One day Susan reached out and gave me a gift. She told me exactly how I could help. She told me exactly how I could be of the most help. “Hey would you want to come over and cook with me one day? My doctors are going to put me on a low-iodine diet and I want to be prepared.”
Of course I said “yes” followed immediately by thinking, “what in the world is a low-iodine diet”?
There was a long list of foods that are not allowed on the diet, but I was thrilled to see that the approved list was full of items available here on our farm (or could be picked up from other farmers at the market). It reminded me that time and time again the recommended and ever changing diets for improved health like Whole 30, GAPS, Trim Healthy Mama all include real, farm fresh food. An encouraging reminder that all of this hard work and giving away of gifts is worth every minute.
This was Susan’s preferred, approved “food” list:
-Potatoes
-Sweet Potatoes
-Small Pumpkin
-Acorn Squash
-Lettuce/Greens
-Carrots
-Peppers
-Tomatoes
-Bell Peppers
-Eggplant
-Squash
-Zucchini
-Beef
-Chicken
-Pork
-Egg Whites
So on a Monday afternoon we gathered up the food and headed for Susan’s along with other friends and co-farmers from Community Farmers Market.
It’s moments like this that the word community is really the thing. For many of us it’s not just a word that we use lightly, but something that we live out-day to day-alongside one another. Not something to be bought or sold, but THE most valuable thing to be nurtured and shared.
As we gathered together to prep and cook we simply got started. There were no recipes, no plans…just everyone using the cooking skill they knew with the food available right in front of them. One person started caramelizing onions while another cut and diced squash and yet another prepared proteins for their place in each meal. Quickly-entire meals were coming together and the freezer was being filled.
“Y’all don’t even know how dear these ladies are to me. A few weeks ago I sent out a distress signal, and these lovely ladies, along with a few reinforcements, were willing and able to answer the call. To prepare for radiation, I needed to start a special diet, the low-iodine diet {LID}. I basically had a tiny window of opportunity to prepare for this diet, and was completely overwhelmed by the thought of it, not to mention not feeling well enough to even know where to begin. So I invited a handful of farmers market friends to a party~ they were asked to bring their farm fresh foods, come to the kitchen, and cook for me all afternoon. Nice of me, wasn’t it? 😉 Well these are a few of the hardworking ladies that were able to make it, and let me tell you, I am NOT going hungry thanks to them. They really made this restrictive LID feel like a luxury. I’ll be sharing more pictures and stories of our afternoon in the kitchen at Susan’s Low Iodine Par-Tay. I hope it pieces together what the Community Farmers Market means to me: community, family, friendship, food, nourishment, service, blessings. I hold these women {and so many others}, and the memory of this day, close to my heart. I will never forget their kindness.”
The word community really does mean EVERYthing.