“Just because I don't eat many starches doesn't mean I don't know what to do with them.”
That was Captain Lee on a Saturday morning, delighting friends and loved ones with his light and fluffy sweet potato pancakes.
“You're still cheating us,” his friend Gary from Tricolor Sounds said with a big smile. “They're already sweet, and they don't need a bunch of syrup – we still can't be as unhealthy as we want to be.”
“Even a police captain has to be a bad boy one day of the week, y'all.”
Everyone was laughing, which tended to be the trend as the sweet potatoes pancakes came out fresh and hot, and instead of having syrup at hand, Captain Lee had a thermos of melted sweet cream butter to pass around and powdered sugar and cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves to put on top, with scrambled eggs and sausage on the side. His plate majored on the eggs, less on the pancakes, but, be that as it may, no one was complaining.
The widow Thornton was truly surprised by the pancakes, which is why the first comment was repeated to her in private, with additional information.
“I recognize that you are an Italian American by heritage, and starches play a major role in your idea of food. That's true for most of the world, actually. I'm the odd man out on this … but I'm not making you into the odd woman, and like my cousin Ironwood Hamilton tends to throw down on the weekend, I will remember your starches!”
“The other thing I know: you like people around, and, quiet as I keep it, I enjoy being a host as much as you enjoy being a hostess. Although I do require more time alone than most people, and would prefer to keep company with our family – you for now, any children the Lord sends us later on – for most of the other time, I just want you to know I'm not going to starve you of the same kind of warm social environment I know you grew up in. I grew up that way too, on the mountain, at the Lee Homestead and the Fairlane Homestead.”
Mrs. Maggie Lee-to-be smiled, and took hold to her fiancee's arm.
“I wasn't actually worried because you buy me the type of food I like all the time, and I like the people around you … but I appreciate hearing you say this nonetheless … and you're having quinoa for dinner today and you don't know it yet.”
Quinoa is a high-protein grain from Latin America, and one of the few grains Captain Lee would eat large quantities of on a regular basis. His fiancee wasn't a big fan at first, but, she had figured it out how to get it to a perfect Italian American standard of tastiness, making both her and Captain Lee quite happy.
Captain Lee put his arm around his fiancee.
“It takes both protein and starch to make a healthy diet, and most of us are a bit out of balance … which is why God made both for each other … and us for each other, Ms. Starch.”
“Right, Mr. Protein.”
Image by Anemone123 from Pixabay
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