The Apostles Ate Stew

by Douglas J. Eboch

Hear the story read by the author


In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm. And on Easter morning Jill Boyer was desperately trying to stave off thoughts of homicide as she tried to get her family ready for church. On a normal Sunday this was a task that could reduce a Navy SEAL to tears. On this Easter Sunday three additional factors turned it into something rivaling the trials of Hercules.

The first was the need to dress the family in especially fancy clothes or risk raised eyebrows from the older ladies in the church. Jill had two daughters: Mary, who was four, and Susie, who was two. Both had spent the entirety of their young lives perfecting the art of whining. The donning of frilly Easter dresses was an occasion for them to attempt their greatest heights of whinery. However when it came to fancy attire, the winner of the whining trophy was Jill’s husband Kevin. Kevin was no more fond of getting dressed up than the little girls and couldn’t care less about the eyebrow positions of the older church ladies.

The second factor impacting Jill’s Easter morning preparations was Barry the Bunny. Barry was Mary’s Sunday school class pet and Mary had been selected to care of it while the teacher was on a much needed vacation. Mary was delighted by the bunny and took it out of the cage at every opportunity. She discovered just such an opportunity when Jill was preoccupied with trying to convince Kevin that even his best tennis shoes were not appropriate for Easter. Unfortunately this occurred after Jill had shanghaied Mary into her dress. It took almost twenty minutes to clean the paw prints off the white cotton and lace.

But the factor driving Jill to nearly intolerable levels of stress was the fact that her in-laws were coming over for Easter brunch after church. Jill’s relationship with Ron and Carol Boyer was not any worse than the average woman’s relationship with her husband’s parents. But it wasn’t any better, either. What really made things hard on Jill was that Kevin’s mother was a wonderful hostess. She could whip up delicious appetizers or full meals, mix exotic cocktails and maintain charming conversation all without any sign of exertion.

Jill truly wanted to be such a hostess. She watched cable TV shows and subscribed to magazines that promised to impart those skills. But she could never seem to pull it off with her mother-in-law’s grace. Yet she continued to try, hoping one day to live up to the standard Carol Boyer had set.

So in addition to dressing her family and cleaning up bunny paw prints, Jill was managing the early stages of preparation on half a dozen Easter dishes in the kitchen, including the star of the meal: a baked maple glazed ham. The last task of the morning was to put the ham in the oven so it could bake while they were at church and be ready by the time Kevin’s parents arrived.

Jill closed the oven door on the ham and herded the family into the car at 8:52. They arrived only seven minutes late to the 9:00 service - beating their average tardiness by several minutes.

When they returned home two hours later, Kevin, Mary and Susie dashed to their rooms to shed their church outfits. Jill went into the kitchen to take the ham out of the oven. It had turned out beautifully, the maple glaze glistening just like the one in the cook book. Jill set it on a rack to cool.

At that moment the doorbell rang. Ron and Carol had arrived. Jill barely got to greet them before they were dragged off by Mary to see Barry the Bunny. After that, Carol presented the girls with Easter baskets. Much nicer and heavier laden baskets than Jill had made for them, of course. A minor youth rebellion broke out when Jill informed her daughters that they would have to wait until after brunch to dig into the candy. Once the rebellion was quashed, Jill took coffee and tea orders from her guests.

When she entered the kitchen, she forgot all about the beverages, however.

There on the counter was Barry the Bunny. Apparently in the excitement over the Easter baskets, Mary had failed to lock him safely away in his cage. And the rabbit had found the ham, presumably drawn by the maple scent of the glaze at which he was now happily licking. Jill lunged forward to shoo him off before he could do any more damage and startled the poor creature. Barry jumped and in the process knocked the ham off onto the floor.

Tears welled in Jill’s eyes as she picked the ham up. She briefly considered if there was a way to save it but the surface was far too mangled. She could still make ham sandwiches for the girls out of it - they wouldn’t care about rabbit saliva - but she would need to come up with something else as the centerpiece of her brunch. She brushed away her tears. There was too much work to be done to waste time crying.

She did a quick inventory of her refrigerator and pantry. Unfortunately the only thing she had in enough quantity that was suitable for a main course was canned stew.

Jill figured if she was going to serve stew for Easter brunch, she was going to have to be clever about it. Fortunately she had paid attention in church.

After serving soup and a frittata for the first courses of the meal, Jill brought out her big pot, the lid hiding the contents. She noticed Kevin’s look of confusion and before he could say anything about ham, she cleared her throat to get everyone’s attention.

“My family has an Easter tradition,” she said. “According to a story my Grandmother told, on the first Easter morning Mary Magdalene and the other women put the makings of a meal on the fire before going to Jesus’ tomb to anoint his body with spices. This was the meal which the women served to the Apostles upon their return from finding the empty tomb, and this was the meal the Apostles were eating when Jesus appeared to them. That meal was stew.”

And with that Jill removed the lid from the pot.

“It is our family tradition to eat stew on Easter,” Jill continued, “to symbolize the coming together of disparate peoples to form the early Christian church.”

The other adults gathered around the table looked at each other, unsure what to say. Then Mary piped up, “is there onions in it, Mommy?”

“Yes dear,” Jill replied. “You can pick them out.”

Then Jill ladled out bowls of stew to everyone and they ate.

After the meal, Carol graciously offered to help Jill clear the table. Jill was far too exhausted to turn her down. While they were in the kitchen, Carol put a hand on Jill’s arm and said, “You know, I think that whole story about the Apostles eating stew is a bunch of baloney. But the meal was quite good and I’m glad you didn’t serve ham. Everyone serves ham at Easter and I don’t really care for it.”

Carol went out into the living room and for the first time that day Jill relaxed. And from that day forward stew really was a Boyer family Easter tradition.