This Week's Groceries

I love what I do, but to protect the privacy of the people I seek to minister to, most interactions I have with people I do not share with you. Sometimes the weight of the needs around me is so heavy on my heart that I just need to talk about something light hearted. So in today's blog I present you with...ta da...this week's groceries from our nearby grocery store, Marufuji.

I love it that we have easy access to such lovely fruits and vegetables all year around. Being a mountainous island country, a good share of the food in Japanese grocery stores is imported. I've heard 75%. Since we eat mostly fresh food, I'm able to get mostly food grown somewhat locally (in Japan at least), but my papaya came from the Philippines, the grapes from California, and the bananas from Taiwan or the Philippines (this bunch didn't say). We'll round out our week of fruit with pears, persimmons, mikans (Clementines), avocados, and apples from Japan.

I already had some apples on hand but had to get this one. It cost 178 yen (about $1.78) and was huge! I have long fingers so this is bigger than it looks. My rule of thumb is not to buy a piece of fruit that costs more than a dollar per serving unless it happens to be something irresistible like a papaya or an avocado. This apple could easily feed us both as an accompaniment to a meal with some left over for another meal...or snack.

The unusual brown and white vegetable with holes to the right of the carrots is lotus root. It goes nicely in the stir fry I'm planning for supper with the bean sprouts, green onions, mushrooms, turnips, turnip greens, and thinly sliced beef.

They were having a meat sale so I purchased almost two pounds for the week...more than we usually eat. With the weather turning cooler my appetite is increasing so having more than vegetables sounds appealing (though I love my veggies!).

I got the water bottles because our earthquake supplies needed updating. I'm not a huge fan of canned food but we have some in the event that food becomes difficult to get as it was for awhile in March 2011 after the big earthquake.

The white cartons with blue and brown labels are one-liter cartons of milk. I bought two to make my weekly supply of plain yogurt that we absolutely love on our morning oatmeal and another two cartons for general purposes. Russ likes to drink milk. We both love our tea and have a cupboard dedicated to our tea collection. Recently I had a day of prayer and vision and decided in the next year I really want to focus on "drinking tea with Jesus." I really want to grow in being silent before Him sipping hot tea without rushing off to this, that, and the other. I really want to know what He thinks. That was a bit off topic, but when I started talking about tea, it came to mind.

I like to make my own bread and baked goods, but decided I needed the crackers for my office. I get dizzy from low blood pressure and having something salty perks me right up. The other day at work I needed a salt fix and my coworker shared her pretzels with me. They really helped me so I decided to be more prepared.

I already have staples on hand like whole wheat flour that I get from the nearby mill. I get my brown rice in 3-kilo bags and oatmeal from Costco. I get our beloved Arrowhead Mills natural peanut butter online along with other foods tricky to find in Japan.

We are blessed. We thank God for the food He has provided for us and the people who will come into our home this week to share it. Every week there's always someone, or several someones who come for a meal. We love it. Russ' disabilities make it hard for him to get out a lot, but God sends people to us. We love our life. God is good.