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Environment – Mealtime mindfulness
When you’re cold and hungry, even baked beans from a can taste delicious. So, after tramping in the winter rain and finally reaching the hut, the previous night’s lentil and potato cottage pie was like ambrosia. The lentil stew was made from sauteed onions, garlic, mushrooms and lentils simmered in vege stock, herbs and spices, with carrots, celery, peas and broccoli forming jam-packed nutrition in a thick and flavoursome gravy, topped with mashed potato. We heated it up on a little primus gas cooker by candlelight as the tui turned into kiwi calls in the forest. The rain fell outside. We felt like druids in a cave. After a slow warming in the camping pot, we dished up our lentil pie. It seemed appropriate to acknowledge how fortunate we were to be there and to be gracious – to say grace, even though we’re not religious. That meant acknowledging the place we were in, its kaitiaki past and present, its forest being and beings, and the food we were about to eat. That took us about an hour! Each ingredient in our lentil pie had a genesis back beyond us to the grower of the seed source, the sower of the seed and the workers – the planters and harvesters in the fields. Everything had a family tree that was long, enduring and deliberate, through time down to me. Whether it was the onions, the garlic or the spices, every passing on of a seed to grow something we ate had been an act of faith and investment in the future. Then there was the effort from the retailers and the transporters. My green lentils came from France, so that meant we had to consider the growing heritage that these were the product of, in their country of origin. Then there was the soil, water and fertiliser that went into what was grown. And the Himalayan salt – what processes and labour were involved in getting that to my bowl in the hut? Shepherd’s pie never tasted like such a significant meal! It sure gave the gravy more gravitas. Mindfulness at mealtimes honours all that went into our food – we’re lucky to have it. Covid and Cyclone Gabrielle, the Ukraine war, climate change and even the ship, the Ever Given stuck in the Suez Canal, all show how fragile our food supply is. When I think about how hard it is to grow a broccoli that doesn’t get destroyed by weather or eaten by bugs, while still being wholesome and not filled with chemicals, it makes me appreciate food even more. It’s pretty easy to eat without thinking, and maybe you can do too much thinking if your lentils go cold. What we eat in a moment might take years to grow, and more time after that and many processes to get to us. That’s all worth chewing over.
Publish Date : 2023-10-12 19:00:00
Image and News Source : localmatters
