Quick Chocolate Pudding

Recipe #8: p. 264, Quick Chocolate Pudding, Grace Whitehead, Kokomo, Indiana

sugar or honey
cornstarch
cocoa
milk
vanilla
margarine (optional)

"After being diagnosed with cancer, Doris started keeping a journal. Some of the entries addressed the writing of Living More with Less, and her frustration with how her illness prevented her from working on the manuscript."

"Journal Entry—November 4, 1979 (written from Hershey Medical center)
I so much want to complete this book, one of the creative works of my life. But weighed in the balance against more time with Paul, Cara, and Marta, (husband and daughters) the book is like a dry dandelion ready to blow. But I shouldn't have to make such choices. If I get well enough to work on the book I will have time with my family."

 "Doris died quietly, peaceably, and surrounded by family on November 10, 1979, the manuscript not yet completed.
But the unfinished manuscript itself may be symbolic. The task of living responsible is never finished. In her preface to the More-with-Less Cookbook Doris describes the search for more responsible eating as a "kind of holy frustration." This holy frustration for more-with-less living needs to continue in our households, travel, recreation, and church life."
http://www.heraldpress.com/Bios/Longacre/journal.html 

Doris kept a list of things she felt were the frivolities of life—things one should not let get in the way of the enjoyment of living.
Life is too short to ice cakes; cakes are good without icing.
Life is too short to read all the church periodicals.
Life is too short not to write regularly to your parents.
Life is too short to eat factory baked bread.
Life is too short to keep all your floors shiny.
Life is too short to let a day pass without hugging your spouse and each of your children.
Life is too short to nurse grudges and hurt feelings.
Life is too short to worry about getting ready for Christmas; just let Christmas come.
Life is too short to spend much money on neckties and earrings.
Life is too short for nosy questions like "How do you like your new pastor?" Or—if there’s been a death—"How is he taking it?"
Life is too short to be gone from home more than a few nights a week.
Life is too short not to take a nap when you need one.
Life is too short to care whether purses match shoes or towels match bathrooms.
Life is too short to stay indoors when the trees turn color in fall, when it snows, or when the spring blossoms come out.
Life is too short to miss the call to worship on a Sunday morning.
Life is too short for bedspreads that are too fancy to sleep under.
Life is too short to work in a room without windows.
Life is too short to put off Bible study.
Life is too short to put off improving our relationships with the people we live with.
 http://www.heraldpress.com/Bios/Longacre/

If anyone is following my posts, you may have noticed that I skipped from Recipe #6 to Recipe #8.  I have already made Recipe #7, but this one feels more timely.

Today, my daughter turns three years old, and I made chocolate pudding for her birthday.  The recipe called for very few ingredients, and the instructions were very simple: Combine ingredients.  Cook.  Stir constantly unti thickened.

This sounded simple enough, and, in reality, it was.  I just did not have realistic expectations for how long it takes for pudding to thicken.

I really enjoy stirring pots of cooking food, and I always have.  I have fond memories of stirring pots of sauce or holiday foods when my family was cooking.

And the process of watching cornstarch turn powder and liquid materials into a thickened substance, was really quite intriguing for me.

But it took forty-five minutes of constant stirring for my Quick Chocolate Pudding to thicken.  Those were forty-five minutes that I could have been reading a book with my daughter, or tickling her, or telling her stories about her first three years of life.

While I agree with Longacre, that Americans in general overeat sugar and processed foods (More-with-Less p. 21), I also believe that she is correct when she says, "There is not just one way to respond, nor is there a single answer to the world's food problem.  It may not be within our capacity to effect an answer.  But it is within our capacity to search for a faithful response" (More-with-Less p. 13).

This search for a faithful response must also take into Longacre's list of Life is too short...

And for me, life might just be too short to make my own pudding in the future.

Quick Fruit Cobbler

Recipe #6: p. 273, Quick Fruit Cobbler--Jocele Meyer, Brooklyn, Ohio

sugar
flour
milk
baking powder

salt

"A dessert is (almost by definition) a food containing sugar.  But before getting into dessert recipes, let's remind ourselves that not all meals require a sweet ending.  The daily dessert habit is firmly entrenched in North America, but not with most other people.  In many countries sweets are used for celebrations only, not to top off everyday meals."  More-with-Less, p. 261

My son turned three about a week ago.  He loves food and eating, which is both helpful and difficult for me as a person with anorexia nervosa.

It can be difficult  when he gets down from breakfast and immediately asks about snack.  It can be difficult when I ask him what his favorite part of the day was and he names a food he ate. It can be difficult when it seems like so many of his thoughts revolve around food.

It can be helpful when I realize that he is learning to care for his needs and his body. It can be helpful when I realize that he shows as much joy and exuberance for food as for everything else in life.  It is helpful when I realize that so many of my thoughts also revolve around food, but at least his are about his enjoyment of eating.

So, when I asked him what he wanted to do for his birthday, "cake" was his response.  He also listed play with cars, and sing "Happy Birthday," but food was definitely part of his desire for his special day.

I used to believe that I could engage in a celebration with other people and not partake of the food.  It was my way of saying, "The food has nothing to do with my relationship with these people.  I can be a part of this relationship just as much as everybody else, regardless if I am eating with them.  My family and friends should love me for me, not for what I do or do not eat."

But over the past 10 years of therapy and recovery work that I have done, I have come to understand that my belief was false.  Eating a meal with someone is a way of sharing life with them, loving them, and letting them love me.


Of course, for food to be a healthy part of a relationship, people have to be healthy and mature enough to not use food as a way to guilt, manipulate, or shame themselves or each other.

My son's birthday offered an opportunity for me to choose a dessert to share with him to celebrate the day of his birth.  It also allowed me to support Longacre's view about the over-consumption of sugar and desserts in the U.S. by choosing a dessert that limits the amount of sugar and takes advantage of the natural sweetness of fruit.

I chose to use Granny Smith apples in the recipe, and it tasted pretty good.  The edges browned more quickly than the middle, so I did not cook it for as long as the recipe indicated.  Next time, I will cook it for the correct amount of time and try a glass baking dish instead of a metal pan.  

So, along my journey to recover from disordered eating and to be a faithful disciple of Jesus, I am learning to eat during celebrations while also thinking about the foods that are part of the celebration.  I do not have to buy a traditional U.S. birthday cake loaded with sugar and frosting.  I can make a cake or cobbler from More-with-Less that provides recipes that value celebrating and caring for God's earth and people.

As Longacre shares, "Sugar never was good for us...We've long been aware of sugar's role in tooth decay, diabetes, and obesity."
 "Much land now devoted to sugar should be used for other crops yielding proteins, vitamins, and minerals." More-with-Less, p. 260-261

Sitting around the kitchen table with my son and the rest of my family enjoying cobbler was a moment free of guilt, manipulation, and shame as I ate a dessert that tasted good.  It allowed me to use food  to celebrate in a way that felt joyful and also faithful.