Moderation in All Things

Fortunately for me, peanut butter showed up late enough on my mission that I didn't have to worry about growing tired of it.

Balanced Diet

The math checks out.

The Ultimate in Missionary Cuisine

Ah, the peanut butter and jelly sandwich. This particular storyline is based on a true story. We didn't see peanut butter on shelves until about four months before I went home. It was a very big deal.

Make the Call

Pizza delivery was the first meal I experienced in the mission field. It was reassuring to know that things wouldn't be quite so foreign.

Fruits of Their Labor

As a missionary, I had my Mom ship me corn syrup in a care package so I could make our investigators a number of different treats. Fortunately, for them, my peanut brittle turned out much, much better. (Also, you know I'm old when I admit to making peanut brittle--sheesh.)

Kitchen Catastrophe

This is why you follow directions exactly as prescribed.

Adventures in Baking

Cooking is an art. These two clearly lack any artistic ability.

Quick Dinner

Some of my companions and I cooked together, but I definitely would have cooked separate from Elder Ryan had we been together.

So Much for Missionary Cooking

Poor Elder Van Dyke, his hubris led to his downfall. Like Icarus, he flew too close to the sun.

Even More Missionary Cooking

I might be with Elder Blank on this one.

More Missionary Cooking

The cookbook is a mysterious thing for a 19 year old boy.

Missionary Cooking

It is always an adventure when an elder decides to be ambitious in the kitchen.

Thanksgiving Dinner

My first Thanksgiving dinner as a missionary was just about as bad as Elder Van Dyke's. We cooked some rice and poured a bottle of Uncle Ben's* sweet and sour chicken sauce on it. Cold. Without chicken.

We were not what you would call competent cooks.

*Strangely a series of Uncle Ben's sauces in a can were the only remotely American food on the shelves of Slovenia stores a couple of years after the fall of communism. These were followed shortly by Dairy Queen and McDonald's restaurants.

Your October 2018 General Conference Activity Packet

As easy as they are to prepare, missionaries can find a way to mess up even pancakes!

General Conference is now under two weeks away. It's time to start preparing for another weekend of spiritual feasting. You can start by downloading the Fall 2018 General Conference Activity Packet. Thanks to the translation work of Sara Mayer, Gabbi Herrera, and Dani Queiroz de Souza it is also available in French, Spanish, and Portuguese too!

Now, while I've got your attention, let me remind you of the other materials I have available should you want even more options to entertain your little ones during the General Conference broadcast:

Consider subscribing to the Mormon Cartoonist Activity Page Newsletter.  The Mormon Cartoonist Newsletter provides subscribers with a free activity page every Friday morning delivered to your inbox to download for sacrament meetings, Family Home Evenings, primary lessons, or General Conference. Did I mention that it's free? Sign up for it here.

If you have Apple products, you might be interested in any one of the fine iOS apps featuring my artwork: LDS Coloring Book, LDS Laughs, LDS Scripture Heroes, and Book of Mormon Adventure.

You can also go old school with one of my activity books available at discerning LDS bookstores: The Puzzle Book for LDS Kids and Now That I am Baptized.

And finally, don't forget about my collection of missionary comic strips. Mission Daze is perfect for the missionaries in your life!

Dinner Choices

As a missionary, my dinner menu was rather limited too.

Meatloaf

Meatloaf is one of those meals that can be prepared in a number of different ways. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if there were meatloaf recipes out there that included cereal. (That being the case, I'm not sure if that helps or hurts this particular strip.)

The Fine Print

And thus ends Elder Ryan's adventures with potatoes.

Potato Potpourri

Looks like Elder Ryan is in for a tough time with his food of choice.

Meatloaf

We have no problem asking 18-year-old boys to travel throughout the world as representatives of the Church, but is it really a good idea to let them cook for themselves?

Missionary Cooking Instruction

At the risk of turning this into a food blog, here's another missionary strip dealing with the stuff.

On my mission, I picked up a number of life skills, including that of following the directions inside a cookbook--as long as those directions were easy and quick. In one area, we had a recipe share regularly with our district meetings, but the majority of my cooking came from a cookbook bequeathed to me by my trainer as he left for home. I, in turn, gave the cookbook to my last mission companion and, as far as I know, it is still blessing the lives of missionaries in Slovenia 20 years later.

(View this week's missionary strip on deseretnews.com here.)