More about meals

This summer I was always planning for meals, budgeting shopping lists, rushing through grocery stores or cooking 21 meals a week, for 46 people, with the student’s help. I had approximately $55 a day, but with the weak dollar, it was about 40 Euro a day. That comes out to about $0.29 per person per day. It’s pretty tight, but we did bring a lot of peanut butter, jelly and breakfast food (oatmeal and malto) with us, which helped out.

For breakfast, we have half sandwiches with peanut butter and honey, either oatmeal or malto (which I had never heard of until this trip- it’s the consistency of runny grits but flavored either maple or chocolate) and hot chocolate. Occasionally I would throw in scrambled eggs, pancakes, breakfast pastries or cereal and milk.

Lunches were hot meals just like dinner if we were at camp or grilled cheeses. Otherwise it was either P.B.J.s or meat/cheese sandwiches or, what I did a lot, one roll per person along with some sausage and cheese slices. And a piece of fruit was always with lunch too, sometimes chips.

Dinners were in large quantity and as filling as I could make them. Here are some meals we had: mac & cheese, potato bar, rice with chili on top, chicken with alfredo pasta, spaghetti with meat sauce, chicken noodle soup with potato, jambalaya, Sheppard’s pie, fussilini with bolognaise sauce, rice with curry stew, and ‘taco rice’ (something I made up because tortillas are too expensive) which is basically Spanish rice with meat, beans, tomatoes, onions and cheese on top.

While in some of the countries, I tried to incorporate local dishes: in Poland we had potato peirogis and kielbasa sausages, in Italy we had two types of pasta including gnocchi and a dish I made up ‘pizza paninis’, in Paris I bought chocolate croissants, and in London, English muffins.

I had SO much fun with this role I played on the team this summer. The Lord truly prepared me for this and put me exactly where I should be. He used me in so many different ways. For the past year, as Rainer and I saved for this trip, we budgeted food and bought groceries with great care to stretch our dollar. These skills came into play so much this summer. He also taught me about patience, teaching the students how to cook... from how to brown meat to finding a spoon to how to whisk gravy.
Cooking in Italy

We had a whole team putting together the paninis, which had about 6 steps while grilling!

Grocery cart ramps that were magnetic in Poland

This is how we set up on the road when traveling. One table, 3-4 students, P.B.J.s and fruit... right in the parking lot.

These are our 3 pots we have had the whole summer.

We brought two packs of pancakes from the states as a treat for the team. Curtis and I fried them up in Prague and Switzerland.

Rainer mixing up the batter!