Feast of the Heart

I didn't grow up with a clear picture of what it meant to be a woman. Raised by my father with two brothers, I had to find pieces of womanhood in the women I worked with, read about, or admired. But slowly, I built a life of intention, crafted with purpose.

As a wife, mother, and business owner, I believe the choices we make, the way we build our homes, the clothes we wear, the meals we prepare, these all shape the lives we lead. It's about creating a space for joy and peace, not by accident, but by design.

We'll explore the stories of people who live life with intention. People who don't wait for life to be perfect, but embrace the beauty and meaning in their everyday choices. Because living a life of faith and beauty isn't something we wait for, it's something we create. And through these stories, we discover new ways to flourish, one intentional step at a time.

Today, I'm visiting the lovely Mary. She's an author, cook, and a mother to all. Mary and I have known each other for years. She's the woman who taught me how to cook, and she taught me that a meal is more than just food. It's a way to show love.

I'm so glad you're here. Come on into the kitchen. So, I'm really excited that we get to spend this time together and just sort of cook together, and I always put you to work. Yes, you do. We're having a little gathering. Okay. You know, I always have to have something salty sweet going on, so we're making some dark chocolate pecan cookies. Yum! Okay.

I'm going to put you in an apron, because we're active cooks. It always feels like home when I walk into your kitchen. Oh, Jo, you're so kind. I'm just so glad you're here. We always have so much fun when we cook together, and I think that's, it's such a joy, you know, when you ask people into your home and just bring them into what's going on, like fill the cookie jar together, or have a cup of tea. Quite literally fill the cookie jar together.

Exactly, exactly. A cookie scoop kind of, you could use it for anything. It's really a multi-purpose tool. But, it helps with uniformity in cookies, and so I already went ahead and just made the dough because I didn't want to waste the limited time we have together. I had to do that, but, you know, these are my husband's favorite cookies. You've got to dig in there. We've been married almost 37 years, so I've been making these since, gosh, we were dating. You know, there's something about food and memory.

The association between it, and these cookies always just bring such good feelings. So, I always like to have some, especially when we're going to do a gathering or something, to have some on the table, because people always ask for these. What memories would you say these cookies bring up?

While my husband was, you know, he was in the Navy for years, these were the cookies that he always asked for when he came home from deployment. It's just a recipe that I learned in my mom's kitchen, and I've made it my own over the years. They bring memories of joy, memories of home. Yeah. You know, when I'm having a really hard day, the best thing in the world for your heart to grow is to serve somebody else. Love God, love people, right?

Look at that mountain of perfection. I haven't made cookies in forever. Okay, so what I thought we could do now, I want to make like a flower arrangement for the center of the table for this little dinner party we're going to have. Ooh, okay. These are all grocery store flowers. Really? I just cut the ends, and I put them in some water overnight, and that allows them to sort of bloom. But I have a couple tricks.

Got a couple tricks. Ooh, I love merry tricks. They're always the best. This is a rose, right? And we're going to take the... Leaves off, because they're not necessary, and take off the thorns. Oh, you take off the thorns? I do, because who needs to hurt themselves when they're arranging flowers?

So, see how it's opened up? They were kind of really tight on these, and they opened up a little bit overnight, but we really want them to be nice and full. Okay, so you turn it upside down, and you just do this a few times. Oh, my goodness.

And do you see how that's opened up even more? Yeah. Then you can go in there and sort of press gently in the flower. So, why don't you take one, and then open it up, and see how lovely that looks?

It's like being very intentional with the individual flowers. Think of the people coming for your dinner party as each of these petals. Oh, I love that. And when they're all together, it makes a beautiful flower. Something I always admire about you is you're always prepared. No matter what's in your purse, you're preparing for people to come. You're preparing for what God has in store for you.

Prepared is good, but flexible is better, you know, and to be ready to roll with whatever the punches that are going to come. And, you know, when you entertain, it's about being together, so it doesn't matter. Even if something gets burned, it doesn't matter. It's going to be fine, because your people are coming. You love them. We have a lot to do, girlfriends. I mean, the flowers are nice, and the cookies are nice, but we have some things to get to.

Mary's approach to cooking has always been about more than following a recipe. She pours her heart into each dish, cooking with intention for the people she loves. So, how did you choose today's menu? So, that's part of the conversation you have with the people before they arrive, okay? So, in hospitality, we want to make things that people love, that they love to eat, and so I always have a conversation with my guests beforehand. You want to ask what their food aversions are, because why would you want to cook something they don't like?

Yeah. If there's an allergy, so important. So, it's just as important to take care of their physical health with an allergy. As it is to take care of their emotional and food-relational health with asking about aversions. So, you just, it's a way of attending to their desires. And you're just so thoughtful with all these details. But that's what hospitality is all about. It's not about thinking of myself. It's about thinking of the people that are coming to spend time with me.

I want to love them as best I can, and this is one way, by making things that they love. Well, you serve people so well. Thank you. I appreciate that. So, what are we serving today? I thought I would take us back to simplicity, right, and to sort of reminisce about the first time you and I ever cooked together. So, we are going to do a spatchcock chicken. Classic. All right, and so what that is, is it's a whole chicken, and we're going to take out the backbone.

You lay it flat on a baking sheet, and then it roasts, and it cooks more evenly. And we also, because I like to add a little more dark meat, we have a couple of chicken thighs that we're going to do that have been marinating in parsley, garlic, olive oil. It's going to be so good. And then we're going to roast some carrots, and we're going to have a spinach salad, something light to sort of cleanse the palate, and some lovely homemade mashed potatoes.

Okay, well, I feel like I can already smell it. It sounds so great. Where do we start? Okay, we're going to start with the carrots. Okay. We're going to peel the carrots. Then we're going to chop the carrots and place them on the tray and put them in the oven. So, why did you choose colorful? Do they taste different? No, they all taste the same, but you've got to remember, we eat with our eyes first.

We're going to cut this carrot at an angle, okay? So, you want a really sturdy knife, okay? And you want to put the hilt of the knife right here, okay, in between your thumb, right? And we're going to take our finger to direct the knife. Okay. Then we're going to Curve our hands like this so that we don't cut off our fingers. It's always very good. We're going to place the tip of the knife there, and we're going to rock it down.

Okay. Scoop. See how we've done that? It does feel good when you're like, you know. It just makes it easier. Use the cutting board and the knife to your advantage. I always keep a bowl when I'm doing this, and I keep these for stock.

I'm going to have you grind salt and pepper. You're saying all we need is salt, pepper, and olive oil. Like, God made the vegetable pretty perfectly, so just salt and pepper. Okay, why don't you hand me the potatoes. Those are next. Here we go. So, I like to use the yellow, the butter potato. It's literally a little buttery. We're going to peel these, and then we're going to cut them in a uniform way and put them into a pot of water and get them boiling for our mashed potatoes.

Okay. Put the thumb towards you, because you have a safeguard on the blade. Most potato peelers have a safeguard on the blade. Okay, your finger, it was like... This is what controls. There, look. Oh my goodness. See how that feels? If I were to put this in and just boil this, it would take like 30 minutes. Okay. When I cut these all, it takes 15. Okay. So, we're going to do the same skills as we did with our carrots. Okay. So, we're going to cut it in half.

Then in half. And fourths. And fourths, right? So, that's all uniform. So, we have about an inch above the potatoes of water. See that? Okay. Is that too much? No, that's perfect. So, these are ready to go. We're going to get them cooked, and then we're going to put cream, and butter, and salt, and pepper, and it's going to be delicious. All the good stuff. All right, so we got the carrots. Yes. The potatoes are in the process. Yes. What do we do next?

We have to get the chicken in next. So, I've done a little prep work for the sake of time, also for the sake of flavor. This is a spatchcock chicken, and what I've done is I've cut out the backbone. With scissors? With kitchen shears, right, or a very sharp knife. In here, we have olive oil, lemon zest, lemon juice. Garlic, chopped parsley, and salt and pepper. Okay. So, this has been in the refrigerator for 48 hours. Two days. Two days. So, I really wanted an intense, bold flavor with the lemon and the garlic and the parsley.

If you don't have 48 hours to prepare, then you can do a quick drizzle of all of this. It just won't be as intense a flavor. Yeah, the aroma. Yeah. So, here we're going to take our chicken, and you have a stoneware baking pan. I prefer the stoneware because it browns the meat really, really well.

Do you know what happens when garlic is roasted? It becomes sweeter and less bitter. Oh, okay. Yeah, so it really... So, it's not scary with all that garlic. It's not scary with all that garlic. Because we're going to do this at 375 for about 45 minutes to an hour, you're going to see it get all brown and wonderful. Yum.

Okay, so we got the chicken in the oven. Now, we're starting... We're doing the salad now, because our guests are arriving probably in the next 30 to 40 minutes. So, this is one of the last things that I do. I turn on the potatoes, I get the salad ready, and what I do is I put the dressing in the bottom of the bowl. Really? Because once you toss the salad dressing, the leaves of the spinach or lettuce begin to wilt. You don't want soggy salad?

No, no soggy salad here. So, we're going to do that right at the end, right? As people come in, we'll toss it right before we serve it. It's got two ingredients in the salad dressing. It has balsamic vinegar, and it has olive oil. This is the healthy drizzle of what we call a drizzle olive oil, so the most refined olive oil, extra virgin olive oil that you can get, okay? So, that's probably about three tablespoons, and then we're going to come in with our balsamic vinegar, and we're going to do...

Probably one tablespoon to two. Right there. See in the center how it gets there? Pretty. Right? A little salt and pepper. Here we are. There's our dressing. Yum. Okay. I think we have about 10 minutes before our guests arrive. We do. So, I am adding the last bits of everything. Okay. These are some chopped walnuts. We're going to add them to the salad to add texture. A little something to crunch, to go with the sweetness and the kind of the zing of the onion.

Okay. All right, we're all set. Why don't we go set the table now? Okay. The table becomes a place of gathering, where stories are shared and memories are made. For Mary, this is the final, most important step in creating a meal, making space for connection.

Sitting at Mary's table, surrounded by family and friends, I reminded of the real reason we cook, to bring people together. It's not about the perfection of the meal. It's about the love that went into it. Cooking with Mary has reminded me that the true gift of a meal is the time we spend together.

Today, we've learned not just how to cook, but how to create something more. Moments of connection, love, and intention. In a world that often feels rushed, creating moments of intention can be a quiet revolution, and sometimes it all starts with a meal.