Bread and Wine: Goat Cheese Scrambled Eggs

Oh, goat cheese again. Seriously, Shauna, give me a break.

While I didn't mind a break from the heavier lifting of the  more involved recipes than this one, I drug my feet to the oven to make these this morning.

Full confession, I made only two eggs (instead of the 12 written in the recipe) since it was just me and the kids this morning after a looong week, and they don't do eggs. So, I adapted, but luckily with happy results.

This simple recipe falls in the chapter "On Scrambled Eggs and Doing Hard Things." And of course it's oh so fitting and just HAPPENED to coincide with some relatively hard things I had going on this week, so it was the perfect meditation I needed to have.

So, here we go: eggs, goat cheese, and thoughts on all the stuff we don't want to do.

Bon appetite!

The Recipe: Goat Cheese Scrambled Eggs
Ingredients: Eggs, crumbled goat cheese

Making these were actually a lot of fun this morning, as I had my two favorite helpers with me. The kids are at such a  busy stage, it seems, especially my son. While my daughter could probably stand to read with me for an hour in the mornings, my son cuddles for around 10 minutes and then is off like a shot for another hour or two, which in turn gets my daughter wound up. So I made sure they were involved with mommy's blog project this morning, giving them whisks and mixing bowls (only my daughter got the eggs). Together we whisked and stirred and said "cheers!" with our sundry wire accoutrements. I won't lie-- I love getting them in on cooking.

I followed Shauna's directions perfectly. She says to pour the eggs in a COLD nonstick pan over low heat. I obeyed her... until I didn't, inching the heat up just a bit to a two. It was fine...and it wasn't. I quickly realized what Shauna meant by "slow is cheap": eggs cook so FAST, and if you want that truly creamy, almost cheesy texture, you must go slow, no bones about it.

The eggs were starting to stick EVER so slightly so I guiltily turn the heat to the lowest low and quietly drug my spatula around.

This is it, I think to myself. Here I am again. I can't go slow. I can't simmer, I can't leave eggs alone. Why do I always to pickpickpick at stuff? Why can't I just let it be and go slow?

Alas, I am still quick, busy, antsy me, despite everything I'm learning through this cookbook. Even so, I applauded myself for slowing down and taking note of what was actually taking place. The eggs relaxed and so did I; it was fine. Cheesy, creamy curds bloomed under the spatula in no time.

The goat cheese was actually better on the eggs than I expected, reminding me of feta except for the extra tang at the end. With bacon, the tang was barely imperceptible, and actually complementary.

I'm still no goat cheese fan yet, all, but I did not mind it a bit with such delicious eggs.

The Chapter: "On Scrambled Eggs and Doing Hard Things"

This evening as I finished my usual puttering and putting the house back together after the littles had gone to sleep, I asked myself, "What are my scrambled eggs?"

In the chapter Shauna uses the scrambled eggs scene as the embodiment of doing the things she knows she is supposed to do but may not really want to do. The eating healthy when we want to gnosh; the resting when we really want to go frantic; the exercise when we would rather chain-smoke.

It's the taking steps towards the life we know we want, rather than the one that's easy and convenient at the moment.

Shauna recalls a particular moment of choosing scrambled eggs and an early bedtime over "eating every pizza in the state of Illinois" on a particularly stressful night.

And, I love her description of her emotions: "I was almost scared by how badly I wanted an escape hatch out of my feelings."

Oh heart, have you ever felt that way? Oh, I have, I have. I have had the days where I want to eject from whatever situation I'm in and escape, oh escape, to something simpler, easier, less demanding.

But that's not really living, that's escapism. That's not growing up, that's refusing to.

As I continue to write and try to niggle around to find what I'm good at and good for in this life, I'm realizing I can't keep taking escape hatches from difficult situations.

As a mother, I have many moments I would prefer to escape during the day, so I get on social media, or get really busy with an important home project, anything so I don't have to sit with the heavy weight of mothering and tending the unseen emotional and spiritual lives of my children.

In my writing I have jumped into the escape hatches of social media to avoid the wrestling with the word and spirit. I love to escape. I am an escape artist.

So, eggs.


What are they for me? I wonder, and, wow can I turn from my escape hatches to care and presence?

I am finding that there are few things more grounding than hot tea or snack to care for a rumpled spirit. It works better than a bag of gummi bears. Physically I am healthier this way.

I'm learning that deep breaths and walks help me become more peaceful and focused, instead of staying walled up (literally and figuratively) inside. Mentally I am healthier.

I'm learning to talk more freely with God and to ask for His help to bear whatever is so difficult in a moment, as opposed to dismissing it as unimportant. Spiritually I am healtheir

Being intentional, being present, sticking with the thing before us is no easy task; it can feel so hard sometimes. But the hard things are the good things, and of course, are ultimately what we wanted all along.