A few days ago, when cleaning out our refrigerator, there was a small amount of gravy that I poured into the sink so I could wash the container. It had been there a couple of days, and I did not foresee anyone eating it. I used the word pour, however, I should rather have said, when I turned the bowl upside down, it began to come out in clumps. I was very fascinated because it looked like chocolate pudding, it was no longer a liquid, but a solid. It had gelatinized. I know there are a lot of eyes rolling right now and people saying, ‘well duh’. Yes, I have known ever since I started cooking that the gravy thickens and has a thickening agent in it, but I had never stopped to think about it or read the ingredients to see that in many cases it is gelatin. These are things we take for granted. No, not the strawberry or lime-flavored kind, which is exactly what I think of when I think of gelatin. Here are some things I have learned about gelatin since then for all you skeptical naysayers.
Have you ever gotten the turkey out of the refrigerator the day after Thanksgiving to have leftovers and seen it is compacted in a jelly like substance? Well folks, that is exactly what gelatin is made from. No, it is not fat and yes, it does taste great, it holds all the flavors. Why, what is it? Gelatin is classified as a food item and not an additive in products because it is bone, marrow, tendons, hides and skins of chickens, cows or pigs and some scales from fish, boiled down, it is a natural source of collagen and protein. Go read the label on your strawberry or other flavored Jell-O and you will see that it contains protein! The process of coming up with what we have today in products has evolved over thousands of years. When cavemen first noticed what happened when they boiled down these animal parts in water, they began to use it as a glue in clothes, tools, and furniture. The Egyptians were one of the first to use it as a food source in broths and soups. On an industrial scale the process has been perfected through many steps to bring us the colorless, almost odorless powder that we can add to anything we want to thicken. In addition, gelatin is also used in cosmetics, medical devices, photographical applications, wine making, musical instruments, pharmaceuticals and more. One last tidbit, if you classify as ‘vegan’ put down the Jell-O and things with gelatin in them because ‘animal by product’ is the direct origin of gelatin.
Other words used for gelatinous are ‘viscous’, meaning a glutinous consistency, a quality of sticking or adhering; ‘congeal’, meaning to set, gel, or clot; ‘amalgamate’, meaning to unite into one, merge or composite; ‘coagulate’, meaning to thicken into a viscous, or coherent mass, curdle or clot. None of this sounds very good, but who wants runny gravy, and if you have liquid Jell-O it would be considered juice. In addition to that, gelatinization or most often called coagulation is very needed when it comes to the human body, however, unwanted clots can also be dangerous. The smallest cells in the body, only visible through a microscope, called platelets, assist with this process.
Thrombocytes are their official name from the Greek word meaning to clot, but their nickname is Platelets. When they are inactive, not needed at the time, in the body, they are flat and look like little miniature plates. When they are called to action, meaning the body has been hurt or injured and needs help for the bleeding to stop, they puff up and push out their little sticky tentacles, called projections, and get to work. They rush to the sight of the injury, called interrupted endothelium, and stop the bleeding by clumping and adhering together. Changing their shape at activation turns on their receptors and sends out a chemical message, thus plugging the hole or connecting to the receptor bridges called aggregation. If the sight of the wound is too large or the platelets are not working correctly or the count is too low, the consequences could be catastrophic. On the other hand, if these little guys start activating within the veins and cause a clot within an intact vessel, we have a blood clot, which can obstruct normal blood flow and lead to a crisis as well. I am not a physician, and there are many technical, medical terms for all of this, however, this is my short and sweet explanation of the process of platelets that congeal together for the saving of a life. They play a very important role but can also get out of hand if not regulated.
Though I did not initially know much about the origin and uses of gelatin, I did have knowledge about platelets from a firsthand experience. I will give you the nutshell version of my platelet story. It was the year 1988 and I was expecting our third child, (though our first baby was stillborn, she is still counted). On a routine visit to the doctor’s office, after much prodding with the stethoscope, I heard these dreadful words before going into complete auto pilot, “Ms. Smith, I am not hearing the heartbeat, we would like you to stay and do an ultrasound.” Not much was said during that test either affirmative or against, besides a lot of mumbling, but I knew. The next thing said to me after I was dressed was, “Ms. Smith we would like you to wait in the consultation room and the doctor will call you there.” Why so formal when there is something solemn to say? Out of respect I guess, but I was only in my twenties at the time, but at that moment I felt old. When the doctor called, he confirmed our worst fears that the baby had indeed not made it and proceeded to give me instructions, yes, all of this took place over the phone. The bottom line was, I carried the baby for a month, feeling quite humiliated, embarrassed, and guilty, as if it was my fault (because I still had to go to work each day, face everyone and try to act normal). Things were far from normal, but we made it through one day at a time.
During this process of time, the hope was that my body would naturally abort the baby and I would miscarry. Of course, with hindsight, age and experience I would have never agreed to that route now. Long story short, my body did not abort the fetus, but it was beginning to attack itself. I got a call one day after they had received my lab work results in, that said, “Ms. Smith, we need you to go to the hospital as soon as possible.” The platelets, those tiny little soldiers in my body had almost all depleted. They had to do a procedure to take the baby immediately and in addition, my life was in danger because of the bleeding. I did not have any coagulation, gelatinization properties in my body. I looked like a MAC truck had run over me. After several transfusions of blood and platelets, the D&E and D&C procedures, and I might add, people praying for me all over the globe, including my husband who wore out the carpet in the waiting room from pacing back and forth, God intervened and spared my life. How incredibly important such a small cell can be. I will add that God has blessed us with healing and four beautiful daughters. Though we do not understand, we do not question His ways.
Genesis 2:7 states, “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” In Job 10: 8, Jobs says to the Lord, “Thine hands have made me and fashioned me together round about;” David’s words are similar in Psalms 119:73, “Thy hands have made me and fashioned me: give me understanding, that I may learn thy commandments.” Psalm 139:16, “Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.” God had created us with all our smallest parts and formed us. There was a substance that he took, dirt, and shaped and fashioned us into a beautiful creation, for His glory. Isaiah 64:8 states, “But now, O Lord, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou, our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand.” There is an adhesion, fashioning and molding that takes place by the potter to make us into the vessels we need to be for His kingdom. When we become a part of the family of God, as the tiny cells in the body do such an incredible, magnanimous, and critical job, this is how we become in the body of Christ. Fitly framed together, now all of one body, many members, having different jobs and functions. They are all important and needed in fulfilling the proper functions of the body of Christ. Ephesians 2, Romans 12 and 1 Corinthians 12 go into depth of how members should conduct themselves in the body, what we should and shouldn’t do, so that the body can remain healthy and productive. Ephesians 4: 1-6 Paul admonishes the church, “I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love; Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; One Lord, one faith, one baptism, One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.”
As there is a bonding agent in meatloaf, which are breadcrumbs, a binding substance in concrete, which is cement, a sticking agent in paper mâché’, which is glue, and a coagulating factor in Jell -O and gravy which is gelatin, so there is a binding agent in the body of Christ which is love. Galatians 5:22-23 states, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.” You can have as much of this spiritual fruit as you want. They keep everything together and lubricate all the moving parts in the Kingdom of God. Verse 25 states, “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” It is a spiritual kingdom; therefore, the fruit of the Spirit is what makes everything make sense.
Have you ever had an ‘ah ha’ moment? All the bits and pieces of life that have been happening around you suddenly converge in one moment in time, congealing and finally making sense. You have heard the expression, “Things are finally starting to gel.” When we made Jell-O as children we would read the box, taste a bit of the sweet powder, get out bowl and measuring cup, read the instructions and put it all together, and then for the final step, it would have to go into the refrigerator for a couple of hours. A couple of hours! That felt like days to us! We would keep opening the fridge door, checking on it and shaking the bowl to see if we had any gelatinization, which we called jiggling. Of course, this would also cause giggling. Oh, how wonderful it was when we finally got the green light to serve and eat the finished product. An ‘ah ha’ moment.
What ingredient for you, makes your life converge, come together, make sense, gelatinize? If you have lost track of that, go back, look at the recipe you used way back when it all made sense. When you find a good recipe, stick to it, don’t try to substitute the ‘gelatin’. Life is too short to be scattered and frustrating. All over the place and too liquid. Yuck. We need a solid foundation to build upon so that we can get the jiggle, giggle factor back into our day-to-day humdrums. After all, who likes runny gravy?