During the pandemic, we took the same walk every day. Past the same houses, the same picket fences, the same dogs barking behind chain link. Our little family, walking off the cabin fever one block at a time. And when we got home? Almost every day: a big bowl of greens with grapes and walnuts, drowned in ranch dressing. Not fancy, but reliable. Solid. Something we could count on when the rest of the world felt like it had lost its footing.

Those early pandemic days were heavy and uncertain. Every headline was breaking news. Every grocery trip felt like a calculated risk. Every day stretched long and blurry. And right there in the middle of it, I fell in love with food. Not in the restaurant reservation kind of way, but in my own kitchen, with my own hands, with my people gathered around the table.

Food became more than survival. It became a small act of hope, of creativity, of grounding myself in the rhythm of something ordinary and good. New meals, old recipes rediscovered, experiments gone sideways, and dishes passed down from generations before me. It all mattered. It still does.

That’s where The Jeanie Jo & Joanna Project began, really. Not in a well-lit blog post or a recipe card, but in the quiet decision to keep cooking. To keep feeding the people I love. To find joy and history and story in the food on our table. That season shaped me into someone who didn’t just cook, but someone who wanted to understand how food tells the story of who we are, where we’ve been, and where we’re going.

Grape & Walnut Salad

The one we ate almost every day after our family walk, when time felt slow and small, and grace showed up dressed in greens and ranch dressing.

What You Will Need:

• 4 cups mixed spring greens
• 1 cup red grapes, halved
• 1/2 cup walnut halves, toasted
• Ranch dressing to taste (the more the better, in my house)

What You Will Need To Do:

1. In a large bowl, toss greens with grapes and walnuts. Drizzle with ranch dressing, toss lightly, and serve with something cold to drink and people you love. Optional: Eat outside if the sun is shining and you need reminding that life is still good.

That simple salad reminds me how much good can come from a hard season. I learned to feed myself well both literally and figuratively. I found healing in the kitchen. I found creativity I didn’t know I had. I found a rhythm of paying attention to what nourishes and what brings joy.

We don’t always choose our difficult seasons, but we do choose what we carry out of them. For me, I carried out a deeper love for food, for gathering, for telling stories around meals, and for this strange, beautiful path toward becoming a food historian. I carried out this truth: good things grow even in hard soil.

Today I’m asking you:
What good thing in your life has come out of a difficult season?
What do you carry now, even if you picked it up slowly, one small salad at a time?

Gracefully yours,

Help keep the words flowing and the stories brewing.
Buy Me a Coffee

Reference
Niequist, S. (2024). Celebrate Every Day. Zondervan.