Loaves and Fishes (and a LOT of Strawberries)

A few weeks ago (it has taken a little time to recover enough to write about it) I hosted a reception for a “joint service” of Raleigh Moravian Church and Light Mission Pentecostal (which uses our church building every Sunday afternoon).  The members of Light Mission Pentecostal are a group of immigrants from Burundi, and over the past several years, have become near and dear to the congregation of Raleigh Moravian.

Let’s take a step back….  Two or three times a year, I volunteer my services to host the weekly Fellowship Hour after our Sunday church service.  This is a time of catching up with friends and sharing some time with other members of the congregation.  Anyway… I asked the Keeper-of-the-Calendar which weekend would work best for our upcoming schedule and I picked this Sunday (May 15) almost at random.  About two weeks before, I got an email from our Pastor telling me that this particular Sunday would be a special joint service between our congregation and the Burundi fellowship.  As always, I say that I am up to the task.

I needed to up my game a little, since there would be between 160 and 200 people present on this particular Sunday.  (208 to be exact)  Nick suggested that I streamline my menu (not get so crazy) and up my quantities of each dish.  Begrudgingly, I agreed.  I turned to my dear friend, Pintrest, and got to work!

I started off with some basics, crudités of the “3 C’s” celery, carrots, and cucumbers.

One of my favorite fellowship hour staples is my spinach artichoke bread.  I make the dip in advance, then thickly spread it on to sliced baguettes and pop them in the oven for a few minutes to get them nice and melty.  Cool, slice, and place onto a few serving dishes, and BAM!!  It is a showstopper EVERY TIME I make it!

To keep things light, I made a fruit salad with blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, and kiwi.  I am very glad that I work for a CSA (community supported agriculture) business, and I was able to purchase all of my fruit fresh and locally grown.  (Support your local farmers!! J)

 

Next I turned to a surefire summertime standby - Pimento Cheese Cups.  These little bites of Heaven are easy to make, quick to serve, and always a big hit.  My helpers LOVED the pimento cheese, so I sent her home with what little there was left over! 

I also like to make ham and cheese sandwiches for our fellowship time, they always go over well! However, I wanted to do something a bit different this time. So, I went to BJ’s (it’s like Costco or Sam’s here) and got 5 boxes of mini croissants. A slight change, but I think it made the sandwiches just a bit fancier than basic rolls! I also found Maple Bacon Onion Jam at Harris Teeter, and that just seemed like it was meant to go on these sandwiches. I heard many oohs and aah’s just letting people know what spread was on them!

 

I wanted to try something a little different and stay with a light and springy feel so I made Lemonies Bars (basically, blonde brownies with lemon rather than a chocolate flavor).  These came out a little dense and gooey, but I got no criticism from the congregation.

 

Everything is better on a stick, right??  And since we’re in the height of strawberry season, I made Strawberry Shortcake Skewers.  I even made my own Angel Food Cake from scratch.  They came out pretty good.  I am glad that I had some help in putting them together, because I couldn’t pre-skewer these since I didn’t want the strawberries to stain the white angel food cake.

Since I was going for a fruity/berry theme, and I had heard that the Burundi’s LOVE fruit (hey, who doesn’t?) I thought I’d make something fruity to drink as well. Strawberry Lemonade fit the bill perfectly. It can be a bit challenging sometimes making drinks, since they take up a lot of room in the fridge, so I often have to make my drinks on the day of. Needless to say, there was a lot of blending going on at the Shore house Sunday morning! Nana’s Lemonade worked perfectly with the strawberry puree, and adding a little soda water gave it just enough bubbles to make it interesting!

I couldn’t have pulled off this event without some great kitchen helpers from the Mission Group at Raleigh Moravian.  They were the hands and feet that helped to pull all of my culinary skills into a reality to serve the masses.

 

In the true spirit of our joint congregational service, as I was in the kitchen pulling all of my offerings together for the reception, the members of the Burundi fellowship began arriving for the service and brought many tasty and interesting dishes.  As the tables in the fellowship hall were filling up, we began to shift dishes around, and scrunch things together.  Then more food arrived, and there was more finagling about of dishes.  It was a wonderful sight to see all of the dishes from the two churches coming together to create such a multitude of food!