Every Day Bonding

While at Elliza and Daniel and Elliot's home, the elder members of the triumvirate prepared a particularly fine meal for all of us who had come to greet Elliot. It was a Mark Bittman recipe for "West African Peanut Soup with Chicken". I found the recipe on-line, and have the link here:

http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1012581-west-african-peanut-soup-with-chicken

The color is mainly provided by the sweet potatoes or yams and the peanuts and peanut butter, I think, together with the tomatoes and greens. It smells, and tastes, delicious! It is the kind of recipe that invites you to modify it as you will. Mark Bittman usually nudges over toward the vegetable side of life, but my guess is that both ingredients and amounts can be adjusted. I intend, for instance, to make it spicier, and to try various greens. I do wonder whether I would like sweet potatoes or yams better. Grocers sometimes add to the confusion by labeling sweet potatoes as yams. No matter!

What was even more satisfying is the deep-down fact that, not just eating together, but eating together around a single pot of food resonates to the bone! Food is almost always pleasurable, but eating together is adhesive. I am thinking about it every day.

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