Lenten Works of Mercy

Lent is right around the corner and I see an opportunity use the the Spiritual and Corporal Works of Mercy as a springboard to come up with some family sacrifices (at the bottom of the post for your reference) and at the same time honor the three pillars of Lenten Sacrifice:  Prayer, Fasting and Almsgiving.

We have already agreed on one sacrifice to make together; we will eat on a food stamps budget for the entirety of Lent. But after our conscientious observance of Advent this year, I really want to help us keep Lent in an active way.

I brainstormed these ideas to talk over with the family to see which ones we want to implement. [2/14: The ones in bold are the ones we chose] Here is my starting list; what are your ideas?

• Buy food for the hungry before Easter using our savings from our "food stamps" budget and have the kids take them into church on Easter as offerings.  (We did this at Christmas and it was good for us all).
• Make up "help bags" for the homeless to carry in the car.
• Cull our closets for high quality things we don't wear to donate to the children's home and women's shelter
• Get wish lists for local children's and homeless shelters to see if we can meet any of those needs
• Write letters to cheer service-persons abroad 
• Challenge each member of the family to share his or her faith with someone 
• Send an encouraging note to someone going through a hard time
• Start a prayer jar; place names of family and friends (living and dead) on slips of paper in a jar on the table.  Each night, draw a name from the jar and pray for that person (or the repose of their soul).
• Set a purpose to speak (mercifully) to someone who is on a destructive path.
• Share this excellent blog post with Dear Hubby and the teens
• Make a concerted effort effort to "bear wrongs patiently and forgive all injuries." I'm thinking of getting some bear stickers for the little ones to put on a paper cross each time we notice them "bearing" with each other.  Might be good for the big ones too!
• Pray for someone or a situation we learn about on the news
• Sacrifice TV time and use that time to write a letter to an elderly friend or do a good deed for someone, such as cook a special meal, clean something, repair something, etc.
• Calendar times to attend stations of the cross on Fridays
• Make a King's cake for Fat Tuesday (since I forgot on Epiphany this year! Here's a pic from last year)
• Participate in a Food Fast to help us understand how the hungry are suffering (Feb 21-22); I won't have the little ones do this, but they'll have no sweets or extras that day [two of us are doing this; the others think they're crazy!]

The corporal works of mercy is as follows:

• To feed the hungry;
• To give drink to the thirsty;
• To clothe the naked;
• Shelter the homeless;
• To visit the sick;
• Visit the imprisoned;
• To bury the dead.

The spiritual works of mercy are:

• To instruct the ignorant;
• To counsel the doubtful;
• To admonish sinners;
• To bear wrongs patiently;
• To forgive offences willingly;
• To comfort the afflicted;
• To pray for the living and the dead.

Fantastic Fish Pie

It's Lent.  It's yummy.  And no, I didn't eat it (calories), but everyone else loved it.  All that said, I can't really take credit because it's Jamie Oliver's recipe.

Fantastic Fish Pie

 Jamie Oliver from The Return of the Naked Chef

(My notes are in italics; the photos are mine) 

6 large potatoes, peeled and diced into 1-inch squares
salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 free-range eggs
2 large handfuls fresh spinach, trimmed and washed
1 onion, finely chopped (I don't use the onion)
1 carrot, halved and finely chopped (we like the carrot chunky)
Extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 pint double cream (I use light cream or just milk)
2 good handfuls grated mature Cheddar or Parmesan
juice of 1 lemon
1 heaped teaspoon English mustard
1 large handful flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
455gr/1 lb haddock or fresh cod fillet, skin removed, pin-boned and sliced into strips (use whatever you have; I've used halibut, snapper and crappy)
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Nutmeg, optional

Preheat the oven to 230C/450F/gas6.  (We do 350 for 30 min)

Put the potatoes into salted boiling water and bring back to a boil for 2 minutes. Carefully add the eggs to the pan and cook for a further 8 minutes until hard boiled, by which time the potatoes should also be cooked. At the same time, steam the spinach in a colander above the pan. This will only take a minute. When the spinach is done, remove from the colander and gently squeeze any excess moisture away. Then drain the potatoes in the colander. Remove the eggs, cool under cold water, then peel and quarter them.  Place to one side.

In a separate pan slowly fry the onion and carrot in a little olive oil for about 5 minutes, then add the double cream, and bring just to a boil. Remove from the heat and add the cheese, lemon juice, mustard, and parsley.

Put the spinach, fish and eggs into an appropriately sized earthenware dish and mix together, pouring over the creamy vegetable sauce. 

(before pouring on the sauce)

The cooked potatoes should be drained and mashed, add a bit of olive oil, salt, pepper, and a touch of nutmeg, if you like.  (we use butter instead of olive oil here)

Spread on top of the fish. Don't bother piping it to make it look pretty, it's a homely hearty thing. Place in the oven for about 25 to 30 minutes until the potatoes are golden.

Serve with some nice peas or greens, not forgetting the baked beans and tomato ketchup. Tacky but tasty, and that's what I like.

And here is the picture 2 minutes after I put it on the table -- I was just a little too slow!

Try it and let me know how much you love it too!

 

First Friday - White Fish Risotto

I saw a recipe for white fish risotto on one of my regular blogs and thought, "Why not?"  Since it is the first Friday of Lent, I wanted to start out with something a little special.  This appealed to me because we everything I needed for the recipe already in the house! 

First I needed to make the fish stock.  It was easier than it sounds since I had snapper throat in the freezer. 

The risotto was as simple as risotto can be.  As long as you have everything to hand when you start, you can't go wrong.  It's flavored with orange (both zest and juice) and it was a light and delicate flavor.   I made the recipe just as listed except I cut the butter back a bit.  My only "do-over" is that I would have reserved a couple of slices of orange (similar to the photo) and some minced parsley (which went in the stock) to decorate the top of the dish, it was so white!

 This dish was fantastic!  Every single one from youngest to Dear Hubby asked for seconds. Try it for yourself and let me know what you think. 


Photo credit.