European Sloppy Joes and Christianity

I'm sure that it won't come as a surprise that I have been put in charge of team meals for the rest of our time here in Leuven. Cooking for me on my budget is no problem, but when you factor in 15 trackletes (three of them being throwers and half of our team being guys), things get a little tricky. If I had lower standards, we would be eating pasta and meat sauce every night. Fortunately for my team, I answer to a higher power.

Meals have been pretty standard so far - spaghetti and meat sauce with salad and bread, pasta salad with chicken, but I was really wanting to feed the kids something of substance and a lot of protein. After three track meets in four days, glycogen levels are pretty low and protein is needed to start rebuilding damaged muscles. After much thinking and asking others for help, an idea was reached: Sloppy Joes.

For those of y'all reading who aren't familiar with the concept of Sloppy Joes, It's pretty straight forward: ground meat, sauce (bbq or a combo of various spices), diced veggies, and let simmer for 20-30 mins. But this is Belgium and they don't have the usual packets, sauces, or way of measuring ground beef. So, I got creative. With the help of Brad (the AIA staff member serving in Germany), we guesstimated the amount (in pounds) of ground beef that we had and then proceeded to stand in the sauce section, trying to decipher Flemmish ingredient lists and wondering how in the world we could make this work. Here is the recipe for Sloppy Joes - European Style:

• 3ish kg of ground beef. Don't ask me for a fat percentage because I have no idea.
• 2 red peppers, diced
• 3 onions, diced
• 1/2 bottle each of random Belgian "BBQ" and "Tomato" sauces
• 3 small boxes of tomato puree
• 3 packets "tomato spice seasoning"
• Brown meat and veggies in a pan
• Dump meat and veggies into a large pot. Add sauces and seasoning
• Simmer on low for 30ish minutes, partially covered
• Serve on hamburger buns

They turned out really, really well. I was pretty surprised, to be honest. But then again, you can't really screw up tomato sauce, ground beef, and veggies. So, with a stomach full of Sloppy Joes, we headed out to find our nightly ice cream/waffles. We were all a bit slap happy by the time we got back and bed was sounding pretty good when God had other plans for our night. 

Our hostel owner came up to a small group of us and said he had a question that he had been wanting to ask since we first arrived - what exactly is Athletes in Action and why in the world are we in Leuven? We explained who we were (a Christian sports ministry made up of fairly elite athletes who have come over here to compete on the European track circuit and build relationships with others that we meet) and that Leuven is pretty central to most of the meets that we had scheduled to compete in. He then admitted that he had googled us before we came and then he said he had another question - what is a ministry? That launched us into a two hour discussion about Christianity and about the religious culture here in Belgium, specifically in Leuven. We gained a lot of insight into the history of Christianity, specifically the Roman Catholic church. We heard some stories that make me incredibly sad for the people here. Stories of abuse and power struggles. That is how they see God. But that is not God - He is love, He is safe, and He wants us to come home to Him. The conversation also spread to the two leaders of the group of international engineers. It was a really healthy discussion and we left it with the ball in their court and they all said it is something that they would like to revisit at some point. 

Some other updates since the last time I blogged; we had a track meet for about half of the team on Tuesday that went alright. We weren't looking to set records since we are entered in Belgian National Championships this Sunday. Also, three members of our team have left to compete in other meets around Europe: Katie is in Rome, Matt is in Sweden, and Kaarel is in Estonia. Our team will be back to full strength on Sunday evening! 

Dinner last night was, according to my athletes, my finest work yet. The menu was chicken and veggie stir-fry with brown rice. Again, complete dumb luck when it came to the flavoring but it scored a level 4 out of a possible 3 levels. We were also treated to a tour of the older part of Leuven by Roel in which he introduced us to a new ice cream and waffle stand. 

Prayer requests:

• Safe travels for our three team members coming back to us this weekend
• Safe travels for the trip to and from Brussels this Sunday
• That our conversations we have had really take root and what we said did not fall on empty ears

Thank you again for your prayers and support!