For Christmas breakfast, we had some very special foods – bacon and blueberry muffins. More than likely, that doesn’t sound very fancy to you. You may even think that it’s a pretty pitiful breakfast to be blogging about, especially for Christmas Day. But it was perfect.
Bacon, because it’s a Western food, is often only sold in bulk at hotel or restaurant supply stores. On Christmas Eve, I was searching for a chafing dish to use as a fondue pot (another treat I had in store for Christmas day). After I made my purchase at the restaurant supply store (the same place where I bought my oven), I noticed a large chest freezer in front of the store. I started poking around among the chicken feet and pig intestines, hoping for some frozen treasures. I casually asked if they had bacon. “Yes, we do,” came the surprising answer. Of course, it wasn’t there in the case; the boss had to ride his motorcycle down to the warehouse to retrieve it. When they go to that kind of trouble I generally feel obliged to buy what they bring back. Fortunately, it was 2 kilograms (about 5 lbs) of good quality bacon and at a price that was just a tad more than the pork I buy at the grocery store. I know, bacon is not even considered a meat on the food pyramid. It’s a fat. I guess I should compare the cost to a bottle of oil. But you have to admit that, health considerations aside, bacon is a wonderful treat for someone who hasn’t eaten it in over six months.
I thought the bacon would be perfect with the blueberry muffins. I’d already planned them way in advance. I had bought a tiny bag of dried berries at a special imports store when we traveled to another larger city to spend Thanksgiving with American friends. They cost more than I’d like to admit. But again, I was preparing for a special treat – Christmas Day breakfast. I soaked them in boiling water to plump them up again. I didn’t even have a full cup that the recipe called for and I was sorry that I hadn’t indulged in a second bag. I topped them off with some dried cranberries (also bought at that import store).
The muffins were perfect. The bacon was crisp. I even warmed the plates before we ate. As if bacon weren’t decadent enough, I put butter on the table. This was Christmas Day Breakfast. It was going to be special.
Sprite and my husband raved. They said over and over how good the muffins were, “Better than Starbucks, Mom!” (Poor child, that’s her only experience of blueberry muffins – Starbucks coffee shops in Asia.) We all savored the bacon. “This is a perfect Christmas breakfast, honey!” my husband praised me. And it was. After we ate, we opened our presents and enjoyed the holiday together.
What’s my point here? It’s not really about muffins.
Living abroad has taught me that simple pleasures like a blueberry muffin or a slice of bacon can really be huge treats when they are rare. And when that simple pleasure is truly savored as we did with our Christmas breakfast, it brings the heart so much pure joy. You realize as you’re experiencing it that it’s actually a very trivial thing – a muffin. But at the same time it feels so luxurious. You truly relish the moment as a gift and as a blessing. And I’ve come to love those moments. That ability to give yourself over to an extreme sense of pleasure in an innocent and insignificant thing is a blessing in itself. Living in China has taught me this joy. My husband knows it, and my daughter does too. We don’t feel that we’re missing out by being “deprived” of bacon and blueberries. Actually, we know that we are better off by being deprived because we can find great pleasure in them when we do have them.
I’m not going to make parallels to Americans’ current financial problems. You can make those connections better than I (especially if you live there). But don’t be afraid of being deprived; it can actually make life much sweeter.
Remember when I told you that one blog goal for 2009 is to write more? On Christmas Day my camera broke. Great timing. So I have no pictures of our great breakfast or great day. But I’m writing. So it’s all good.
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