Memorable Hot Lunch

Friday at school is usually hot lunch day. One of the mothers prepares and serves it to everyone. Today was the one day on the calendar left after all the mothers had their allotted number of turns scheduled or completed, and one more slot needed filling. The teachers volunteered to take that slot. In the back of our mind, we thought there might be a Friday earlier in the year when a funeral or a snow day bumped off someone else's turn and that person might be able to fill in on March 16. We have not had a single snow day however, and no Friday funeral days. So we teachers planned a memorable meal--so memorable perhaps that no one will ever trust the teachers again to provide hot lunch.

Much earlier in the year our principal, Mr. Schrock, had said he'd like to do some activity to help students be more thoughtful about those who suffer hunger, and their own choices and attitudes in light of this. We kept returning to the subject occasionally, trying to think how we might accomplish this. Finally, two days ago, we agreed on offering two poverty meal menus. They would be identified regionally, and students would be assigned to the meal option listed on a slip of paper which they drew randomly.

One menu option was "Latin America," and the other was "Pleasantview Area." (That's where we live.) The menus were further described on mini-posters in the serving line. The Latin America one was a "present day" poverty food, and the Pleasantview Area one was "Depression Era" poverty food. The Latin America one had beans and tortillas, and the Pleasantview Area one had wheat berries and milk.

We had assumed earlier that rice and beans was the appropriate poverty food choice for Latin America, but when I called Sharon, a former missionary to El Salvador, she told me that very poor people eat only tortillas with salt. If times are a bit better, they eat beans with tortillas, and if they can have rice, they think they're doing pretty well. So we backtracked a bit and swapped out the rice plan for tortillas--to be eaten with beans--for the less grim poverty meal choice.

The Depression Era food plan resulted from an idea that surfaced during the Rural Roots project the composition class did. This involved interviewing 17 people from our churches who are over 80 years old and grew up here. "What did you eat?" we asked them, in general terms and specifically about the time during the Depression.

Melvin Nisly's answer was the most memorable to me: "We learned to eat wheat," he said. I assumed it was Graham cereal (cracked wheat), like we often ate while I was growing up. Somewhere though I picked up that often it was whole wheat berries, so I called Dad and asked him what the wheat cereal was like.

"It was soaked whole wheat," he said.

"Soaked and cooked, or just soaked?" I asked.

"Just soaked, I think," he said. "Sister Lizzie would know for sure."

I started looking around online and found recipes right away for soaked wheat, most of it covered with boiling water and soaked overnight. When I described to Wes (Mr. Schrock) what I found, he recognized it right away as something his mother used to talk about. He knew she could tell him how to prepare it. He went home and experimented. During the night he got up and boiled water, then put a cup of dry whole wheat into a one-quart thermos. He added about 3 1/2 cups of boiling water and put on the lid. The next morning it was just right for eating as a cereal.

Yesterday when we talked about it at school, he decided it would be simpler to add salt to the soaking water than to try to mix it in at the end of the soaking time. That made sense to all of us--until this morning while I was getting ready for school. Then it occurred to me that adding salt might inhibit the uptake of water by the wheat berries--a dim memory from some high school lab experiment demonstrating osmosis.

All of us teachers happened to draw the wheat berries and milk menu option. When Wes took the first bite, he said, "This is not as soft as it was when I did it earlier."

"I wonder if adding salt to the water made a difference," I said.

"Oh, that's right," he said. "Basic biology. I never thought of that. I'll have to make a note for another time." No part of the kernel was hard, but it was a little chewier than usual. We served the milk in a glass and the students didn't quite catch on that it was to be eaten as a cereal--till they saw us teachers finishing up our cereal, so they ate wheat and drank milk. That was another small glitch.

Early this morning, during choir, Wes had posted signs in various places. "Sugar and Fat-free Zone. Only water for drinks." Later he posted other signs saying that no snacks were allowed without permission. Unsweetened coffee and tea without cream were allowed. At lunch he told students they weren't allowed to trade foods.

While we teachers were still trying to decide on a meal plan, Wes remembered a story he had read or heard years ago about James Bucher, a non-ethnic Mennonite who became a revival preacher in the mid 1900s. In one home in the deep South, he was invited to stay for the noon meal after he had made a call there in the morning. He accepted the invitation and, along with everyone else at the table, he was served a single piece of cornbread. Just that, nothing more--no butter or honey or milk or sugar to eat with it. No one complained and no one apologized. Mr. Schrock read that story to the students today.

Norma remembered a time when her dad lost his job when the place where he had worked for more than 20 years closed down. They ate lots of beans and rice after that--none of it embellished with condiments familiar to people with exposure to Latin American food. They had very little meat.

I didn't say it, but I remembered suppers of cornmeal mush and milk, without sugar. Dad was a farmer, so we never knew what "being out of work" meant--but we knew what not having a harvest meant. I also remember that, although we raised and sold hogs as part of the farming operation, we hardly ever ate pork. We needed the cash from selling the hogs and could not afford to spend that cash on expensive meat.

Throughout the day today, there was an invitation to think about the merits of choosing thankfulness even if one's food is very plain. Gluttony is one item on the list of seven deadly sins--not a list found in the Bible in that form, but taught against in the Bible. Mr. Schrock also put in a plea for people who fast for any reason not to compromise the physical and spiritual benefits by gorging immediately afterward.

Near the end of the day we served a simple snack of popcorn and milk. Students seemed very grateful for that simple snack.