Feast + Fast - Holy Wednesday

For each day of Holy Week, Christina Rees offers a reflection for our hearts and minds, and a recipe for a simple meal to nourish our bodies. All these recipes and many more can be found in her book Feast + Fast: Food for Lent and Easter

Wednesday 8^th April 2020

I write this after posting sympathy cards earlier today to the wife and daughter of the first person I have known to die of COVID-19. Yes, he was over 70 and had underlying health issues but if it hadn’t been for the coronavirus pandemic, he wouldn’t have died - not now, not yet, and certainly not alone in a hospital room, unable to say goodbye to his family, missing out on their hugs and kisses and last precious words to him.

Any understanding of who God is must take into account the reality of our lives on this planet, where we, in common with all other living creatures, face eventual death. Just recently the artist David Hockney, self-isolating in Normandy since early March with his two assistants and his dog, sent a letter to Will Gompertz, the BBC’s Arts Editor, along with the iPad paintings he’s been producing every day of the signs of spring around him.

Hockney wrote, ‘We have lost touch with nature rather foolishly as we are part of it, not outside it.’ Referring to the coronavirus, he wrote, ‘This will in time be over and then what? What have we learned? I am 83 years old, I will die. The cause of death is life.’

Hockney is right: the cause of death is life, but the reason why this bald statement doesn’t have to induce in us a sense of hopelessness or despair is found in the subject of Hockney’s paintings: he is capturing all the signs of new life around him, buds and blossom sprouting from barren branches, leaves and flowers emerging from dark soil. We can trust that life follows death, just as spring follows winter. When we die, our new life may be in a spiritual realm in a way we cannot yet understand but it is life and it is still us: we live on.

Jesus said to Martha, ‘I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.’ In his letter to Will Gompertz, David Hockney gave his own comment on life after death: ‘Do remember they can’t cancel the spring.’

Although Lent is not traditionally a time for treats, I do include some recipes for puddings and snacks in Feast + Fast - Food for Lent and Easter. One snack is perfect for keeping me going between meals, especially if those meals are scaled down in size or far apart. It is both sweet and savoury and is the easiest recipe I know. I just made some of these peanut butter and molasses balls recently and because I didn’t have any dried milk, I used desiccated coconut instead, which I think is even more delicious. I also left out the demerara sugar, which isn’t really needed anyway. I’m not too proud to say that along with the rather sophisticated truffle-like looking balls, I did also make some peanut butter slugs!

RECIPE

Peanut Butter and Molasses Balls

This was one of my favourite snacks as a teenager. It is high in energy and good for instant energy on the go. This is particularly easy for children to make. My daughters used to have great fun making all sorts of wiggly shapes out of the mixture.

Makes 12 balls the size of large marbles, or a few large peanut butter slugs!

7oz/200g peanut butter (with no added sugar or salt)

1–2 tablespoons dark molasses

1 tablespoon powdered milk (optional)

Demerara sugar (optional)

Mix the peanut butter with the molasses and the powdered milk. Adjust the amounts depending on how much of the mixture you want to make up and whether you prefer more or less molasses. If you do not have powdered milk or you do not want to use it, that’s fine, just make sure the consistency of the mixture is firm enough to hold a shape.

Take a small lump of the mixture and roll it into a ball between the palms of your hands. Do the same with the rest of the mixture. For added crunch and sweetness, roll the balls in a little Demerara sugar.

Place in a plastic container and freeze for about an hour. Take the balls out as and when you want them. They only need a few minutes to thaw before they are ready to eat and they travel particularly well for energy on the go. You can also store them in the refrigerator if you prefer them less hard.