CHINESE DESSERT

“A merry heart doeth good like a medicine:
but a broken spirit drieth the bones.” (Proverbs 17:22)

Yes, a merry heart does good like a medicine and I want to share an anecdote from my life that I hope will put a smile on your face today!

At least fifteen years ago, I was on my way home from a major Assemblies of God pastors’ meeting in western Massachusetts. I can have a tendency to get very hungry, and I was “starving” on this particular day! I just could not wait to sit down and devour a good meal! “Fast food” was not going to do! I was delighted to find a Chinese restaurant in the Springfield, Massachusetts area, and I happily pulled my car into the parking lot.

I hit the restaurant during the lunch period, and as is often the case with Chinese restaurants, this one had “luncheon specials”. I ordered a luncheon special, and boy did that pork fried rice and the various kinds of meats taste GOOD! In looking over the menu, one thing that had kind of stood out to me was the fact that the menu advertised a special dessert the restaurant featured that patrons were encouraged to try: a Chinese coconut ice cream dessert. I was not planning to order dessert, but I must say that dessert sounded interesting.

I wolfed down my Chinese lunch and all too quickly the food, the hot tea, and the cold water were all gone. The server brought me my bill, a fortune cookie, and on a small white plate was a white, tubular thing with some sort of lined texture all over it. For the first second, I wasn’t sure what that was, and then, OF COURSE, I realized it was that Chinese coconut ice cream dessert! It all made sense, the white “desserty” shape, and the lined texture was the coconut flakes. I hadn’t specifically ordered it, but I thought maybe they gave it to everyone who ordered a luncheon special.

I took my fork, and went to carve a chunk out of the Chinese coconut ice cream dessert. To my surprise, I couldn’t make a DENT in it with the fork! I knew that sometimes restaurant ice cream and other frozen desserts COULD be very hard. They kept them in amazingly cold freezers, and sometimes they COULD come out almost rock hard. I took another stab with the fork, and amazingly, I just could NOT break into that frozen hardened ice cream! Boy, was this uncomfortable?!

I knew it might look kind of weird, but I figured I’d need a KNIFE to CUT into the rock hard ice cream. I took the knife and fork and ...and.... I gave it all I had and I could NOT budge it!

“Man!” I thought, “how COLD is this, anyway?!”

I awkwardly reached my hand down and felt it.

What I felt was NOT ice cream.

What I felt was NOT frozen.

No, my Chinese coconut ice cream dessert was not a Chinese coconut ice cream dessert at all.

Instead, what I felt was a moist wash cloth!

So, be careful when trying to eat a Chinese coconut ice cream dessert!