Ms Cook is enthusiastically committed to the discovery and enjoyment of locally grown and crafted foods. As a child, she would take on an alter ego and pretend to be “ms cook”, appreciating farm to table meals in her Grandparents’ kitchen or chatting with her parents over a bowl of homemade ice cream. As an adult, she awakened to the fact that locally initiated sources of meat, eggs, dairy and produce had all but been replaced by massive shipments from very far away. The outcome – “Ms Cook” lives again. She researches the sparkling flavors of foods that are produced nearby and are prepared as soon as possible. Ms Cook shares the food sources around her that have enriched her life in community and serves up adventures with local food producing friends who are committed to that same quality she celebrated back in the days of little “ms cook”. She tells a tale of real food with recipes that will benefit the health of the family and the community. Ms Cook writes a weekly food column for The Columbia Daily Herald and teaches seasonal cooking classes: Loco for Local, at Columbia State Community College. She also contributed in the development and production of Provisions and Politics, a national winner of the Tabasco Community Cookbook Awards.
Ms. Cook’s Table
February 28th, 2009The Learning Curve
February 25th, 2009
Wright Sanders - the fourth of seven children - stoically bears the burden of the ‘invisible, middle child’ while working full-time on his family’s farm in Dogwood Mudhole, Tennessee. Amidst the constant demands of caring for pigs, chickens, sheep, goats, horses, and cattle, he still carves out time to carefully cultivate his skills in the sarcastic arts and apply them to his descriptions of his charges on the farm. Wright enjoys macramé, long, shoe-removing chases in muddy pens and removes his dirty carcass to nearby Lodi every evening where he lives with his wife, Jena, and their 2.8 children.
Justin Sanders is the second of seven children. Wright’s older brother, convinced that he knows everything, Justin daily strives to redefine the phrase ‘the blind leading the blind’. Justin enjoys domineering lectures and restarting nearly completed projects. He lives on the farm with his wife, Ellen, and their four children, who he affectionately refers to as “cheap labour”.
Publisher’s Blog
January 21st, 2009
Lisa is the owner/founder of Local Table and an obsessive/passionate gardener and lover of the outdoors. She and her husband Dale live in beautiful Smith County and are in the livelong process of restoring an 1870s farmhouse and bringing the farmstead back to life. They share their place with numerous cats, dogs, chickens, guineas and a retired old mare.
Local Choice
January 21st, 2009
Growing up in Atlanta, Katherine’s enthusiasm for food and cooking sparked at an early age. As her appetite and passion traveled with her to college at Sewanee and a few post-college years in Washington, D.C., she learned the importance and benefits of making the Local Choice by visiting farmer’s markets and local restaurants. To further her interest in the nutrients of home grown food and organics, Katherine became a Nutrition and Wellness Consultant (certified by the AFPA) in 2008. Now, fully planted back in the South, Katherine will explore the bountiful produce of middle Tennessee, by choosing local ingredients to whip up a meal or seeking out a local restaurant when she happens to “forget” to go to the farmer’s market. Follow her as she makes the Local Choice
