Phyllis’ Blog

Sometimes you brush up against something so basic, so real, so pure, that it takes your breath away.

A little story.

Our daughter Kate has a friend who, she’s been telling me, is an amazing cook. Everyone tries to get a bite of whatever Val brings to a church fellowship meal. It’s not that it’s laden with butter and cream or built on exotic cuts of meat. Usually it’s bread or pie or pizza - all made from whole grains. Which Val and her family grow themselves. Which they also grind.

“It’s good aerobic exercise,” Val says matter-of-factly, saving her enthusiasm for the hand-grinder she has mounted on the hutch in her kitchen. It was a gift from friends in Germany. She says she can’t count the number of people who’ve begged to buy it from her. But she’s not selling.

Not that she isn’t an extravagantly generous soul. After observing the near-food-fights over her contributions to the fellowship meals, and the countless requests for her recipes, Val asked a few of her most eager fans if they’d like an introduction to cooking and baking with whole grains. It would take a couple of hours on a wintry Sunday afternoon. She could show them the various hand-ground flours she works with, and then use them to make pancake batter, pizza dough, and pie crusts while everyone watched - if they were interested.

Kate told me all of this with great excitement - and when she finished, I invited myself to the party.

The cooking/tasting convened in Val’s kitchen, which sits in the center of the log cabin which her industrial-arts-teacher husband salvaged as their home 20 years ago.

This is not a fancy kitchen, although the stove is a workhorse with substantial burners and an oven that offers both traditional and convection heat. The equipment and appliances in the kitchen have earned their way in. This is not a designer’s haven. Instead, it is a kitchen stocked with purpose.

When Val went rooting through her stack of large mixing bowls, obviously intent on finding a particular one, I asked her what she was looking for. “I want to mix the pancake batter in the bowl with the larger bottom and gradually sloping sides. My flat whisk just fits in it - and I want the flat whisk because it folds the yeasty mixture into the dry ingredients with just the right amount of lift.”

When she pulled out her electric skillet and set it up on a wedge of countertop next to the stove, her husband, Jim, suddenly appeared. “I love to do pancakes,” he explained, positioning himself on the dining-room side of the work space.

She handed him a dinner plate; he placed it under the electric skillet and between its legs, and started spooning circles of whole-grain batter into the thin film of oil in the pan. Clearly, there was a system here. As the pancakes finished, Jim scooped them onto the now-warm dinner plate and returned it to its heated spot until eating time.

Meanwhile, Val was showing us how to make a whole wheat pie crust, rolling it so it fit the pie plate perfectly, delicate in its consistency, but sturdy. She filled three pie shells with apples, dusted them lightly with homemade crumbs, and put them into the oven to bake.

Then she mixed and kneaded pizza/stromboli dough. When it had risen to its proper, buoyant size, she cut it into 12 equal pieces and handed one to each of us. We shared rolling pins, the toppings we had each brought, and the pizza stones already heating beneath the apple pies in the oven.

And then from nowhere, Val brought out another ball of risen pizza dough, flattened it to the length of her butcher block, and spread it with sautéed venison, onions, and mushrooms. A few twists of the wrist, and she slid the stromboli into the oven, now vacated by our pizzas.

And so we sat down to eat - only to discover a plate of whole wheat chocolate chunk cookies that Val had baked just before we all arrived.

The pancakes were substantial, yet gloriously light. The pie crust was crispy thin with apples settling down around it. The pizza was chewy but too quickly gone. The stromboli casing held its filling gently. The cookies had the perfect balance of chew and chocolate.

But what has stayed with me - beyond the wonder of the food - was this woman’s grace and wholeness.

There were no sermons about the superiority of whole grains. No self-righteousness about eating what she and her family grow on their homestead. No showing off hoity-toity kitchen furniture.

Just full hospitality - and shared wisdom straight out of her life. Val doesn’t possess what she’s learned. She passes it on in an atmosphere of generosity.

When I thanked her husband for letting us invade his and Val’s Sunday afternoon, and for sharing so bountifully, he said, “Val’s just trying to do what’s right.” What is there about real goodness that makes it so contagious?