I wanted to share something that we have done here on Chuuk for the Elders.

We fed 14 Elders a large meal of buscuits and sausage gravy, peas and carrots, Jell-O and lemon squares for dessert. They ate all they wanted and seemed to really enjoy it. But I wanted to take the time to explain something we gave out after the meal.

As we have mentioned, we just can not get many of the things we usually use for cooking. The Elders live a lot on Spam, Rice and Top Ramen. So while we were shopping, we started writing down 'what we could get where' here on Chuuk. We made a list of all the items that would be good for cooking or making meals and then which stores carried them at one time or another. It became a large 2 page list.

Sue started writing up recipes that only calls for things that can be found here on Chuuk. She put together a list of 52 recipes that the Elders can cook up even if they have only a one burner stove. It ranges from breads through meals, salads, and desserts. She wanted to make sure they could cook what ever was in the cookbook so we even practiced cooking cookies in a frying pan so they could make home-made cookies if they wanted to. The recipes tell them how to do it. (We of course had to eat up all the practice runs.) Sue came up with the name of CHUUK CHOW and we printed that on a nice front cover with our names and the date. We stapled it together with a nice back on it and now they have no excuse for eating poorly.

Then we presented a copy to each Set of Elders at the meal we seved on Tuesday. We told them it was to stay in the apartment if they were transfered. It was a tremendous hit. They read through many of the recipes and said, "I can make that!" or "I can't wait to try this!" She is now the Cook Queen of the Chuuk Islands.