"A Religious Art"

I won't bore you with what I ate on my first day after the fast. Well, maybe just briefly, if you don't mind terribly...
Breakfast - warm brown rice with a compote of prunes, apricots and cranberries.
Lunch - homemade miso soup using, yes, leftover vegetable broth, and including garlic, onions, tofu, spinach, fresh shitake mushrooms, and, of course, miso paste.
Snacks - a reasonably-sized chunk of young goat gouda and a cup of goat yogurt.
Dinner - We went out to a new-to-me family-owned and -operated Middle Eastern restaurant here in town that serves not only meaty, but also vegetarian and even vegan versions of traditional Middle Eastern food. Everything is made to order. A definite winner! I had a Greek salad, a vegetarian combo platter that included meatless Moussaka, Mujadara, and Spanakopita, served with homemade yogurt. Homemade baklava and Turkish coffee for dessert.

Thanks for your patient indulgence.

Now, on to the intended topic of the day.

This morning I was browsing again through a book that my friend Aral gave me last year, called Not for Bread Alone, which is a collection of writings on "Food, Wine and the Art of Eating." In it is an essay by Judith B. Jones, called "A Religious Art." I'd like to share just a bit of it here with you.

It begins with a quotation, which her husband had once posted for her on their refrigerator door, and which is from the Dialogues of Alfred North Whitehead, who was a prominent Process Theologian:

"Cooking is one of those arts which most requires to be done by persons of a religious nature."

Amen!

And the following are quotations from Ms. Jones, herself:

"Cooking demands attention, patience, and, above all, a respect for the gifts of the earth. It is a form of worship, a way of giving thanks."

"But what about all the time it takes, one is constantly asked - all the shopping, tracking down of choice produce, hours of attention lavished on the preparation of a meal? I guess to many people in our world of modern conveniences, it is irrational. But then most pursuits 'of a religious nature' are irrational."

"...I've been pursuing the root of the word 'religious' and I find that it is thought to spring from religare, meaning to bind, to tie fast, to reconnect. Isn't that exactly what we do when we cook? We connect again to the earth, to the source of our food, and we bind to one another in the sharing of it, in the breaking of bread together, the celebrating of life."

Beautiful words and beautiful thoughts with which to start the weekend! Good eating and Godspeed!