17 minute read
Cook of the Month
Photos by Brooke Echols Herbed Potatoes
Whether you like them baked, mashed, grilled, roasted, in potato salad, or au gratin, potatoes are one of the most versatile vegetables you can put on your plate. They’re also nutritious, being a good source for fiber, “which is important for digestive health and can help you feel full and is beneficial for heart and gastrointestinal health,” says Katie Funderburk, an extension specialist in nutrition with the Alabama Cooperative Extension System. “One small potato with the skin on provides about 10 percent of daily fiber needs.” Potatoes are also naturally fat free, cholesterol free, and low in sodium, an excellent source of vitamin C, and those eaten with the skin are a good source of potassium, according to Potatoes USA, which represents 2,500 potato growers and handlers across the country. White potatoes aren’t much different from sweet potatoes in the nutrition they provide. “The big difference is that the sweet potato is an excellent source of Vitamin A,” says Katie. “The orange coloring of the sweet potato comes from the plant pigment beta carotene, a powerful antioxidant that our bodies turn into Vitamin A. Beta carotene and other antioxidants found in fruits and vegetables can decrease your risk of heart disease and certain cancers.” The recipes sent in by our readers showcase the variety of ways you can enjoy your potatoes, from breakfast to dessert! For more recipes, visit livewellalabama.com or potatogoodness.com/potato-recipes.
Potatoes are one of the most versatile vegetables. Truthfully, Brooke Burks nothing beats just some good old mashed potatoes. Here, we show you how to jazz them up and make them a dish that everyone will love. WARNING! These fancy mashed potatoes may also make folks fall in love with you too! This is the first side dish I ever fixed for my husband of now 26 years. So simple, yet so delicious!
Garlic Mashed Potatoes
Photo by The Buttered Home
2-3 pounds white potatoes, peeled, cubed and boiled 3 tablespoons butter 8 ounces cream cheese 8 ounces sour cream 2 teaspoons garlic powder 1 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon pepper
Dried parsley or green onions, for garnish Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Boil and drain potatoes. In a large bowl, mash potatoes until desired consistency is achieved. Add butter, cream cheese and sour cream. Mix well.
Add salt, pepper and garlic powder, mixing well. Pour into a greased 9x13-inch casserole dish. Bake for 20-25 minutes. Garnish with dried parsley or chopped green onions.
Cook of the Month: Teresa Hubbard, Franklin EC
Teresa Hubbard, an aide for special needs students at Russellville Middle School, got the idea for her “Potato Surprise” recipe after seeing a similar recipe in an AllRecipes magazine a few years ago. “They had a recipe in there for loaded potatoes with bacon, onions, celery and leftover potatoes and cheese,” she says. The mixture was fried as patties, but she modified the recipe using flour tortillas and adding in sausage, red bell pepper, cumin and chilies. The “surprise” dish was a hit with her sister and nephews and her sister encouraged her to send it in for this month’s contest because it was so good it might win. She was right!
Potato Surprise
1¼ cups leftover mashed potatoes (that were prepared with salt, margarine and milk) 1 cup hot pork sausage, cooked and crumbled 1/2 cup red bell pepper strips, chopped 11/2 teaspoons ground cumin ¼ cup onion, chopped 3 tablespoons diced green chilies, drained 1 cup grated sharp cheddar cheese 1 large egg 11 8-inch flour tortillas
Cook sausage and drain off grease. In a bowl, stir together mashed potatoes, sausage, pepper strips, cumin, onion, chilies and cheese, stir well; beat in egg. Place ¼ cup of potato mixture, just below center of tortillas; fold up bottom edge, fold over left and right sides and fold top down. Rub water on tortillas to seal seams together. Fry tortillas in deep hot oil 375 degrees 1-2 minutes or until golden brown, turning once. Drain on paper towels. Yields 11 servings.
Potato Chip Cookies
Potato Chip Cookies
2 cups butter, softened 1 cup sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla 31/2 cups all-purpose flour 2 cups potato chips, crushed 1/2 cup pecans, chopped
Cream soft butter, sugar and vanilla. Add flour in small amounts. Fold crushed potato chips and chopped pecans into the batter. Scoop dough 2 inches apart on cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes.
Lexie Turnipseed Dixie EC ¾ cup butter ¼ cup celery, minced 1 teaspoon oregano 1/2 teaspoon salt ¼ teaspoon garlic powder ¼ teaspoon black pepper 2 medium onions, sliced 6 baking potatoes
Melt butter in a skillet, add celery and sauté about 10 minutes. Stir in seasonings. Set aside. Cutting not quite through, slit each potato into 1/2-inch slits. Place each potato on sliced onion on top of a sheet of foil, large enough to wrap a potato. Pour about 1/6 of butter mixture on each potato. Bring edges of foil together and seal securely. Bake it your preferred way. Potatoes are done if soft when lightly squeezed. Cooking tips: charcoal grill over medium coals approximately 60 minutes; conventional oven on a baking sheet at 350 degrees for 60 minutes; crock pot potatoes can be stacked, baked 4 hours on high or 6 hours on low.
Karyl J. Stockinger Pea River EC
Potato Breakfast Bowls
Per person: 1 potato, cubed 2-3 small okra pods 1/2 small onion 1 mushroom, sliced 1 handful of spinach leaves 2 eggs
Salt, ground cayenne pepper, garlic powder and rosemary, to taste
Olive oil Pour enough olive oil to coat the bottom of a skillet and turn on medium heat. Cut potato into 1/2-inch cubes and add to skillet. Slice okra into ¼-inch pieces and add to skillet. Cut slice of onion, then cut into 8 pieces like a pizza, and add to skillet. Slice mushroom into thin slices and add to skillet. Add spinach leaves and cover. While veggies cook, whisk eggs with salt, powdered cayenne, garlic powder, and rosemary. When spinach leaves are wilted, and a fork easily pierces the potatoes, add the egg mixture, stirring occasionally until dry. Serve with whole grain toast.
Jennifer Fleming Baldwin EMC
Potato Stuffing
1 medium onion, chopped 3 celery stalks, chopped 5 tablespoons butter 4 slices whole wheat bread, torn into pieces 3 cups cooked mashed potatoes 1/2 teaspoon dried sage 1 tablespoon dried parsley
Salt and pepper, to taste
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large pan, sauté onion and celery in butter over medium heat for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in bread, potatoes, sage, parsley, salt and pepper. Grease a medium sized casserole dish and add stuffing mixture. Bake, uncovered, for 1 hour or until top is slightly browned and crispy. Great for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Also, a perfect side dish with meatloaf.
Janice Bracewell Covington EC
to the winning
Please send us your original recipes, developed by you or family members. You may adapt a recipe from another source by changing as little as the amount of one ingredient. Cook of the Month winners will receive $50, and may win “Cook of the Month” only once per calendar year. To be eligible, submissions must include a name, phone number, mailing address and co-op name. Alabama Living reserves the right to reprint recipes in our other publications.
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Gratitude
Ireceive Chief Executive, a quarterly magazine that addresses management and leadership issues for business leaders. The summer issue contains an interview with Chester Elton about his and Adrian Gostick’s book, “Leading with Gratitude,” which I found interesting and will comment on this month.
We are in turbulent and disrupted times. The COVID pandemic will soon enter its third year. People are unsettled as they deal with COVID exposures, illnesses within their families, changes in their workplace, lifestyle and recreational activities, and so many other challenges.
The disruptions find their way into the workplace and employee attitudes. “Leading with Gratitude” states that letting people know they matter in a workplace is the most important factor in retaining and motivating people. It also states that younger employees are looking for an organization that provides them with a sense of purpose. They want to make a difference.
As I read the interview, I thought it made sense because we are all that way. We all want to be a part of something bigger than ourselves so we can make a difference. Being part of a positive change is important to us and our self-esteem. Also, and equally if not more important, we all want to be recognized and appreciated for what we do.
That means CEOs should express their appreciation and gratitude for what their people do for their companies. “Leading with Gratitude” describes different ways CEOs have expressed gratitude within their organizations. Some are as simple as saying “thank you” to those who do well. Other examples include building a gratitude channel within the organization to get everyone involved in expressing gratitude. Others find writing personal notes to those whothat have done a job well or that are experiencing difficult times effective. Another CEO stated that before getting down to business with an employee, she takes time to ask how the employee and their family were doing.
In an interview about his book, Chester Elton says real “gratitude in a business sense is an emotional affirmation” that what someone did matters, and by extension, that person matters. He further states, “You can’t be in a state of gratitude and a state of anxiety at the same time. Simple practices of expressing gratitude lower anxiety levels.” Elton also says that gratitude “communicates what you value most. If you want to be a better communicator, lead with gratitude.”
Elton closes the interview by saying that leading with gratitude is all about better employees, better decisions, more productivity and better employee retention. An expression of gratitude influences leaders to be better leaders and to be better people, too. Why would you not come to work excited every day?
As I read the book review, I became convinced the authors are correct. Gratitude does reduce anxiety levels and helps make people more comfortable. Comfortable people are more productive, happier, easier to be around, more interactive and more creative.
It also is apparent that gratitude should not be limited to the workplace. If gratitude helps employees be better, isn’t it logical that gratitude also builds better interpersonal relationships, stronger friendships, and better people?
So many people have supported us, invested in us, helped us and counseled us when things have been difficult. It starts with our parents, teachers, friends, co-workers, family members, and children. And, there are many other people we may not know all that well who have helped each of us on our way through life.
We have so much to be thankful for: living in a free country, having more conveniences of life than anyone else in history, having the best healthcare system ever known despite the COVID pandemic, having food to eat, having jobs to support ourselves and our families, and so many other things. When was the last time we offered gratitude to those who have supported or helped us or who help us every day of our lives, whether they be grocery clerks, customer service representatives, doctors, or just friends or family?
Chester Elton is correct, “You can’t be in a state of gratitude and a state of anxiety at the same time.” A state of anxiety is no way to work or live. Look around for people to express your gratitude. It will make their day a little bit less stressful and make them feel better about themselves and their life. And it will make you a little bit better, too.
I am grateful and appreciative to all of you for your expression of support and others for constructive criticism of my articles, which I hope makes me a better person. I hope you will find many people to express your gratitude to and will have a good month.
Gary Smith is President and CEO of PowerSouth Energy Cooperative.
Alabama has many historical treasures; let’s work together to preserve them
TVA Volunteers monitoring a Tribal Site.
The Tennessee Valley is rich in Native American history. With more than 20 federally recognized tribes that call the Valley their homeland and more than 12,500 reported Native American archeological sites on TVA property, it’s not uncommon for hikers and even property owners to stumble across an artifact — and be tempted to keep it.
For Karen Brunso, Tribal Historic Preservation Officer and citizen of the Chickasaw nation, this is the equivalent of finding, taking and selling a tribal artifact.
“Pottery shards are our grandmothers’ dishes; stone tools are our grandfathers’ tools,” Brunso said. “And if someone takes a sacred item, it’s the same as looting a church. Tribal artifacts are not a cool way to own a piece of history, they’re pieces of history that tell a story – our story.”
In addition to eliminating a piece of history, Stacye Hathorn, partner to TVA’s Cultural Compliance team and state archaeologist for Alabama, said that removing an artifact from an archeological site in particular can impact the integrity of the entire site; meaning that they can no longer identify what the location was used for historically.
“Not everyone gets to write their history in books, but everyone gets to write their history in the soil,” Hathorn said. “Even the flakes left over from someone carving an arrowhead can help us determine if the site was a simple campground or a war site. But if the arrowhead is missing, we’re missing a very crucial piece of the puzzle. Unless we find other artifacts deeper in the soil of the site, we won’t be able to tell that story correctly.”
Since archeological sites are non-renewable resources, even professional excavation projects require calculated measures and thought.
For the past six years, TVA has been partnering with the University of Alabama’s Office of Archeological Research to analyze and catalog artifact collections that were gathered from the Guntersville, Wheeler and Pickwick basins in the 1930s and 40s. The artifacts, which range from pieces of Native American life to European trade goods, were collected by TVA and University of Alabama archeologists and researchers before the sites could be impacted by construction of the dams.
So, what should you do if you find an artifact – either on TVA property or in your own backyard? According to TVA senior specialist archeologist Erin Dunsmore, the answer is simple. She notes that it could be illegal to dig in these sites, especially if you find a burial site. If you find an artifact, do the right thing and don’t touch it — leave it where it is. Then, she recommends that you follow these steps:
Take a picture of the item just as you found it.
Remember the precise location, so you can report it with the photo to Dunsmore and the team via email at culturalresources@ tva.gov.
If you see someone illegally digging for artifacts on TVA property, contact the TVA police at 855-476-2489.
If you find an artifact on your own property, it’s best to stop what you’re doing and contact your state archeologist or email the address above. TVA’s team can help you contact the correct authority.
NEVER post about your findings on social media because it gives dishonest people the opportunity to steal and loot.
Let’s work together to help preserve history and show reverence for Native American tribal heritage.
Kevin Chandler is general manager, Alabama District Customer Service, for the Tennessee Valley Authority.
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