A Week in Food

Of all the aspects of living in community, perhaps one of the most integral is food. Food brings us together, whether over supper, sharing a snack, or through... One example that comes to mind is the spontaneous conversations that occur here in the unit, usually late at night, usually in the kitchen, and usually with some sort of snack that is being created and eaten. Kitchens, for some reason, seem to be the perfect place for the most important talks, or “Kitchen Conversations” as dubbed by those of us in the unit house.

In any case, food is a central part of daily life, and this past week, I had the privilege of heading up culinary operations here at the unit house. As a unit, we try to eat five meals together every week: Sunday breakfast and Tuesday through Friday supper. There are two people who handle cooking each week. One of these two is head chef and decides the menu and generally directs cooking. The other, given the title of “sous-chef”, assists in the effort. The following week, the sous-chef becomes head chef, the head chef no longer has to cook, and another person comes on to fill the sous-chef’s role.

My first role this past week as head chef was deciding on a menu. Back home, I really haven’t done much cooking – the occasional batch of cookies, biscuits, and the like and very infrequently a simple meal. So I was excited to try my hand at the creation of something that I really enjoy consuming. In the process, I’m trying to abide by several mantras:

·    Try to make things based on what’s on hand

·    If in doubt, make something from More-With-Less (Extending the Table and Simply in Season if still stumped)

·    Healthy

·    Delicious

With these in mind, my leader Renee (sous-chef for the week) and I set off to the grocery store. The simple life that we’re trying to live while in Service Adventure means that we’re allotted $100 per week to feed five people. It can be hard to get all the staples and still have enough for fresh fruits and vegetables and other healthy and delicious items. This week, we were lucky. We had enough flour, sugar, and other essentials in the cupboard so as to free up funds for things like feta and fresh spinach, cilantro, and tomatoes.

With shopping complete and a nicely stocked fridge, the cooking commenced. For Sunday breakfast, Renee made a nice egg casserole. The following day, I kicked things off with a batch of granola. 

granola

Our first actual supper was the next night. Soaking a pot of beans overnight, we cooked up some rice and beans. Toppings included lettuce, tomato, sour cream, cheese, and a fresh salsa I whipped up which included some smoked habañeros. The salsa wasn’t quite hot enough, though – and I made a mental note to rectify the lack of heat later in the week. I also tried my hand at making churros – though a relative failiure, they were still quite tasty and a good finish to a good meal.

Rice and beans with colorful and delicious toppings

salsa!

Wednesday night, we hosted the weekly church Bible study at our house. On the menu was a very copious quantity of curried carrot soup, cheese biscuits, and assorted fruit crisp for dessert. The kitchen was filled with appetizing aromas of bubbling soup and baked goods.

We have been fortunate to receive some food from our service placements and other sources. The commute home from work is sometimes complicated by having to carry baguettes, bananas, or homemade salmon hot dogs. This week, we received a big bag of carrots from a church member’s garden, potatoes and half a cabbage my work supervisor’s garden, fruit, a pastry, and more.

Things I brought home one day from work 

Thursday night meant beef and spinach lasagna, multi-bean salad, and garlic bread.

lasagna

garlic bread about to go into the oven

Friday night was pizza night! That meant making pizza dough, a red sauce, and a white sauce from scratch. Our different pizzas are as follows:

·    “Supreme” (red sauce) with mushrooms, green pepper, onion, ground beeft, and cheese

·    “taco pizza” (red sauce) with left-over beans, tomatoes, onion, cilantro, garlic, oregano, habañero peppers, and cheese (This pizza was moderately to severely very hot due to a possibly excessive amount of habañero. Nonetheless, it was enjoyed by the hot-food lovers in the house)

·    white sauce with spinach, tomatoes, feta, garlic, basil, oregano (there was also a variation of this with red sauce and mozzarella instead of feta)

·    dessert pizza with peaches, cinnamon, and crumbles made with butter, flour, and sugar

preparing toppings for pizzas

Long story short, we ate well and I also really enjoyed cooking. It does take up a lot of time, but it’s fun to be creative, solve problems, not always follow recipes, and make delicious and healthy food. I look forward to the next time I’m cooking. Until then, it’ll be nice to relax and enjoy other’s cooking! Thanks for staying in touch and reading the blog – I still appreciate all your prayers, letters, emails, and other forms of communication. And if anyone has any recipe suggestions that are good for those on a budget, I’d love to hear them!

Crow Pass Traverse Attempt

The area where we camped - near Crow Pass in the Chugach Mountains

It was an ambitious and exciting plan – our unit would hike the 24 mile Crow Pass Traverse. Considered to be one of the best hikes in the Chugach Mountains, we chose this as our first group-backpacking trip of the service term. The five of us, hoping that we had not bit off more than we could chew, set out from Anchorage on Friday after work, arriving at the trailhead at about 6:30 in the evening. Our goal was to hike 5 miles that evening (the first several miles are the only continuous uphill section of the whole traverse – the rest is more or less a gentle downward slope) and then camp. We planned to hike a good ways the following day, and finish up Sunday morning in time to catch a ride to church.

Our camp site

Of course, things don’t always go as planned – especially in the outdoors. For starters, it was the first time backpacking for two in our group, and a 24-mile hike isn’t maybe the best way to introduce someone to hiking. It started to get dark less than a couple hours out on the trail, and we decided to set up camp after about three miles near a scenic lake and imposing mountain peaks on both sides (actually, it would have been hard to find a place along the way that wasn’t scenic and surrounded by rugged, beautiful mountains). Then it got cold – low 20s and windy. We were definitely on a “winter” hike, even though it was mid-September. While I was moving, it was easy to stay warm, but while cooking, setting up the tent, or other stationary activities, hands and feet became numb fairly quickly, even with what has been appropriate clothing at least for Kansas winters.

...cold enough for ice in the stream and in our water bottles

Moonset over snow-dusted mountains

Snowing in the morning

We gradually came to the conclusion that at the pace that we had been going, we weren’t going to make it to the end of the 24-mile trail in time to rendezvous with our ride to Church. Also, a river crossing that we would have to make 8 miles down the trail could be too dangerous to cross with the current water levels and at the very least would be moderate to severely un-enjoyable in the cold and later also snowy weather. Our plans were then thus adjusted – we did a little more exploring the next morning and then packed up and headed back the way we came. It was disappointing to turn back for sure – I was really looking forward to the views and experiences that further stretches of the trail was sure to promise. Maybe in hindsight, we shouldn’t have launched into such an ambitious hike with people at different levels of hiking experience. In any case, the short time that we were out in the Alaskan mountains was great. It only whet our appetite for more – several of us have pledged to return and hike the whole traverse next summer when weather conditions might make for a little easier time (others of the group have had their fair share of hiking for a good while!).

The hiking party

A glacier that several of us hiked to in the morning before heading back

Glacial streams bring to mind a barren volcanic landscape

Though we ended up being out in the wilderness for less than 24 hours, I still had time to enjoy some photography and enjoy being out in and seeing the power of the landscape. I’ve often looked up at the mountains from down in the city and wished that we could go hiking or backpacking in them. From the bright moon illuminating a rocky valley to snow swirling around and obscuring an imposing, dark peak above an expansive glacier to watching mountain goats navigate the steep rocky slopes with ease and grave, it felt good to be in land where you don’t quite feel as powerful, strong, or important as you think you are while amongst the comforts of a city or home. 

Work and Such

Finishing up my second week of work today, I’m beginning to get a feel for my job – the service placement where I will spend approximately 40 hours each week. For me, this service placement is at the Bureau of Land Management (others in my unit volunteer at a soup kitchen, a Habitat for Humanity building project, a women’s abuse prevention center, and elsewhere). My position at the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is maintenance worker, where I help keep the BLM Anchorage Field Office facility up and running.

The workshop at BLM

My initial impressions of the job weren’t overly enthusiastic. When I originally applied for Service Adventure and listed the BLM as my primary service placement choice, I was envisioning time spent out in the field, doing trail work, grooming ski trails, and engaging in other “outdoorsy” sorts of activities. In fact, previous Service Adventure participants at the BLM worked with Recreation instead of Maintenance – the former being more of the outdoorsy association and the latter being more upkeep of the facility. When I heard that unlike previous Service Adventurers, I would be spending most of my time with Maintenance, I was initially disappointed. I was also nervous, as I haven’t had a whole lot of experience in construction or the operation of heavy machinery, both things that I would be doing. My feelings towards the job have changed a little since then, however.

The mountains which can be seen by stepping out the back door of the shop

Things I like about serving at the BLM:

·    Varied tasks (in the past several days, I’ve: helped install road signs, cleared brush, set the flag to half-mast for 9/11, cleaned, worked on a large sign for the BLM, inspected trails and foot bridges, helped install a swinging door, and more…) Though there will be some things that I do on a routine basis (clear snow in the winter for one), I have chances to do a whole multitude of different jobs and tasks during the year.

·    Learning valuable and practical skills. I hope to come out of this year at the BLM with all sorts of skills that will be beneficial down the road

·    Get to spend time outside in God’s creation. The facility where I work is located on a 730 tract of forested land on the edge of Anchorage. I can see the light and weather changing on the mountains from the door of the shop, and I’ve seen several moose thus far (with hopes to see a few bears, lynx, or other animals).

A typical scene biking to work - overcast and drizzling!

Finally a clear morning to bike to work!

Things I don’t like:

·    It can be hard to feel like you’re serving others. Installing a stop sign, though necessary and potentially interesting, just doesn’t feel as serving-the-least-of-these or disciple-like as, say, serving at a homeless shelter or soup kitchen. Which leads me to the next negative, which is…

·    I wish there was more interaction with other people. A big part of why the placement at BLM might feel a little removed from serving others is because there isn’t much interaction with others. Though I’m introverted — not needing interaction with others 24/7 – I find myself craving the kind of service that brings me into more contact with others. The vast majority of my time at the BLM is spent either working by myself or with one other person.

Both of the two aforementioned items are things that I hope to work with, and hopefully turn into positives or see in a new light. Continued thanks to everyone who is supporting me and the rest of the unit as a whole through prayer, keeping track of our exploits, sending letters or emails, or any other means. 

This has nothing to do directly with work, but to leave you with, another scene from a recent little afternoon hike in the Chugach Range.

Church

The church meets in a Catholic Chapel

An integral part of Service Adventure is the supporting church community. For the Anchorage unit, this community of faith is Prince of Peace Mennonite Church. We’ve had the opportunity to worship twice at Prince of Peace so far, and it has been a joy to experience a new and different group of people and ways of worshipping. The first thing that caught my eye was the size of the congregation. Compared to Bethel College Mennonite Church (my home church in Kansas) which usually has 300 people on any given Sunday, attendance at Prince of Peace has been between 30 and 40 people. Worship is not very complicated and there is a nice informal feel. I have really appreciated the warmness with which we have been received. I feel like a smaller church facilitates relationship building quite readily – everyone knows everyone else and the church becomes like a family. And it is this family that we have been heartily welcomed into.

Large windows make for great scenery that can at times be a little distracting!

Prince of Peace has been very intentional about spending time with us new Service Adventurers. During our first week of orientation, we had suppers over at several houses of people in the church. Around delicious meals such as kabobs, tzatziki sauce, and chai or halibut pizza and ice cream, my unit mates and I had many great conversations with church members. I’ve found virtually everyone in the church to be fun, interesting, hardy people who also take an interest in us. Conversations, whether about cross country skiing, fishing, Wendell Berry, or bike maintenance all have left me energized and excited.

Conversation after the service

There are some things that I miss, however. Namely, powerful 4-part harmony singing. While I have enjoyed singing and have sang new and quality hymns, the same robustness that is achieved with 300 is not possible with 40 people. I miss being able to hear all voice parts around me at all times. Some of us are hoping to form a small choral group, though, which would be an awesome way to flex the ol’ golden pipes, worship together, and have a generally good time.

In any case, I’m excited to continue worshiping with the Prince of Peace community. Looking into the future, I look forward to contributing to worship through reading scripture, playing piano, or otherwise and traveling with the church on its two-year plan to read through the Bible (we are currently in 1^st Samuel). 

Well, the next blog post will probably be on my work, which we started several days ago. Until then, thank you for you prayer support. Prayer requests include unit unity, safety in commute to work, health and strength, and for a deepening of our relationships with God and others.

-Mark

And, just for fun... climbing Flattop with the unit and several church members