By PEGGY MOEN
The Lenten Cookbook by David Geisser, with essays by Scott Hahn. Sophia Institute Press, Manchester, NH, 2022. Hardback, 212 pages; $29.95. Visit www.sophiainstitute.com or call 1-800-888-9344 to order.
Tired of eating and serving the same old store-bought, dried-up Hot Cross Buns during Lent? We recommend The Lenten Cookbook by David Geisser, with essays on Lenten observances by Scott Hahn. Geisser is one of the leading chefs in Switzerland and he has served as a Swiss Guard under Pope Francis. Hahn, a theology professor at Franciscan University of Steubenville, will be known to many Wanderer readers because of his numerous books and talks explaining the Catholic faith.
This cookbook offers a remarkable range of recipes, for soups and salads and main dishes and breads, with possibilities for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and collations (small meals). You will find recipes suited to your own skill level as a chef.
Speaking of the old standby Hot Cross Buns — read and try some of the recipes herein which include Hot Cross Buns with Pistachios and Saffron, Hot Cross Buns with Maple Syrup, Hot Cross Buns with Dried Fruit, Hot Cross Buns with Corn Meal, and Hot Cross Buns with Rosemary. To me, a cook of very modest accomplishments, the Hot Cross Buns with Corn Meal sound like a good starting point for trying these exciting and creative recipes.
Here are some other new twists on old themes in the kitchen: Homemade Crunchy Muesli, Sweet Potato Hash Browns with Fried Egg, Pot-au-Feu-Style Vegetable Stew with Sea Bass, and Butternut Squash Quiche.
For those needing to reduce their cholesterol, here’s a good offering: Egg White Omelet, with mixed fresh herbs, tomatoes, and olive oil and vinegar.
Fasting and dieting are distinct from each other, although healthy eating is a legitimate concern for many. The Lenten Cookbook includes a “Traditional Fasting Substitution List” that many might find helpful. Also included is a table of contents of “Recipes for Traditional Fasting,” such as Mixed Fruit Salad, Fried Tofu, Bread Salad, Spelt-Nut Bread.
If your Lenten spirituality has become as stale as mass-produced Hot Cross Buns, the essays by Scott Hahn will enliven that as well.
As to the meaning of fasting, Hahn, in an introductory essay entitled “The Joy of Fasting,” recalls The Joy of Cooking, self-published in 1931 by the widow Irma Rombauer. Mrs. Rombauer, writes Hahn, showed generations of Americans “that delicious and beautiful home-cooked meals were within their reach,” as opposed to cookbooks at the time which were “generally fussy and complicated, often full of fancy restaurant dishes that required techniques and ingredients that weren’t readily available to middle-class Americans.”
He asks: “So why are we talking about a book of hearty meals and decadent desserts at the beginning of a fasting cookbook? The truth is that the Catholic practice of fasting has come to a somewhat similar place as American cooking in the 1930s. On the one hand, there’s the spiritual elite, mostly monks and nuns, who fast regularly and seriously, and on the other hand, there’s everybody else, for whom fasting feels like an extreme practice that has fallen into disuse.”
But now, “we are rediscovering what so many generations of Christians before us knew: Fasting is part of the good life, and fasting is joyful….In denying ourselves the satisfaction of our bodily appetites, we become more aware of, and closer to, the spiritual reality of God.”
This is a beautiful book as well, with high-quality photographs by Roy Matter. The pictures are not only of the scrumptious food, but also of saints and church scenes. The cover is, appropriately, purple.
Along with offering outstanding seasonal recipes and historical and theological background on fasting, this book will make an excellent Easter gift for anyone on your list.
Highly recommended.
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