Food...Meeting...More Food!

How can you go wrong with food talk to begin an end an evening?

We started out with an interesting display of kitchen utensils at our first Food & Nutrition meeting of the new year.  Christi brought a large bag of gadgets that can be used in the kitchen.  The 4Hers were shown everything but the kitchen sink...from tortilla press to potato ricer to spiral cutter...and everything in between!  I think the group enjoyed trying to figure out the more obscure tools before Christi told them the real use.  The most interesting gadget was the meat tenderizer that looked like it would be used as a torture device in my house of boys!  We were even shown how to use the spiral cutter to make sweet potato spirals.  And, Christi also showed us how the ricer worked with boiled sweet potatoes.  I am sure my boys got a few ideas at the class tonight.

Katy, then, got our monthly club meeting off to a great start.  After the opening prayer and pledges, she gave a recitation of a poem written by Mother Theresa entitled "Do It Anyway."  I encourage you to read the entire poem on the link but the last lines are:

"Give the best you have, and it will never be enough.  Give your best anyway.

In the final analysis, it is between you and God.  It was never between you and them anyway."

I don't think Mother Theresa ever heard the 4H pledge, but it seems she would understand and agree with our motto..."To make the best better."  I think this poem meant even more to our family as we had just spoke of Mother Theresa as today was the anniversary of her death (15 years ago).  Maybe she was looking down on our little 4H club with a smile tonight.

The meeting continued with our regular officer reports, committee reports and project information.  The new business for the night was about a booth to promote 4H at a local festival.  We will need more families to sign up to make this work, so I will need to send out more information by email.

The guest speaker this month was an exterminator, David, who spoke about pest removal.  The main focus was about mice and rats, but he was kind enough to take questions about any pest concerns.  He even showed us some of his traps and bait.  I had never heard of a sticky paper that smells like peanut butter.  Very interesting!

The meeting was adjourned to the enjoyment of the youth to play a game called Spinach.  The objectof the game being to make the person in the middle of a circle laugh.  How do you do this?  Ask them a question that can only be answered with the word 'spinach.'  For instance, "What did you comb your hair with today?"  The youth spent quite a bit of time with this game.  They even changed the answer to "Sasquatch."  Refreshments were delicious as well.  Yummy layered dip and Oreo cheesecakes!

After the main group left for the night, we had a small group stay behind to try out our hushpuppy recipe.  Read my 'other blog' to find out about our first attempt.  We had a new recipe that combined one of our family favorites with cornmeal...artichoke chicken!  The best part of these hushpuppies was the crisp exterior and moist interior.  Our recipe needed some more cheese and some heat (jalapenos did the trick!), but was a winner as far as we were concerned.  And, we had some great judges stay behind to help us make this determination.  A big thank you to Zach, Taylor, Robin, Katy, Lynda, and Matt.  Of course, we did some tasting ourselves...Brenda, Jamie, and I came some tips along the way to tweak the recipe.  Michael, Sean, Henry, and Brianna took some of these and made the recipe work.  

Now we need to decide how to dress the team up like patriots.  Michael will be Abraham Lincoln, Sean as Washington, Brianna as Betsy Ross and Henry as ??  (not sure!).  We only have a couple of weeks to decide...I am sure we will figure it out!   We will probably be tired of cornmeal by that time also...but definitely worth the effort!