Slow Food

Jim and I are not fast foodies, in fact I think it has been decades since we tried a Mac Donald's Hamburger and quite frankly, once was enough. We have never been dashboard diners, even at the busiest times in our lives. So consequently cooking is a necessity. However, after years and years of dashing home after work, caring for mom, dropping kids off everywhere for their activities, night time church meetings and school involvement, etc. I was pretty burned out by the time we stopped punching the time clock. I still did the cooking daily, but it was a bit lackluster, I have to admit.

During those very hectic years I tried all kinds of methods of staying organized and feeding the family well but, bottom line was I still had to spend too much time that I didn't have...thinking about it, planning, shopping for the food and the like. I tried crockpots and food co-ops and organic delivery on the front door and making meals with and for friends on an exchange type of arrangement. I would cook for your family on Monday, you would cook for mine on Thursday, so we'd get a day or two off.

I tried making three months worth of menus on the computer and then buying everything for the meals that week, then using flexibility as to what night I would cook which thing. I had a computer generated shopping list that I could just mark off the things we needed, I think I tried everything, make-a-mix cooking, making two of everything and freezing one, you name it...I tried it. But, sadly it was never my passion. I wanted to create the best home environment I could and that had to include cooking. The driving force for me was to nurture and take care of my family more than loving the process of creating in the kitchen.

I know the thing that took the joy out of the creative part was always having a time crunch. But now...things are different. We have time. What a tremendous blessing that is. So I thought by eliminating that one thing maybe a passion could be reborn?

Jim really enjoys cooking. He is like a sous chef, loves all the slicing and dicing and chopping and then he can look into what I see as an empty refrigerator and create something astonishing. He loves experimenting with food that he says talks to him. And he stages his meals like a decorator. Very perplexing but he does it and it is a gift. (Especially to me!!)

Here is a salad he made for lunch the other day.
We are a good match because while he is staging the food,
I am crazy over the plates and other tableware.

These seemingly simple things can make an ordinary lunch into something special. I love that because it is part of slow food, as opposed to fast food which is just designed to fill up the hole. Taking time to enjoy a meal together is one thing that builds good family relations. More than once our kids were treated by their Dad to breakfast by candle light on cold winter mornings. The older I get the more I realize that the little things make all the difference in your day to day life. They are more than a nice touch they are good for the soul. Slowing it down a notch is essential. I hope our children are reading this!

Anyway, pardon the digression to the Martha Stewart moments....

Now that we have more time than money, we are free to actively seek things that we both enjoy doing together. We are trying to discover some new things that we enjoy. So I have been collecting all kinds of recipes electronically. So if and when the fancy strike us, we can just jump right in to it. So with that as a background here is what we are going to cook this weekend. It is going to be fun, even without the wine. This guy is a genuine Italian character.

http://screen.yahoo.com/the-perfect-italian-meatball-27096548.htm