Sunday Snack

Each Sunday after church our congregation stays around and eats a "snack" (aka lunch) together. Each Sunday one family, or sometimes two together, prepare the food and clean up. Of course, over time it's become a precious time of extensive visiting, fellowship, encouragement, and working happily together. After snack, we regularly have 5-10 people who stick around an hour or more, the menfolk talking shop in the fellowship hall and the ladies competing for the dish-washing spot and swapping recipes. It's a joy.

Today I was in charge of snack. Here's what we ate:

Ritz and butter crackers; Monterey Jack, pepper jack, and cheddar cheese slices
green grapes
apples with caramel dip (I made this from sweetened condensed milk, and it worked!)
sausage cheese muffins -- mini and regular size
corn salad with Fritos scoops
homemade brownies with Heath bar chips on top, served with French vanilla ice cream (Which reminds me ... I really need to get my brownie recipe on this blog!!)

Below are the muffins and the recipe. I found this recipe on Pinterest and here's the website. I altered the recipe somewhat.

• 1 lb. mild ground pork sausage
• 1/4 cup finely diced onion
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 and 1/2 tablespoons baking powder
• 1/2 tablespoon salt
• 1/2 cup shortening or coconut oil in solid form
• 1 (10.75 oz) can condensed fiesta nacho cheese soup
• 2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese
• 3/4 cup milk

Cook sausage and onion in a large skillet over medium to med-high heat, stirring until it crumbles and is no longer pink. Do not leave large chunks of sausage. Drain and cool. 

Preheat oven to 375. In a bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt, and shortening and mix well with a pastry cutter. Combine sausage, baking mix, and shredded cheese in a large bowl. Stir together the soup and buttermilk; add to sausage mixture, stirring just until dry ingredients are moistened. Spoon until lightly greased mini muffin tins, filling to tops of cups. Bake for 15-18 minutes or until lightly browned. Bake full-sized muffins for 25-30 minutes.

Below is the corn salad and its recipe as well. This is a Paul Deen recipe I found on Pinterest, and it comes from this website.

• 2 (15 ounce) cans whole kernel corn, drained (I might try frozen corn next time, as I prefer its bright flavor.)
• 2 cups grated cheddar cheese 
• 1 cup mayonnaise
• 1 cup green pepper, chopped 
• ½ cup red onion, chopped
• 1 (10½ ounce) bag coarsely crushed Fritos chili cheese corn chips (I bought large Fritos Scoops instead and served them around the bowl of salad, instead of mixing them in. I felt this would keep them crunchier.)
• Mix first 5 ingredients and chill. Stir in corn chips just before serving, or serve them separately.

Both these recipes worked beautifully, tasted great, and made our snack a success today. Why is eating together so vitally important for Christians? How many times in Scripture does God eat with men? Didn't Jesus command us to eat together regularly? Isn't one of the first and most beautiful things we'll do on the New Earth someday to enjoy a huge feast together with the Lord, His wedding feast where He celebrates that His church is finally all with Him? Yep ... eating together is important! We're practicing for heaven!