What We Eat

Of all of the comforts of America we have forsaken, food has been the greatest challenge for all of us. For the first few months we were here, every single day at lunchtime, Jonah would talk all about his favorite American foods. We've tried to put a stop to that, and teach contentment. It's a struggle when Tyler is the worst culprit... he searches the Internet for pictures of Whoppers and Doritos. Torturous. And then there's all you people on Facebook who love to post pictures of food. It's just mean, ok? Haha... here are some pictures of what we've been chowing on. I've never felt so healthy in all my life. But really, I'd go back to Taco Bell in a second!

First off, there is basically nothing to eat unless you cook it. Cereal and milk is not really an option. (Unless you pay a ridiculous American penny!) So, the other morning I woke up to no charcoal in the bin and no paraffin in the container. That means no fire. I sent the boys to the chicken house to fill the charcoal bin, and I refilled the paraffin... and we were set to start the porridge!

We drink millet or posho porridge just about every morning. It's basically a thick drink made with peanut butter, milk, water, sugar, and either ground millet flour or corn flour. It's pretty tasty.

But, about twice a week, when we have a zillion eggs (because we have a zillion chickens), 

we have veggie omelets. YUM!

Every day except Sundays, we have either rice or posho and beans. Greens are a special treat. 

Posho is that ground corn flour I was talking about... it's made like thick mashed potatoes for lunch.

Everyone drinks -filtered- water all day. We've gotten used to it warm. The milk here tastes kind of gross by itself, so we add it to food for the calcium. We DID just get a chest freezer that runs off solar energy, though! We've been blessed with cold water, sodas and yummy juice boxes. 

THANK YOU JESUS!

As far as snacks go, they are few and far between. The other day I was really wanting some cookies. The oven is quite a process to get rolling, and Tyler wasn't home. I decided to make cookie dough with no eggs. Delicious!

For dinner, we have been making some American food, and some local dishes. It's pretty easy to find ingredients for Asian and Indian food here too. We make a lot with peanut sauce or eggs in order to gain the protein we miss with no meat. Beans are a gag-it-down meal for most of our family, so we avoid them other than lunch. We add the eggs or peanut butter to pasta or cabbage for a Thai flavor. I've been deep frying eggplant and making onion rings lately. I also make lots of soups... creamy, veggie, whatever we happen to have. 

Peanut butter is quite a process to make, and seriously expensive to go and buy pre-made. So, we made a giant batch a while back. We're just getting to the end of it. It has lasted us about a month.

Step #1: Roast the peanuts.

Step #2: Have awesome friends that WANT to help remove every little red peanut skin.

Step #3: Bring them to the grinder man in town. Other people grind them at home. HARD WORK!
I didn't go with Micah and Tyler for this step, so no pictures... but it took a good 2 hours for the grinder man.

And every night, if there are dinner leftovers, I bring them to my neighbors. They are SO BLESSED to have this extra food... as weird as it seems to bring leftovers to neighbors! Julius and Caroline (the neighbors) have never tasted butter or cheese before... ever! There's no cheese unless you drive 2 hours to Gulu. Tyler happened to be there a few weeks ago, and got some. So, when the oven was finished, we made pizza and brought them some. OH MY! I love to see their faces when they eat something new and yummy! Julius was so excited when Tyler told him we could basically fry anything in the deep-fry batter that I fried the eggplant in. He said, "We must slaughter a rooster and try!" Chicken nuggets. This guy is a genius.

And then... there's the dishes... 

I have a spigot over there to the right. I fill the two basins with water - one wash, one rinse. The blue basket is my drying rack. 

And that's that!