Sunday, February 28, 2016

"Fellow Missionary Spotlight: The Melanie Version" or "A Brief Demonstration of Kevin's Loopiness"

It’s time. The “Fellow Missionary Spotlight” lecture series must commence.

Cue Melanie “La Profa” Jorgenson. Melanie, a two-time winner of the “Most Energy” award and recent recipient of the “Most Difficult Class to Teach” commiseration, has recently received much attention for her work in the area of gastronomy.

Other characters featuring prominently:

The Missionaries, aka The Food Critics: well known for their exacting criteria and detail-oriented critique, feared throughout a 14 manzana area, frequenters of at least seven additional food establishments, and distinguished for their commitment to establishing a safe location for production of high-quality pancakes

Señor Pancake – A mischievous little fellow who shape-shifts often into a variety of edible and inedible forms

Junior Pancake – A nonexistent relative of Señor pancake made up in the ultimately unsuccessful hopes of pulling together a pun

Narrating Lawyer: One of the aformentioned food critics, a dabbler in all things narratory (including the heretoforthwith inscribed story), has a tendency to launch into floury yet incorrectly used language best reserved for the confines of the law office, in this the twentieth hour of the twenty fourth day of the month of February and at other times too

Señorita Syrup – A Type II diabetic, known caramel lover, and often described by her avid (vaguely southern) twitter followers as “a whole buncha sugar mixed with water in varyin’ quantities”

***

Our story takes form over the course of four meals.

It begins in a lowly kitchen on the North coast of Honduras. The propane stove is almost out and rain threatens any considerations of an outdoor fire.

Melanie “La Profa” Jorgenson is working away. She has Señor Pancake on the rocks, and by that I don’t mean she’s drinking him with ice. Two hours pass with Señor Pancake hiding in a giant vat of batter mixed with far too much water. Melanie has been throwing flour at the batter at varying intervals in vain and even threatened to catch the stove on fire if not appeased. After several griddle cleanings and trips to the trash can, La Profa seeks out one of the food critics (Kevin) for assistance. Señor Pancake immediately pops out of hiding and begins to multiply on command.
Henceforth an edict is edictified, or in layman’s terms, a declaration is declared:

The Undersigned Concerned Hopeful Effervescent Foodprovider (CHEF) Melanie “La Profa” Jorgensen does hereby declarify that on this, the first day of individual pancake cooking, in the splendid month of January in this, the Two Thousand and Sixteenth Year Since The Inaccurately Dated Birth of Christ According To The Gregorian Calendar, the aforementioned undersigned undersignee is committed to producing a supper of bona fide pancakes adhering to the standards set forth by the Finca Missionary Quality Food and Pancake Administration (abbreviated FMQFPA and commonly pronounced Ffmquafpa). Or in the words of the Undersigned CHEF, “I’m going to keep cooking pancakes at every meal until it actually works!”
Etc.
***

Then three more times in a row of cooking pancakes happened with varying degrees of success but each with their individual problems, some of which are related to Señorita Syrup (was too watery, had too much sugar, turned into caramel when we got delayed by 15 minutes, had a pumice stone get stuck while trying to clean the pan, forgot oil, etc).


Cool kid though. She’ll get there. We here at Ffmquafpa take pride in our Concerned Hopeful Effervescent Foodproviders.



P.S. You can read about Melanie in a more detailed and less unbalanced fashion here on her own blog: https://hugsfromhonduras.wordpress.com/
P.P.S. She approved this message, don't worry.