This school year, my Mom-in-law’s church started a weekly after school club for the kids. I am fortunate to be on maternity leave because I get to take them every Thursday (you have to drive there).
Even though we are not church goers ourselves, we think it’s great that a church would provide a club like this to the family of its members, for free. The people that volunteer to be there are truly a blessing for the kids.
My kids and my sister-in-law’s kids love going there. They do all sorts of activities, and crafts and always come home with something that they created. Last week, we all ate some lovely scones that they had baked after dinner.
But Explorers club is more than that. Because all of us Mom’s also get to hang out. We drop off the kids downstairs and we head over to a room upstairs to have a good old chat. And it’s so lovely to have that little break for some adult conversation.
Ok, more often than not, you end up chatting about children, but not all the time. This week, we chatted about food. And I got some really good tips from Ms C on a couple of quick healthy meals you can do for one person (ideal for when you need to rustle up a quick lunch). The first was with cannellini beans. You just drain and wash the beans (already cooked in a can), mix with leaves, tomatoes, peppers, mushrooms, feta cheese or whatever other salad stuff you like, drizzle a bit of olive oil or lemon juice, salt and pepper to taste and voilá.
The other was a cous-cous dish… well, there were 2 variations really. 1) Onions/garlic/broccoli/carrots/chopped tomatoes. The other with mushrooms/courgette.
And then we talked about a chickpea curry that I make, which is basically taking a meat curry recipe and replacing the meet with chickpeas. Served with white rice, it’s delicious.
I left that session feeling rather hungry and inspired to make one of the dishes that weekend. Alas, to this day I have yet to try it. I will do at some point, for sure 😉