Best of Mennonite Fellowship Meals or Culinary Concepts

Best of Mennonite Fellowship Meals

Author: Phyllis Pellman Good

Favorite recipes to share with friends at home or at church. More than 800 recipes ranging from Sweet and Sour Baked Beans to Potluck Fondue, from Seven Layer Salad to Tarragon Mushrooms, from Amish Vanilla Pie to Tapioca Dessert, from Sloppy Joes to Chicken with Ginger, and from Homemade Rolls to Native Bannock.

This practical, easy-to-use cookbook is full of recipes which may be made without elaborate preparation. It contains ideas for finger foods, one-dish meals, health-conscious cooks, cross-cultural dishes, and small recipes for entertaining at home, as well as a few recipes large enough to serve several hundred people. All from the kitchens of a people known for their delectable cooking.

Table of Contents:

Table of Contents
Food for Fellowship

We have observed the growth of a wonderful practice in many Mennonite congregations during the last several years-the church fellowship meal! Where we once invited "company" home for Sunday dinner, today we are more likely to share a carry-in lunch in the church fellowship hall after morning worship.

It's a custom worth fostering, we believe, especially when we see so little of each other apart from Sunday morning. Furthermore, it seems more appropriate to relax in the spirit of community rather than to be entertained by one starring (and probably tense and exhausted!) cook.

Familiar Favorites

Collected here are favorite recipes from Mennonite fellowship meals, offered by the cooks who prepare them. "People ask me to bring this," some explained with gentle pride. "I love watching people go for this dish," or "I take this because I never have any leftovers," admitted others!

A Multi-Cultural Event

Food fuels friendships and begins to undo prejudices. In that spirit, this book contains favorite dishes from the many food traditions which are now part of the Mennonite family of faith. In some places throughout North America, Mennonite fellowship meals are multi-cultural events, reflecting the make-up of their congregations. Experiment with the Lao, Chinese, Belizean, Mexican, Native-American and African-American dishes that are part of this collection.

For Eating at Home

Not only are all these recipes fellowship meal favorites, they also feed family and friends equally well at home. One note if you prepare these dishes for eating at home-the number of servings included with each recipe assumes the traditional bounty of a fellowship meal. Consequently, we have assumed more servings per recipe than is likely to be adequate for home use.

About Titling Recipes

While most Mennonite cooks take pride in the food they fix, they are also a modest lot. We took one liberty as editors that may challenge the humility of a few who submitted recipes to us: in some cases we included the name of the submitter in the title of the recipe, in an effort to distinguish it from similar surrounding recipes. (We figured that was in keeping with our tradition of crediting the maker of a favorite dish by the name we give it-"Aunt Anna May's Snickerdoodles," for example.) We do apologize if we have embarrassed anyone with this decision.

If You're in Charge

In the interest of easing your planning for a fellowship meal we have included a chapter about overcoming common hurdles-what to do when your oven space is limited; what if there are too few electrical outlets; how to overcome tight quarters for eating.

If You Don't Know What to Make

To give you inspiration when you've been asked to bring finger food, when you're looking for something children will enjoy or when you want to make an unusual dish, we offer special indexes at the back of the book to those categories, plus several others.
May you find this food delectable and nourishing, not only for your bodies, but for your friendships and families also. There is incomparable warmth in eating together. This is food for fellowship. Thank you, countless cooks, for offering your best dishes so bountifully!

--Phyllis Pellman Good and Louise Stoltzfus

Book review: The Sivananda Companion to Meditation or Diabetes Handbook

Culinary Concepts: 100 Recipes and Tips for the Home Chef

Author: Judith Baigent

Culinary Concepts: An Extraordinary Cooking School provides 100 simple, yet delicious recipes as well as menu suggestions and cooking and preparation techniques that make it easy to prepare the perfect meal. Recipes include hors d'oeuvres, soups, salads, vegetables, seafood, chicken, meats, and desserts and are the favorites of the students who attend the Culinary Concepts cooking school. The school teaches a wide variety of classes for everybody from children to serious home chefs, with meals ranging from backyard barbecues to elegant events. With no particular food style, each teaching chef brings his or her own cooking specialties and many of the recipes taught have international appeal.
Culinary Concepts' main goal is to make time spent in the kitchen totally rewarding, and to help people find joy and satisfaction in cooking and in dining with friends or family once they're through. Growing up in Nelson, New Zealand, Judith Baigent attributes her love of cooking to the fun and fragrant memories of times spent in her grandmother's welcoming kitchen. Sharing food was family time spent together, whether growing and harvesting it from the backyard garden or preserving harvested fruits and berries for the winter. After time spent training in the culinary arts in Europe, Judith moved to Los Angeles for three years before gratefully moving to Tucson. She has two children, Timothy and Angela, as well as two grandchildren. Culinary Concepts is located in Plaza Palomino, 2930 N. Swan Road, Tucson, Arizona. Check out the website at culinaryconcepts.net.

Steven G. Fullwood - Library Journal

The best thing about Culinary Concepts-besides its perky name-is that it represents the best of what cookbooks should offer: a sumptuous variety of easy-to-follow recipes by someone who knows the way around the kitchen, inside and out, and isn't afraid to take you to your best chef self. That person is Baigent, the owner of Culinary Concepts (CC), a highly interactive cooking school located in Tucson, AZ, where students offer their own styles and specialties to share with others in a 1300-square-foot classroom. This is a unique cookbook filled to the brim with CC's students' favorite recipes, taking Baigent's creative "collective" sensibilities that much further. Here nascent chefs will find tools: a key for terminology (e.g., blend, simmer, julienne) and all the basics for creating appetizers and meals for one or many. The book's colorful design and mouthwatering photographs of prepared dishes are among its best features. For soups and salads, vegetables and meat dishes, this volume is sure to be referenced for years to come. Recommended for medium and large collections.