troy austian | blog

Adventures in Eating: Fasika (Ethiopian)

Last night I took my Adventures in Eating small group to an Ethiopian restaurant in St. Paul called Faskia. We had a great time, as we always do, and the food was excellent! Now understand that you'll generally hear me say that about the places I take this group.  That's because I do my best make sure that's the case first, and that's why I take the group there!  Basically, I eat there first. This I call research!!!

Ethiopian food, though exotic, is rather uncomplicated.  There is very little fat involved in cooking, meats are thoroughly trimmed and cleaned, and the ingredients are all fresh and natural, making Ethiopian food some of the most healthful in the world.   Dried spice combinations unique to Ethiopian cooking lend a rich, piquant taste to many dishes.

Most dishes begin with a bread, but not in loaf form.  It's a light, slightly spongy, pancake-like bread called injera.  Injera is the staple of the Ethiopian diet and is placed first on the plate to hold whatever comes after.  The dish may be chicken or lamb or beef or lentils, split peas, or other vegetables, simmered into a savory stew served over fresh injera.  More fresh injera is customarily served on the side. The injera is torn off in small pieces and used to grab bite sized portions of the food, no utensils needed.

In the reminder email I sent out to my group, I gave them the clue that there would be no silverware.  One couple in the group replied, "Yeah! Down with the silverware!"
I love it.

Fasika comes highly recommended and well reviewed for its authentic Ethiopian cuisine.  It was a hit with my group for a good reason...it was really good!  If you want to try it, I'd suggest going with a couple friends and sharing their ultimate combination platter.  There also make a really good cappuccino!

RECOMMENDED!
Fasika
510 Snelling Avenue North, Saint Paul, MN  55104
651-646-4747

Adventures in Eating: Kimson Vietnamese Cuisine

Last Saturday night, for our first meeting of 2007, I took my Adventures in Eating small group to Kimson Vietnamese Cuisine in Bloomington.  It was a great time of good food and fun together.  Basically, we meet at church; I give everyone a brochure that has info about where we're eating and also includes discussion questions for group time in the cars on the way.  Once at the restaurant, we get the food ordered (sometimes family style, sometime individual), I share a devotional, and then we hang out, eat, and have fun.  I've gotten to get acquainted with some cool people in our church that I didn't know yet.  It's great.

I love the Vietnamese soup called phö.  It’s wonderful, and I had the chance to have it in Vietnam while on a missions trip in 2005.  I was originally introduced to phö by some Hmong friends of mine a few years ago, who took me to what it still the best place I know of for phö in the Twin Cities — that place is Saigon Restaurant on University Avenue in Saint Paul.  (Unfortunately, they close at 8:00 p.m. on Saturdays, or else we'd have gone there.)  Kimson, however, is my second favorite place for phö, and they have lots of other great dishes.  Kimson is an excellent Vietnamese restaurant that I very much recommend.  Try the Vietnamese iced coffee with condensed milk -- it's awesome!  The spicy chicken wings are great.  There's a stir-fried beef dish with fried potatoes that are like thick-cut potato chips -- it's really good.  There are many other really good things to eat at Kimson

RECOMMENDED!
Kimson Vietnamese Cuisine
8654 Lyndale Avenue South, Bloomington, MN 55420
952-885-0230

Adventures in Eating Small Group

My Adventures in Eating small group is so much fun! There's nothing like getting together with a group of people with a common interest and enjoying it together while getting to know each other.

I'm a food guy, and in that vein the only thing better than eating great food is enjoying it with friends. And I absolutely love to introduce people to good cuisine, and to share that experience with them. It's great fun for me. If I cook something at home and my first thought is "Wow! This turned out good!" then my second thought is "Who can share this with?" My Adventures in Eating small group allows me use my passion for food for something much greater.

If you'd like to take a passion of yours and use it for ministry, helping you do that is a huge passion of mine, so let me know! "Be in a small group. Better yet, lead one!"

Mountain Biking Adventures

It's been a great summer with my mountain biking small group!  We mostly rode at Lebanon Hills but  also hit Theodore Wirth Park and the Minnesota River bottoms.  All three of these places are great places to ride.

For our second to last ride, we went to Theodore Wirth Park in Minneapolis.  There are some great trails with lots of turns and obstacles, and it's just a really nice area.  There's this one big dirt mound jump that's a lot of fun!  At one point in the ride, Brian Andren stopped in front of me and pointed into the woods.  There was a good size female deer just 20 feet away from us!  Beautiful!  And then we noticed a fawn just beyond her, and then another!  We looked at the deer for a while...they looked at us.  It was nice.  I think that while we were thinking, "Wow! These deer are beautiful," they were probably thinking, "I wish these pesky humans would quit staring at us and move along so we can get on our way!"

For our very last ride (as a small group), we went to a section of the Minnesota River bottoms that I'm rather fond of.  At almost the farthest point (of course!), I got a flat in my back tire.  Arrgh!  Bummer.  Some guys came by that let me use their tire pump, and then I booked back as far as I could make it until the tire pressure was too low again.  Then we walked quite a ways until finally someone else had a pump, which gave me enough air to make it back to where we were parked.  I wasn't the only one riding without a spare pump, but right afterwards I got my tire fixed and bought a pump!  The really serious riders don't only carry a pump, but a whole tire repair kit.  Maybe I'll do that next year!

I really love mountain biking, and it's great to do it as a small group and build relationships in the process.  For more info on small groups at River Valley Church, click here.  For more information on bike trails in the area, check out the Minnesota Off-Road Cyclists web site for trail guides, directions, trail conditions, calendars, forums, etc.

Gearing Up for Fall...Small Groups

I'm loving summer, but fall is coming fast and we're gearing up for our fall small groups!

If you've already been through our Small Group Leadership Orientation, I just need to get your Small Group Profile in by this coming Friday, July 28.  Just download it from the Small Groups page at rivervalleychurch.org, fill it out, and email it to me at pastortroy@rivervalley.org.

If you're interested in being a small group leader, please shoot me an email to let me know you're interested, and then attend our Small Group Leadership Orientation this Saturday, July 29, 8:30 a.m. to noon in Suite 1000.  Snacks will be provided and we'll cover the groundwork.  Attending informs you, but doesn't obligate you, so come if your interested.  You can talk with me or a small group coach afterwards about ideas for leading a group.  We work with you and support all along the way.

Please let me know if you have any questions!  pastortroy@rivervalley.org

Is It Hot Enough For Ya? Nah!

This past Saturday was one of those record-setting days where we hit 100 degrees in Minnesota.  It also just happened to be a day that my Mountain Biking small group meets (1:00 p.m.), and that my Chasing Daylight small group had plans to cook out (7:30 p.m.).

We had 6 mountain bikers for the ride.  It was fun as usual, though the heat made it a bit more work, and I think we went through our water a lot quicker than usual too.  A couple of us had minor wipes.  Tom Poch (video guy at RVC) had a bad wipe on the advanced trail and his ankle got pretty swollen.  I gotta check and see how he's doing today.  Mountain biking is a great sport and lots of fun, but today was a reminder of what goes with the territory.  But there's no doubt we'll all be back for more!

We enjoyed some good food off the grill before diving into our Chasing Daylight small group Bible study.  We ate inside in the air conditioning, and then had a great time going through a really good study on uncertainty.  A wonderful end to a hot day!

What Are You Doing this Summer?

We're doing the final edits and finalizing the summer Small Groups Directory so we can get it to the printer on Friday.  The Small Groups Fair for the summer session is coming up May 20 & 21.  I'm excited to say that we will have over 30 small groups available this summer!  That's roughly twice what we had last summer, and it's as many small groups as we've had in any trimester so far.

This is great because it means there'll be many ways for people to connect and grow this summer.  And we'll need even more groups this fall.  As more people step up to lead small groups, more groups are available for more people to connect.  As RVC continues to grow, we need more people stepping into leadership and service in small groups and other ministries so that together we can reach our community by helping them to ultimately connect with Jesus Christ.

Small Groups Fair

This weekend was our Small Groups Fair at church to launch our winter/spring session.  Thanks to the great team who worked hard to make it a success, and to all the small group leaders who are making a difference by serving.  You guys rock!

Pastor Rob did a great job preaching on how RVC must grow smaller as it grows larger, and that small groups are how we do this.  Being connected at RVC means being in a small group, so if you haven't done it yet, it's time!  Join a small group, and then move along the path to small group leadership, because we need more small groups so that more and more people can get connected...so that we can continue to grow smaller as we grow larger.