Minestrone

 

 

I made this Minestrone from the book An Everlasting Meal.  I love this recipe (and this book) because it's not so much precise instructions for how to cook Minestrone, but is more of a method, encouraging to use up whatever you have lying around your house and whatever is in season when you are preparing the dish.  The few changes that I made were to reduce the olive oil to around 1/4 c, eliminated the meat (because I didn't have any on hand, used basil and parsley for the herbs, and carrots, onion, celery, spinach, tomatoes and zucchini for the veggies.  I also used whole wheat elbows for the pasta of my choosing, and chickpeas and red kidney beans for the beans of my choosing.  I really liked this soup, definitely my favorite Minestrone I've ever eaten, and liked it best topped simply with plain parsley.  I'm looking forward to trying out lots of other variations based on the veggies that I have around at the time.

Book release: The Longest Bridge across Water

We are very excited to announce that Jeremy's book, The Longest Bridge across Water, will be released January 3rd. Please see the facebook fan page for details. Like the book page to stay up to speed. We will be drawing at random a name on Black Friday to receive a free copy of the book.

The Discipline Book

I have been reading The Discipline Book for months now and am glad to have finally finished it.  I have to say that it is my favorite book on discipline that I've read yet.  It has more information and practical application than any other discipline book that I've read.  I do not buy into every single philosophy that the authors suggest, but there was a lot of good information I was able to glean from this book.  If you are pro-spanking, then this is not the book for you, but I found it very refreshing in contrast to all of the Christian discipline books that seem to be heavy in the physical discipline category. (I am not trying to get into a pro/con spanking debate with this, and I respect the right of each family to make their own decisions, so please respect our right to make our own).

Practicing His Presence

I have been reading the book Practicing His Presence.  First of all, it is quickly becoming my favorite Christian book ever.  Mainly because instead of being a how to/ 5 step program, it is the documented experience of two men, as they sought to be constantly in aware and in tune with the presence of the Lord.  This is encouraging and challenging me deeply.  So yesterday was my first day of really intentionally trying to constantly seek His presence.  I'm thinking and hoping that this discipline will get easier with practice.  Here is a summary of how yesterday went...

6-7 am:  most of this hour was spend in the presence of the Lord, worship, journaling, basking
7-8:  maybe a few seconds of this hour was I aware of Him
8-9: again, maybe a few seconds of this hour was I aware of Him
9-10: trying to learn how to be present and listen to God amidst the chaos of having multiple kiddos here.  retreating to the couch with my journal.  resolving that the most important priority today is resting in the presence of the Lord, not my to do list.  resolving that my day will still be... no, will be more victorious even if I don't accomplish the things I'd like to do.  pondering the balance between responsibilities and rest.  of how to be present with God while doing.  but not doing out of duty or obligation, but all as an act of worship, and out of love.
10-11: had some great worship time as I cleaned the house.  then had a neighbor, and a friend (with more kiddos) over.  had a hard time staying present with the Lord amidst conversations and kiddos running around.
11-12:  a few moments aware of His presence, a lot of doing.
12-1 pm: busy and distracted with housework and caring for kiddos.  need to work on being present with Him and others simultaneously.
1-2: prayed for friends and sent encouraging text messages.  more aware of Him during this, but still need to practice listening to Him amidst doing.
2-3: reflected. journaled. praised. thanked. then not.  still compartmentalizing my time with Jesus, and my time for tasks.  encouraged though.  because this documentation and intention is allowing me to experience much more of Him than normal in a day.
3-4: realizing that in my efforts to constantly be aware of the Lord, that I have neglected to bring the kids into that with me.  taking a few moments with them to seek Him.  worshipping.  sitting.  resting.  even a few minutes are so refreshing.
4-5:  busy & preoccupied.  listened to a sermon... find it funny how things like that, that are supposed to encourage me in Him can actually distract me from His presence and peace.
5-6: busy & preoccupied mostly, with a few moments of awareness
6-7: time with a friend.  hard to be fully present with the Lord while relating with her.
7-8: more of the same.  but spent some time in prayer with a couple and had a great time seeking Him.  still struggling to rest and listen to Him while praying with others.
8-9: moments of awareness
9-10: pretty much tuned Him out completely.
10-11: trying to bask in Him while falling asleep.  worshipped.  prayed.  funny how prone I am to "doing" rather than just being and resting.  had a few moments of awareness with Him and then my mind would drift off to details.  then after a few minutes come back to Him, and so it continued on and on.
2-3 am: (Noah woke up and then I couldn't fall back asleep).  some rich time with Him, while the house and outside world are quiet.  finally listening well as He unpacked some truth in recent words for me from friends... allowing that truth to soak in and speak to my heart. 

what a great day!  the most part of each hour was not spent in His presence, but constantly realizing that, and getting back in tune with Him is so refreshing.  prior to this exercise I'm sure that often hours at a time would go by before my heart turned towards Him.  what a glorious and victorious day.  and this is just the beginning.

A Homemade Life

I finally finished reading A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from my Kitchen Table by Molly Wizenberg.  This is one of my favorite books ever.  Not because it was profoundly life changing.  Not even because of the amazing recipes, which it is full of.  But because, never before have I read a book that I would so much love to write my own version of.

As the title suggests, this book is a memoir of Molly's life, told through recipes that were meaningful to her.  For each recipe there is about 2-3 pages of life story that goes along with it.  The book gives you a good sense for Molly's family, her travels in Paris, and how she met, dated, and married her husband.  It's all told in a very casual and witty tone of voice, as if you were sitting down enjoying a meal with her and she was sharing these stories with you while you dined.

This book is filled with great recipes that I'm dying to try.  In fact, I'm seriously tempted to make this book a "Julia project" for me, and cook my way through it.  In fact, in the few weeks it took me to read this book I've already tried the Braised Cabbage and Bouchons au Thon.  Next I have my sights on her pickled carrots that were served at her rehearsal dinner, and the chocolate cake that she made for her wedding.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and have never been so sad to finish a book, because I don't want it to end.  I really looked forward to reading a recipe and the story associated with it each evening before bed.  I guess I'll need to become a regular follower of Molly's blog, Orangette.  I see several other food memoirs in my future, I think it's my new favorite genre of books.  Does anyone have any favorites to recommend?

new favorite cookbook

I just got a new-to-me copy of Deceptively Delicious.  I have only made one recipe so far (which was delicious!), but I am just enamored with this book.  Jessica Seinfeld (yes, Jerry Seinfeld's wife) has a great concept of getting kids to eat veggies, and of making meals more nutritious, by slipping vegetable purees into everything from scrambled eggs, to meatballs, to baked goods.  If you have picky eater kids, or know grown ups who aren't big fans of vegetables then buy this book!  We all like vegetables here, but I always love anyway to make food more nutritious, and still tasty.

Super Baby Food

Over the last week I read the book Super Baby Food and loved it so much that I had to write a mini review of it here for all who may be interested.  Out of all the baby food books and cookbooks that I've read this was by far the most informative and exhaustive on the subject.  It provides plenty of instructions for how to prepare your own baby food from vegetables, fruits, whole grains, beans, dairy etc.  It also includes food safety tips, cooking instructions, storing/ freezing instructions, thawing instructions and more.  My favorite part though is that it has tables outlining what individual foods are allowed to be introduced to your child at each monthly marker, as well as sample menus for a balanced daily diet, and sample feeding schedules.  This is such a well balanced, nutritious plan for feeding children, and ends up being very economical by relying on quick and easy homemade grain cereals and fruit and vegetable purees.

Irresistible Revolution

I recently read  The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne.  Aside from the Bible, this is one of the most challenging books that I've ever read.  Throughout the book Shane focuses on the concepts of loving and meeting the needs of the poor, loving our enemies and being peacemakers, and loving our neighbors.  He challenges Christians to be faithful in these areas, and shares stories of how he has done these things in very counter-cultural ways.  Shane shares some of his experiences from serving a colony of lepers in Calcutta, to his time as a peacemaker in Iraq while the US was bombing them, to some of the ways his community, The Simple Way, are living out the Gospel in their neighborhood.  Inspiring and challenging pretty much sums it up.  It's a great, easy read... check it out!

p. 113 "We can admire and worship Jesus without doing what He did.  We can applaud what He preached and stood for without caring about the same things.  We can adore his cross without taking up ours"

p. 102 "Jesus never says to the poor, 'Come find the church,' but he says to those of us in the church, Go into the world and find the poor, hungry, homeless, imprisoned..."

p. 71 "The matter is quite simple, The Bible is very easy to understand, but we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers.  We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand, we are obliged to act accordingly.  Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly.  My God, you will say, if I do that my whole life will be ruined.  How would I ever get on in the world?  Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship.  Christian scholarship is the prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close"

p. 170 "Poverty was created not by God but by you and me, because we have not learned to love our neighbors as ourselves.  Gandhi put it well when he said, "There is enough for every one's need, but there is not enough for every one's greed.""

p. 329 "We cannot magically arrive at a community that allows us to give everything if we do not currently nurture a culture of sacrificial giving.  As Gandhi taught, the means must express the end that we desire; the journey is as important as the destination.  If our community, in its current state, does not reflect the brilliant cultural and economic diversity that marked the early Jesus revolution, how can it reflect that in its later state?"

p. 329 "Our big visions for multiculturalism and reconciliation will make their way into the church only when they are first lived out in real relationships, out of our homes and around our dinner tables and in our living rooms.  Perhaps this is why Jesus begins it all by sitting around a table with a Roman tax collector, a Zealot revolutionary, a fisherman, a Pharisee, and a prostitute."

p. 344 "What is crazier: one person owning the same amount of money as the combined economies of 23 countries, or suggesting that if we shared, there would be enough for everyone?"

same kind of different as me

I've had this book for over a year and finally got around to picking it up.  It was a quick & easy read.  This book is a true story, but reads easily like a fiction book.  I found the first few Chapters a little slow to get into while the setting and characters were developed, but once I was into the plot it was an easy page turner.  I loved the writing style, consisting of one Chapter at a time from the view point of each of the authors/ main characters.  Same Kind of Different as Me is the true story of an ex-con homeless man, and a wealthy art dealer and how their lives came to cross, and eventually a friendship was built.  I enjoyed the honesty on behalf of each of the authors, especially regarding their initial opinions and misconceptions about each other, and about the Lord.  The book beautifully displays how God worked in each of their lives, using each other to draw them both into a deeper relationship with Himself. 

Shannon

Redeeming Love

I just finished reading Redeeming Love, and I have to say that I loved this book.  It's a Christian fiction book that is a quick page turner.  Redeeming Love is based off of the book of Hosea from the Bible, and how God had told the prophet to take a prostitute (Gomer) for his wife.  This marriage was a symbol of Israel's unfaithfulness, and of God's abounding grace, love, and forgiveness. 

Redeeming Love is set in the 1850's and tells the story of God telling a man (Michael Hosea) to take a prostitute (Angel) for his wife.  The story twists and turns as Angel has a hard time accepting Michael's unconditional love, as she is burdened and scarred by the chains of a rough childhood.  This book is more than a romance novel of a marriage filled with Christ-like love though.  It is the story of the Lord drawing a woman that the world has cast aside to Himself, and His cleansing, healing, forgiving, redeeming love.

One cannot help but finish this book with a renewed sense of gratitude over the way that God pursues us, and the beauty and freedom of His love.  I will definitely be reading more Francine Rivers novels in the future.

Shannon

The Hidden Art of Homemaking

I recently finished reading The Hidden Art of Homemaking by Edith Schaeffer and Deirdre Ducker. I enjoyed the definition of ‘hidden art’ as provided on the back cover of the book;

“I would define ‘hidden art’ as the art found in the ordinary areas of everyday life. Each person has, I believe, some talent which is unfulfilled in some hidden area of his being- a talent which could be expressed and developed.”

Edith takes this concept of hidden art and develops it in further detail in the follow categories; music, painting sketching and sculpturing, interior decoration, gardens and gardening, flower arrangements, food, writing- prose and poetry, drama, creative recreation, clothing, integration, and environment.

This book is a great handbook for any “Proverbs 31 woman”. It is filled with tips on how to use your home and life for ministry unto the Lord. It’s a great read for any woman who may be in a rut; finding her role as a wife or mother to be ordinary or boring. The book provides great encouragement reminding the reader of the numerous “small” things that a woman does around the home and the significant eternal impact that can flow from those. It provides ideas for creativity and twists on your old routines, all the while staying focused on keeping things simple, inexpensive and focused on relationships.

What are you currently reading?

Shannon