365 Inspirations—40: Cooking for Friends

"I like the creativity of planning a party, or cooking and taking care of people, creating a memorable meal or event."—Martina McBride

 I love getting creative in the kitchen. It's my laboratory where I try all kinds of new things. Today my writing group was scheduled to come over to my house at 6pm. I planned on preparing a main dish and a dessert and they were going to bring sides. I wanted to see how creative I could get without going to the grocery store.

Sometimes it's fun to see what you can create with what you have on hand. I think everyone appreciates it if you can create something special from nothing.

I looked in the fridge and found that I had some Italian sausages on hand and lots of veggies. I also had lentils and chicken broth. I stir fried the Italian sausage with cabbage, carrots, onions and kale in coconut oil. While it was cooking, I added in a dash of cayenne and a tablespoon both of curry powder and cumin. At the same time, I boiled the brown lentils in a big pot.

I then poured chicken broth and a few cups of water into my Crockpot and added in the stir fried ingredients. I rinsed the lentils in a strainer and added those too. I let everything simmer on low for a few hours to let the flavors mingle.

I wanted to create a delicious sugar-free, grain-free Valentine-themed dessert. I found that I had little oven-proof baking cups in the cupboard. I decided to make little chocolate cakes (grain and sugar free) with heart strawberries.

Here's my recipe:

3/4 cup of almond flour
1/2 cup-3/4 cup cocoa powder
1 tsp baking soda
3 eggs
1/2 cup honey
1 tsp. vanilla

Mix the wet ingredients together with a beater. Sift the dry ingredients together and slowly add to the wet ingredients. Pour into oven-proof baking cups. Cook at 350 degrees for 15 minutes or so.

Cut strawberries in half. Cut a small triangle out of the top of each half to make a heart and place on cooled cake. I had these cute little wax heart candles in my closet and added those for extra flair.

My writing friends showed up and really loved the soup and the little cakes which we ate with Market Spice tea (Seattle's Pike Place Market tea) and Chai Spice tea.

They brought broccoli, green salad and bean salad side dishes for the meal and they also brought cheese, crackers and wine.

The food and company were great and we did prompt writing using Osho Zen cards. Each card has a beautiful picture on it and a word and we used these to start our free writing. It was good way to start the writing process without thinking too much about it. Afterwards, we shared our writing. We are also working on a collaborative book together, but focused more on prompt writing this time.

I've been meeting with my little writing group (just three of us) for three or so years now and we always have a good time together and enjoy the creative process. I so enjoy cooking and having them over for our meetings. Next time we'll meet at another member's house.

Do you sometimes have friends over? Do you like cooking for company?

365 Inspirations—12: My Writing Group

 The world is so empty if one thinks only of mountains, rivers and cities; but to know someone who thinks and feels with us, and who, though distant is close to us in spirit, this makes the earth for us an inhabited garden. —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I've been meeting with my writing group for almost four years I think!  When I made a commitment to publish my book, I felt I needed the support of other writers. I wasn't sure who would be in this group. I mentioned out loud at school one day that I wanted to form a writing group and two of my co-workers at the community college where I teach ESL piped up that they wanted to be a part of it.

We started out meeting weekly, but now we meet once a month. Our enthusiasm for meeting each other and sharing our writing and our dreams has not dwindled over the years. If anything, it's grown stronger. We even had a writing weekend getaway at my family's lake house in November last year. We had so much fun and I hope we have a chance to do that again one day! Above is a picture of us collaging together which also helped give direction to our writing and goals.

We are currently writing a novel collaboratively. Whenever we get together, ideas for this book seem to spring forth effortlessly. I have no idea if this book will ever come to be, but boy are we having fun writing it.

I think inspiration is contagious and if you have a group of like-minded people to share your ideas, interests and dreams with, it really does help to speed things along. And when you do succeed in your endeavors, your community or group will be the ones who are right there next to you. This has been my experience and I feel so fortunate to have these people in my life.

Last night we met for yet another session. We hadn't seen each other since mid-December. Everyone came to my house and I made a Crockpot of chili, one friend brought corn bread and a big tossed salad and the other friend brought some dip and crackers and some dessert.

Not much writing happened in the meeting because we needed to catch up with each other and find out what was going on with everyone. We enjoyed the food and chatting and planned our next meeting time and place. I have a feeling we'll be writing and sharing quite a bit in the next meeting.

Do you have a community or group that you meet with regularly that shares a common interest? What is it and what do you usually do together?