Community and cause in Oegstgeest
On 18/9/2019, I cooked an Indian (mostly) vegetarian dinner for the 40 Oestgeestenaars who signed up + 10 volunteers who helped me cook and serve.
I’m extremely grateful that I got the chance to tell people of India’s deep engagement with living healthy, happy and complete lives without eating animals and the relevance of this message for us today. Hundreds of years of practice has made the Indian vegetarian kitchen the most sophisticated cuisine in the world for food without meat. Heads nodded while I spoke.
Fifty people thoroughly enjoyed a simple, home cooked meal made by volunteers who had never watched over a big container of boiling milk with lemon juice patiently stirring as it split, never known anything like asafoetida existed and almost fainted when I held freshly ground green cardamom to their noses , and had forgotten what bitter tasted like until they tried fenugreek seeds ( and almost fainted )They were the most fabulous bunch of folks to cook with! More power to them!!
As for me – this was a hugely rewarding experience. I got a lot of positive feedback about this meal. In Dutch we say
‘Er is werk aan de winkel’
The journey has just begun.
