTION:  I  confess. I picked the boule bread because it’d be an easy one. No googling random transnational companies.  No dead-ends--or worse, no incriminating discoveries on the previous whereabouts of my California raisins (shudder). I happened to already know the ingredients of the bread are from the Midwest and Kansas: I could trace them all pretty easily. I could even do that with the earthenware jar it was baked in. I’d just have to ask the owner, whom I’d met at summer markets.

But when I chew on my toasted slice of boule, I mostly think about Ann, the owner of Crumb. The wheat, the walnuts, the organicy-ness doesn’t really ooze out of it the way it can with other foods. I just think about how Ann is short, spunky and from Memphis.

Bread, as a human invention, is maybe then just as much about where Ann is from as the wheat she uses. Where she’s been has lead her to be committed to being an organic, independent baker.

So to go to the source of my bread I’d also have to go back to the source of this woman. In the same way I thought there was a quick answer to the source of my bread, I usually have a quick answer to who I am. We all have things we call ourselves, whether they are political, social, gendered, racial, educational, familial, or theological terms. I tend to identify as a progressive-feminist-Lutheran-woman-sibling-daughter-grad-student-friend-foodie-runner. But perhaps we can learn something new about ourselves by a pilgrimage through the past of others in our lives. Then the question becomes: who else are we? Who else is that person that has given me so much in my life? Then I become a Southern Baptist-rural housewife, among many other things. Whoa, now that’s different one for me!

So my bread has two homes: Kansas and Memphis. They are really different places. One is vast and dry, the other humid and undulating. But both made my breakfast. So pick a place that you’re from. Then remember that’s not the whole map. Reach back (or left or right) and find the place of someone else who’s made your food, today or any day. Trace the path from them and their place. How does that path get to you and then that place become a part of you? Where are you also from now?? Bon Appetit!

Sunday, February 26, 2012

what kind of smart dog travels from massachusetts?


food list



breakfast: oatmeal and cranberries, raw fruit (grapes, cantaloupe, pineapple), whole wheat toast (gluten!!! nooo!!), coffee

snack: gluten-free pretzels, pomegranate green tea, diet coke (on which i will comment another day), reese's pieces (are these vegan?!)

lunch: soy hot dog (smart dog brand), green beans, salad (what i call my “stronghold delight”—chickpeas, cucumbers, broccoli, black olives and honey mustard dressing), baked potato, pomegranate green tea

dinner: a concoction of chickpeas, black beans, tomatoes, and corn; brussel sprouts, an apple with peanut butter


where did it come from?

let’s talk about smart dogs. the company that makes them is lightlife, and they are working on several initiatives to make their corporate foot print smaller—composting, solar energy, and non-meat food. they also partner with social programs to give some of their corporate profits away. but the company is based in massachusetts, which makes me think about the distance my food has traveled to get to me.  with that very thought in mind, I figured out that if my smart dog flew to me, it would take 301 lbs co2  and that doesn’t include the carbon emissions of traveling by truck between airports, company and grocery store (thanks, terrpass!) that's quite a bit of carbon for one soy dog!

reflections

this weekend we’re at stronghold for the weekend to work and rest. i've worked and volunteered there in various capacities for long enough that the fabulous kitchen staff has a really good idea of what i eat (and they don't even complain!) over the years, i've had several conversations with them about the environmental implications of being a vegetarian, particularly around the issue of animal conditions. but it seems to me that i have to start thinking about the implications of my diet if i want to be serious about its climate impact. 

i'm fooling myself if i think i'm shrinking my carbon footprint by exchanging meat for cross-country-traveling soy. i'm fooling myself if i think i'm necessarily better to the planet if i keep eating corporate meat-alternatives. that said, i have a freezer full of my favorite soy corn dogs (from conagra!) and other vegetarian-friendly food that's traveled quite a distance.

when i deceive myself, i'm capable of an arrogant self-assurance that i'm doing enough. i deceive myself into thinking that i'm mindful enough of how climate change affects other people and the planet. maybe its time for a little local protein and some confession.

want to read more about climate change and a vegetarian diet? 
the new york times did a piece in 2007: "A vegetarian diet reduces the diner's carbon footprint"

want to see what i'm checking out this week?

Be a Sassy Cow

SATURDAY

BREAKFAST: homemade granola with raisins and skim milk. and COFFEE.

LUNCH: black bean soup with tortilla chips (somewhat stale and crumbled on top) with avocado

DINNER: a burger with goat chili, goat white cheddar, and avocado; side salad; a few fries and a few beers; from the Bad Apple Bar and Grill in Lincoln Square.

ORIGIN OF ONE FOOD ITEM: Sassy Cow Skim Milk: Conventional. I bought a half Gal of their conventional milk, but Hyde Park Produce also carries their organic label. It's owned and operated by 2 WI brothers on their grandpa's land, with the creamery and farm close together just north of Madison. Their website explains the location and history of both their creamery and farm, as well as why and how they maintain both an organic and "traditional" herd. (Fun picture of cow looking sassy at the camera!) Basically, it comes down to how they keep the field where each herd grazes. Think of the difference in terms of keeping up your lawn, they say, and whether or not you use herbicides. Though if a heifer stubs her toe or catches cold, the organic girls don't get the antibiotics to make it all better like their cousins would. They have to use rice packs and drink herbal teas. They are forced to be hippies in all areas of life!

THEOLOGICAL REFLECTION: One of the things I appreciate most about Lent is that it acknowledges that I just don't want to do things. I'd really rather not abstain from tasty treats, or take time to learn about issues that depress me, like youth violence or prison reform--ahem, the need for prison reform. But Lent says NO. Do that which is good, but is hard. Whether that's taking out or adding something to your life, the effect can be the same. I was struck at how those organic cows get their injuries treated differently. It reminds me sometimes when my headache is bad, or I just can't wake up in the morning, and I say, "just give me the Advil," or "I just want some caffeine." But what if God was my farmer? What if God said, NO. You are an organic human, and so like it or not, you're going a natural. It's for your integrity and other people out there support this decision. Then I'd proceed to whine and say, but it hurts! And God still says No to drugs (how's that for a T-shirt slogan?) but in fact, is saying yes to my wholeness. To my organic bodily, sassy self.
Now I'm not arguing for or against us all using some Tylenol or Dayquill certainly not. And did I not buy the conventional milk?  It's hard to say yes to organic all the time. I think my conventional milk was about half the price. Just give me the cheap stuff.

But my take away is this: Lent encourages us to say Yes to what is good in one another and for one another. And God helps us figure out what those things are. Lent offers a smattering of all sorts of "nos" and "yeses" to choose from. It draws my attention to what I'd rather seek, and what God would have me seek. So I imagine I'm going to many times remain my sassy self, and struggle against that which is probably for my good. Against what is hard. So thanks be to God. And whether you're a conventional or organic sassy cow today, God is still our herder.

Friday, February 24, 2012

dying and eating


food list

breakfast: fair trade coffee with soy milk, two slices of raisin challah bread
lunch: veggie wrap with side salad… more (non-fair trade) coffee
snacky snack: dark chocolate almond bark, peanut butter rice bar
dinner: vegan burrito, gluten-free pretzels, broccoli

where did it come from?

we had lunch at a locally-owned restaurant in cedarburg, wi. my partner (nathan) and i travel pretty regularly (more on this trip below), but we usually stop at highway oases for meals when we’re on the road. you can imagine how many subway sandwiches we go through. we intentionally stopped somewhere local in the village and found that we could have healthy (and still affordable) food.

theological/ethical implications and reflections

my family is in a season of mourning. we’ve unexpectedly  lost several members of our family since september, so we are getting into a rhythm of living that accommodates death. we’ve gathered around gravesides and coffins and urns and pictures to say goodbye to our dear ones… and then we’ve gathered around tables with plates and cups and silverware and food. today marked the fifth gathering for some of us. we are hungry in our mourning.

there is something about gathering around food in the context of death that urges me toward life. we must eat to physically stay alive. our blood and breath mean nothing if we do not feed our bones.  our souls are fed too. relationships are built around the table between those who gather to share a meal. but we cannot forget those worked so that we could eat. 

when we gather to eat, to give ourselves more life, i wonder if our food has meant death for others so that we might live. who grew my coffee beans? who kneaded the dough for my challah? who wrapped those vegetables into a tortilla so that i could eat before i mourned? and… how are they? do they make a living wage? do they get to rest? do they have enough to eat?

we cannot forget the relationship between ourselves and all those living, human beings who have put their blood and breath and bones to work so that we can eat. as we celebrate God’s gift to us in the life of one we’ve lost, we must also recognize the gift of life we receive around the table from people we may never have a chance to meet and love. 

tonight i’m in mourning, but i’m also grateful.

from farm to table, Creator, we give you thanks for the hands and hearts which have prepared our food.

Thursday, February 23, 2012


THE TASTE OF HURRY
  • food list     here's what I ate Ash Wednesday, and my reflection on it.
  • BREAKFAST: 2 muffins I made.I attempted to substitute hawthorn berries for cranberries in a whole-wheat cran-orange recipe. Banana w/ peanut butter.
  • LUNCH: Wednesday Lunch de---liciousness at the Divinity School. Cheesy-tomato grits, crusty whole-wheat sourdough, corn-lima bean-pea mix, and  coffee chocolate cupcakes with chicory frosting.    
  • DINNER: white-brown rice with wayyyy salty teriyaki sauce, mixed with fried tofu, peas, and broccoli. dark chocolate and an old kit-kat. 

  • origin of one thing: Mountain Hawthorn berry, from China. flat and bright red (think the strawberries in Special K cereal) I thought these would be a good substitute for any type of dried fruit when I spotted them in a Chinatown supermarket. However, they are super tart, and are supposed to be soaked to make tea, according to the rough English on the bag. Thus I had to soak them in honey water to make them somewhat edible. Wikipedia says they are also used for jams, wine, etc. 

  • ethical/theological implications :   I read this article in the New York Times called Food for Thought. It talked about eating with mindfulness. Which translated into eating with nothing at all. No books, computers, TV, or conversations. Just the quiet and your meal. So in preparation for my blog, I decided to try this over breakfast. I had one of my muffins with the Hawthorne berries. In eating it, it wasn't that great. The berries were still too tart, and they were way too chewy. I'd had eaten them before. But this time, I had two observations. 
  • 1st observation: I could taste the overly-chewy nature, but I also re-felt my over-kneading. The pull, the stickiness of the dough--the feeling in my mouth was the same pull and fibrous quality I had felt in my hands. I could experience one physical sensation with my mouth and my hands. They were doing the same thing, pulling apart the wheat. It was weird! 
  • 2nd observation: I almost ate a seed. Hawthorne berries have two seeds, about like orange seeds, in their middle. Because I was making these muffins in a hurry, and just trying to soak, sweeten, and de-seed the berries all at once, some made it into the batter. I thought, boy its a good thing I'm eating slow! Otherwise I'd have a pretty gross seed taste in my mouth and a sore tooth.  This way, I felt the seed in plenty of time to spit it out without chomping down. 
What I was granted in this spiritual practice of mindful eating was not eating a seed. And thank God for that! But I also found a bit of redemption in my previous hurry. I could taste my overworking of the dough, and my careless pitting of the berries. But by slowing down, I was able to not feel the full consequences of this. I could better taste the orange. I allowed the wheat to break down a little more by chewing lots. I was able to reflect on my previous rushing around the kitchen. What on earth was I doing, running around? How unfun the whole process became, and the muffins definitely reflected my state of mind by coming out tasting so rushed. Slowing down helped me redeem that mindlessness a little. I avoided the harsh surprise of eating a seed, and I was able to re-experience the making process by tasting my over-zealous kneading. What else might we avoid by slowing down? How else will we be redeemed from our carelessness by practicing mindful eating? Hard to say, but the results are likely to be surprising--even weird. 

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

breaking boring



last summer i learned that i'm allergic to lactose and have a sensitivity to gluten; my doctor told me that i had to completely overhaul what and how i eat. at the time i was working in a place where all of us interns ate lunch together, so i promptly complained about my new diet. my supervisor at the time joked that i would have to eat the same things over and over again and i would be bored. i didn't quite believe him; despite complaining, i was looking forward to learning how to integrate exotic things like kale into my diet. later my supervisor came back to me and said that as he was taking the same frozen dinner out of the freezer for the millionth time, he realized that we all just eat the same thing over and over again. i wasn't surprised then when after a summer of not eating lactose and avoiding gluten as much as possible, i fell back into old patterns of eating the same boring foods over and over again.

about a month ago, i came home from a dance class with a deep sense that i'd been doing a lot of reading and writing about food and faith, but i had not yet put those connections into practice. i was eating just to eat. in the process i was eating food that i'm allergic too and that isn't particularly good for people and the rest of creation. so for lent, i wanted to take something that we must do in order to survive and turn it into a spiritual practice. and i knew exactly who to ask to help me.

erika and i have spent more than two years thinking about faith and the environment and how those two parts of our worlds affect our identities. food is intimately linked to the environment--we need the earth in order to eat.

so, our posts here will be a place to keep our thoughts on food and faith. there will be three parts to (almost) every post.

  • food list     here's what we ate today. we hope this will help you see that we're not perfect, and it will also help us be mindful of what we're putting into our mouths, bodies and souls.

  • origin of one thing     based on that food list, where did one thing that we ate come from. i'm sort of wondering where a snickers bar really comes to life, so i might just eat it to find out! here we will also think about the place we buy food (what should we know about aldi's, for instance?) and what better alternatives might be.

  • ethical/theological implications     what might does what we eat indicate about God and a good life? we're in God-school, after all!

we hope you learn something right along with us, and we hope you'll challenge us when we're missing something. we look forward to your questions and comments!

welcome to lent.