We live in a time where sharing is made easy-you read an article you agree with or see a photo you like, and you click ‘share’. For the foodservice industry, this can mean instant reviews on your product. Within moments of a dish being delivered to a guest, it has already been photographed and shared with hundreds or thousands on social media, inviting all to come and share in the beauty. Beautiful food is meant to be shared.

Not all delicious food is beautiful enough to post, but it can be made beautiful by the way that we share it. A group of friends sitting around a table enjoying a simple meal of pasta and bread is a beautiful thing. It is beautiful not only because someone took the time to prepare the meal, but because it also has gathered them together. Friendships are rejuvenated, community is built, and both the soul and the stomach are filled. These are all important aspects of our lives that need continual maintenance. At InterVarsity Pioneer Camp Manitoba, we have been building community for 75 years. Our cookbook, Volume: Cooking for a Community has meals and stories that we know were meant to be shared. 

As a Chef, I have had to learn to share. While Chefs naturally want to share their amazing work and see it enjoyed, we may not necessarily desire for everyone to know how it was created. If reproduced by another, it would no longer be our own. Recipes take time to refine and perfect, so why simply share them when we would rather you enjoy the creation, and leave in awe and craving more. That is what brings our guests back to try and experience it again. But what if I shared my work so that countless others could create these beautiful meals to be enjoyed around many more tables? Why keep the good stuff bottled up when there is so much beauty in sharing delicious food? After learning what a gift it is to prepare meals for many to enjoy, I see now that my recipes are meant to be shared.

I invite you to cook together, to grow your community, and to join at a table that assuredly was meant to be shared.