Prize Winning Dumplings

Prize Winning Dumplings

 

 

 

 

Before she ever even reached her teens, she had her first job cooking for a doctor and his wife.  Although none of us today could attest to her culinary skills as a child, we all consider her in adulthood to have been the best cook we ever knew.  Her meals were often typical Southern fare - cornbread, pinto beans, turnip greens, etc.  Her most highly acclaimed dish was chicken and dumplings.  Family reunions, birthday parties, and other events demanded that she prepare this delicious dish.

 

 

 

Two of my most prized possessions are a Hoosier Cabinet (actually Sellers brand cabinet) but in the South everyone calls these type a "Hoosier" whether it's the Hoosier brand or not...kinda like all sodas are Coke whether they are Coca-Cola or not and a hatchet.  Both items are directly related to chicken and dumplings.  The Hoosier cabinet was a prized piece of her kitchen. 

 

In this cabinet she stored her flour, spices, and other items necessary in the preparation of her meals.  That Hoosier cabinet has now found a home in my kitchen where I store many of my cookware items.

 

 

 

My other prized possession, the hatchet, hangs from the rafters of my screen porch.  What, you may wonder, could a hatchet have to do with cooking a meal?  The truth is that my grandmother (the perfect example of someone who knew how to prepare true Southern cuisine) often used this hatchet to decapitate the chickens for her chicken and dumplings.  Throughout the 1980s and into the early 1990s, I can recall time after time of watching her catch a chicken, hold it over a tree stump with its neck extended, hack off its head, catch its flopping body, and place the body in a clean, lidded garbage can until the lifeless body of the chicken was motionless.  After killing the chicken, she would pluck its feathers and use alcohol to singe the pinfeathers.  Once the chicken was cleaned, she boiled it to make the broth for the dumplings.

 

 

 

Why  not just buy a chicken from the store?
Was this process really worth the time and trouble?
If you want to know an honest answer, just ask any one of the hundreds of people who ever had the pleasure of eating Opal Cookston's chicken and dumplings.  They will tell you that no others could compare.

 

 

My grandmother Opal passed away shortly before the Blizzard of 1993.  Her chicken and dumplings are but a memory for those of us who live on.  And though I inherited some of her cooking skills, I have no desire to put the hatchet to use.  I'll leave it there in its place of honor on my screen porch.  If the notion hits me to cook a pot of dumplings, I much prefer to purchase my own chicken from the store.  After all, not all of my memories of decapitated chickens are pleasant, but that story remains to be told.

 

- Cody Cookston
Memories General Store, owner
www.memoriesgeneralstore.com

Trash to Treasure - The Story of a McCoy Pink & Blue Stoneware Bowl

Trash to Treasure - The Story of a McCoy Pink & Blue Stoneware Bowl

"One man's trash is another man's treasure," or so the cliche goes.  But is that true?  Can something that is totally worthless to one person actually have value for someone else?

The answer to this question came to me quite unexpectedly.  I was in my late teens or early twenties at the time.  I had begun to acquire quite a bit of knowledge of pottery and glass collectibles and antiques.  My mother and I had been selling on Ebay for a few years, and we had discovered that some antique & collectible items just would not sell on Ebay so we began exploring additional markets for some of our finds.

One day I learned that an antique mall had been opened in Monteagle, Tennessee.  After talking with the owner, Mama and I decided to rent a booth.  We stocked the booth with a variety of items hoping that someone would find some pieces they just couldn't pass on.  Soon, I found myself going by the antique mall and hanging out with the owner.  I shared my knowledge of pottery and glass while she educated me about jewelry.

One morning she called to tell me that a man from Germany had come by to see if she was interested in buying some items.  His mother who lived in Sewanee, TN, on the campus of the University of the South had passed away.  She had left behind some antiques and collectibles that her son was either unable or unwilling to take back to Germany.

Mama and I were so excited.  We hurried to the antique mall, met up with the owner, and made our way to Sewanee.  Many of the items for sale were out of our budget, and we purchased very little that day.  In fact, I can't recall a single item we bought.  However, there was on treasure we did bring home with us.  At the back of the house was a large trash can.  Broken bottles, antique dishes and pieces of pottery filled the can.  Unashamedly, I dug through the contents.  A few layers down I dug out a 1920s Nelson McCoy Pottery pink and blue band mixing bowl.  It was the 5" diameter size...the rarest size you can find in this pattern.  Although the bowl was cracked, to Mama and me it was a great find to add to our collection.  This man, whose mother had left the bowl behind when she passed away, had seen the bowl as a cracked, worthless piece of trash.  To us, however, it was a treasure to bring home and display proudly above the kitchen cabinets.  So, there it sits in its place of honor --- a treasure rescued from someone's trash amid other treasures all with a story to tell if only an audience of busy passersby will listen.

"One man's trash TRULY is another man's treasure."