Ambrosia Salad — The Sweet Side of the Church Supper Table

I cooked the Wednesday night Bible study supper. My hands. My stove. My kitchen. Four months and seventeen days after Marcus died, I stood in the New Hope church kitchen and cooked a meal for forty people and served every plate and watched every person eat and the watching was the sermon and the sermon was: I am still here. The kitchen is still mine. The cook is back. Not whole. Not healed. Not the Loretta who stood here before March 3rd. But a Loretta. A new one. A Loretta who cooks through grief, who feeds through pain, who serves because service is the only antidote to helplessness she has ever found.

The menu was fried chicken, collard greens, and cornbread. The holy trinity. The foundation. I did not try anything ambitious. I did not reach for the complicated dishes. I reached for the dishes my hands know the way my lungs know breathing — automatically, involuntarily, the muscle memory of a woman who has fried chicken ten thousand times and can fry it in her sleep and possibly from the grave. The chicken was perfect. The greens were perfect. The cornbread was perfect. Perfection was not the goal. Presence was the goal. And I was present.

The congregation did not make a fuss. They did not applaud. They did not cry or hug me excessively or treat me like a fragile thing that might break if you look at it too hard, which I am, but which I do not need to be reminded of. They said thank you, Mother Simms. They said the food is good. They said welcome back. Simple words. Right words. The words you say to a woman who has returned from a place where words could not reach her, who has come back carrying food instead of words, because food is her word, food is her sermon, food is the only testimony she has left.

After the supper was served and the dishes were washed and the kitchen was clean, I stood in the dark kitchen alone. The way I always do. The way I have always done. And I talked to Mama, which is what I do in dark kitchens. And I talked to Marcus. For the first time. I said: baby, I cooked tonight. I made your chicken. I made your greens. I fed your church. And the feeding was the prayer I could not say with words, and the prayer was for you, and every plate was your plate, and every mouth I fed was your mouth, and the feeding is how I will carry you, from now on, in every meal, in every kitchen, in every plate I serve to every person who is hungry. You are in the food now, Marcus. You are in the food the way Mama is in the food. You are an ingredient. The invisible one. The one that makes everything taste like love.

I turned off the light. I locked the door. I went home. The stove was warm. The kitchen was mine. And the cook was back.

The Wednesday night supper table at New Hope is never just fried chicken and greens — there is always something sweet waiting at the end of the line, the kind of dish that has been showing up in church kitchens longer than anyone can remember. Ambrosia Salad is that dish for us: cool and creamy and uncomplicated, the kind of thing your hands can put together while your heart is somewhere else entirely. I have made it more times than I can count, and I made it that night too, because a table that feeds forty people needs something to close on, something gentle, something that says: you are cared for, all the way to the last bite.

Ambrosia Salad

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 0 minutes | Total Time: 15 minutes (plus 1 hour chilling) | Servings: 10–12

Ingredients

• 1 can (20 oz) pineapple chunks, drained well
• 1 can (15 oz) mandarin orange segments, drained well
• 1 cup maraschino cherries, drained and halved
• 1 1/2 cups miniature marshmallows
• 1 cup sweetened shredded coconut
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 cup frozen whipped topping (such as Cool Whip), thawed
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Pinch of salt

Instructions

1. Drain the fruit thoroughly. Pour the pineapple chunks and mandarin orange segments into a colander and let them drain for at least 5 minutes, pressing gently with a paper towel to remove excess moisture. This keeps the salad creamy rather than watery.
2. Mix the dressing. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the sour cream, thawed whipped topping, vanilla extract, and pinch of salt until smooth and fully combined.
3. Fold in the fruit and mix-ins. Add the drained pineapple, mandarin oranges, halved maraschino cherries, marshmallows, and shredded coconut to the bowl. Fold everything together gently with a rubber spatula until all ingredients are evenly coated in the creamy dressing.
4. Chill before serving. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour, or up to overnight. Chilling allows the marshmallows to soften slightly and the flavors to come together.
5. Serve cold. Give the salad a gentle stir before transferring to a serving dish. Garnish with a few extra cherries or a sprinkle of coconut if desired. Serve cold straight from the refrigerator.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 210 | Protein: 2g | Fat: 9g | Carbs: 31g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 75mg