You know that what you eat you are...

23 Jun 2013.

In today’s entry I am going to talk about nourishment – physical and spiritual - hence the musical intro from the greatest musical group of all time, The Beatles. For those of you who tolerate my words to see the pictures, I am sorry no pictures today. I'll try to repent and make it up to the visually oriented next week.

A friend asked me, when I had been in India for a few days, if I was tired of curry. It’s a common misconception that all Indian food is curry. Not all of it is even spicy, although much of it is. The topic of Indian food covers an amazing range of tastes. Actually, there is not even “typical” Indian food. Each State or geographic area has its own cuisine, although now with so many people having relocated from their ancestral home to cities like New Delhi or Mumbai that one can easily find food from every area. I will say I have found food from Kerala to Punjabi (north to south) that I love.

Most of the time for dinner I eat whatever Christina fixes for me. She is a very good cook and excels at Continental as well as Indian dishes. A few times a week she fixes more than I can eat. Those nights I freeze the portions I don’t eat and they become my weekend meals. I am getting adept at using an Indian cooking instrument, the microwave. I am a whiz. I can even take little hard kernels of corn and in 3 minutes make a delicious salty, buttery treat. I may need to see if I can get a patent.

I typically have take away for lunch, unless I get too busy and my day gets away from me. In those cases I enjoy a traditional Indian treat: a granola bar. I keep a package in my desk for such an eventuality. Anyway, back to lunch. I have found several things have become favorites and that routinely find their way into the lunch rotation.

When I came to India, if you had asked my favorite Indian food, I would have said dal makhni and butter naan, and it still is in my top 10. It was my first Indian comfort food. Dal makhni is creamy stew made from black lentils with various spices. The thing I didn’t know was that it had a ton of butter blended in. No wonder I like it! Once it is served, cream is often drizzled on it. Naan is a type of flat bread made from wheat flour and roasted on the inside of a tandoor oven. It has a texture like good sour dough: chewy and delicious.

I’ve decided I must at my heart be a peasant. Dal makhni  is essentially peasant food, as are most of the other dishes that have found their way into my usual meal rotation. A few of my favorities include rajma chawal, a spicy beans and rice that is a lot like Cajun red beans and rice except the spices are different, aloo gobi, which is a dish made with potatoes and cauliflower, biryani, which is a baked dish with layers of flavored rice, meat (or not) and vegetables, and chole masala, which is chickpeas in a spicy sauce. Most of the dishes are served over rice and or with naan or one of the other types of flat breads like parathas, chapattis, dosas and rotis. It really doesn’t matter. Rice – good; bread – good. As I said, I am basically a peasant.

Well, I am starving now. I think I better make the change to spiritual nourishment.

This has been a good week here in New Delhi. Things here go at an interesting pace from a spiritual standpoint. In the last week I conferred the Aaronic Priesthood on one man, the Melchizedek Priesthood on another, helped confer the Priesthood on two others, confirmed a newly baptized member, extended two calls, visited three member families, counselled two people about employment and another two about pursuing education in the US, and spoke in Church. I guess these activities could have only been transactional rather than spiritual but that is not how I experienced them. I love the degree to which I have been able to interact with and bless the lives of individuals here in India, and in turn I have been blessed by them. It seems I use my Priesthood, and spiritually connect with people, more in a week here than I might in several months at home.

Don’t make any mistake. I miss my family and friends terribly. As exciting, interesting, and rewarding as it is here that hasn’t changed. Still, between my work at MAII, which is both challenging and rewarding, and my service in the Church I feel alive in a way that I haven’t for some time: fully engaged. I don’t suppose one person can make a huge impact in a country of 1.5 billion people, but I think I will make a difference with a few and who knows where that will lead. A scripture in the Doctrine and Covenants has been on my mind a lot lately: “Be not weary in well doing for you are laying the foundation of a great work. And out of small things proceedeth that which is great.” Come on, Rae, join me here and experience what I have been. We’ll have a impact much greater than we have had where the Church is established and fully functioning; where people are so set in their lives they are not looking for change. Besides, as noted above, the food is great!

Namaste.