From the Lenz Family Kitchen...

Our family is glad to be home after a week-long trip to San Antonio, Texas for Vision Forum's Reformation of Food and Family Conference.  The event was wonderful on so many levels, and I think all the Lenz's came home stuffed with "food for thought."  One of my intentions following the lessons learned there is to post weekly food creations I contribute to the family diet.  The primary purpose will be to keep a record of successes, failures, discoveries and old favorites.

Many friends and customers have asked our family to explain the method we have for maintaining a healthy diet.  In some ways, we are not the best people to ask because we are spoiled.

Living on a farm means the fresh clean ingredients for any meal are literally at our fingertips.  Watching families we know source good food from multiple local farmers while we grow it a short walk from the back door has often forced me to question whether I would be as diligent and consistent about my food sources if I didn't live on a farm run on principles of health and land stewardship.

Ultimately, I believe an attitude of gratefulness for whatever God chooses to give us for food is essential.  At the same time, being purposeful about the food we eat is, as I am learning, an act of obedience and worship to our Creator and should not be taken lightly.

Our method?  The inspiration for most meals comes from whatever is in the garden and freezer.  Meal planning is established around a few seasonal ingredients on a daily or weekly basis.

This week we had cabbage and we were tired of cole slaw.  So I made big salads.  A Six Arrows Farm chicken went into the crock pot Tuesday morning and Daddy brought home a few ingredients we don't grow, like a lime and an avocado.

I tried a new dressing...Creamy BBQ Cilantro Lime from Mel's Kitchen Cafe, a recipe site we love.

Next time I will be adding more lime a bit more pepper than the recipe calls for and cayenne pepper (something we were out of at the time.)  It was very good, even so, and we don't have any leftovers!

An excellent piece of advice from Chef Francis Foucachon at the conference concerning cooking was to be prepared ahead of time for a meal.  This meal was not even planned until noon of the same day.  My "excuse" for being less than prepared was the fact that we arrived home from the Food Conference about 1:30 Tuesday morning.  Things missing, in retrospect, were a little red onion and black beans (I had them and forgot until we were past the first few bites.)  :)

After clean up Tuesday night, I mixed up a batch of a family favorite, baked oatmeal, to have for breakfast Wednesday morning.  I love the recipe because of the make-ahead style.  Because I put it together the night before, I can stumble into the kitchen half-awake and turn the oven on and breakfast is ready about fifty minutes later.  Ingredients in baked oatmeal are also inspired by whatever we have in the house.  Some favorite additions are coconut, raisins, apples, walnuts or almonds, and dried dates.  This time we ate it with delicious Apricot syrup Aubrey canned last fall.

"A righteous man regards the life of his animal... "

Proverbs 12:10 defines animal husbandry as God intends it to be.

"A righteous man regards the life of his animal but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruelty."

There is a time to kill and a time to heal according to Ecc. 3:3.

My brothers taught me a righteous man kills an animal for only three reasons; to provide food, to protect his family and property or to protect an animal from unecessary suffering. In cases where none of these concerns are present his duty is to respect what God has created. All of my brothers are excellent hunters and processors and yet hunting and farming for them is not recreational. It involves duty and service and taking dominion as God has commanded.

I suppose in ordinary circumstances a person who lives on a farm, slaughters 400 chickens a year, protects those chickens from countless predators and has become expert in animal processing could become callous to death and animal life in general. Not so with my brothers! By God's grace He has shown them the way of the righteous man in respectfully nurturing what God has given us stewardship over until the right time and context. 

The pictures are of a day-old fawn Sam found while mowing our pasture.

We were concerned something was wrong since he wasn't moving and his mother was nowhere in sight. Possibly he had been seperated from her and we could find a different mother for him at a local private wildlife park/zoo. However when we called we learned does will leave their young alone all day curled up in the same position and so our best plan would be to leave him close to where we found him (after Sam mowed where he was :o) ) so his mother could find him again. Sure enough, later in the aternoon he had disappeared so we assume his mother came to pick up her obedient offspring.

In a few years Ben may encouter this same animal in our woods, no longer helpless and fearless but full-grown and proud. If he is hunting he will take it down to serve as dinner and be thankful for God's provision.