Okay, this blog is supposed to be about SPIRITUAL things. But my heart is bursting to share my new love affair with one of God’s greater creations, the humble, divine, onion-meets-garlic, SHALLOT.

One of the benefits of working from home is that you can break from mental tasks to play with food. One can make a delightful egg sandwich or grab some raw veggies with dip and a slice of cheese; and on occasion, create a special lunch. Today was such a day.

And just to make sure I properly connect the dots concerning my spiritual blog ambitions, allow me to say, in all seriousness, that I consider creative pursuits to be the highest of spiritual activities. After all, we are made in the image of the great creator, who not only exercised His great creativity at every turn, but DELIGHTED in it.

Today was that kind of lunch for me — delightful. But it was, I must admit, somewhat premeditated. Here’s why. I’ve been thinking about shallots for a very long time. I use lots of onions and garlic in my cooking. I’d long heard of shallots, described as a mild onion that leans towards a garlic flavor. I was in love at first description.

However, they are, compared to onions or garlic, a little pricey, so I kept leaving them at the market, until recently. My 59th birthday staring me in the face, I thought, “Live what you love, woman, or  miss your opportunity.” I already loved shallots in my mind, and I wanted to know if I loved them on my tongue. So I bought four lovely shallots for an exorbitant price at our local special market, took them home and proceeded to research recipes for how to best use them.

One of my favorite cookbooks is the perennially useful “Joy of Cooking.” It yielded a shallot recipe I chose to be my first, a beef condiment called Bercy Butter. This consists of finely chopped shallots simmered in dry white wine, reduced down and added to butter into which one has stirred some finely chopped parsley and a tad of salt. Bercy Butter, the cookbook says, is a perfect accompaniment to grilled steaks.

One of my husband’s great delights is discovering a great steak, chop or chicken breast in the discount pile at the market, something divine at a deeply discounted price, because the date is expiring but the food hasn’t yet…. His latest find was a couple of fat sirloin steaks. He announced on Sunday he would cook them on the grill for Monday’s lunch, and all my casino slots lined up bing, bing, bing with shallots, parsley, white wine and butter, which I had carefully purchased and had waiting in my pantry for the moment of opportunity. Whatever else I was doing on Monday (writing, counseling, web page updates, correspondence), I would pause at noon and CREATE with SHALLOTS.

I must digress here and say that my muse for waxing on about all of this is a delightful birthday gift I received from my daughter Gabriele. She has a knack for finding you just the right gift. She sent me a copy of “The Supper of the Lamb” by Robert Farrar Capon, a very unorthodox cookbook by an unorthodox Episcopalian priest turned writer and chef. Reading his introduction to the lowly onion is a spiritual experience if there ever was one. So his spirit is definitely kindred with mine while I’m dreaming of shallots and parsley butter, all of which have never ever met in my kitchen.

It is a good thing I like being my own sous chef. I do love a very sharp knife, I love chopping things just the right size, I love my big fat cutting board left behind by a mother who loved cooking and did everything with gusto, and I just love playing with food. But the question remained: would I really like the Bercy Butter? Would my husband Ron, who has endured many a culinary experiment in our 28 years (“Please Honey, don’t try a new recipe when company is coming!”).

Well, it’s Monday, it’s just the two of us, and my shallots are waiting to fulfill their destiny (I’m working in all the spiritual connections I can, folks!). There have been some disasters, some things that made us laugh till we cried, and others that just made us cry. Even so, most failures seldom outstrip the joy factor of trying a new thing with food and flavor.

Here’s the verdict: Bercy Butter turns an ordinary steak into something extraordinary, and hubby loved it!

Ah, my first culinary turn with shallots, and it IS love at first bite.

And it was a great fun lunch, a very satisfying moment in the middle of my day, and left me delighting anew in a God who did not settle for making only garlic and onions.