#cornbread cakes with peas and leftover stuffing and some potatoes... lets go

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cornbread pancakes >>>>>>>>

[the-record-columns]

Nov. 27, 2019: Columns

Thanksgiving:  Family and football

By KEN WELBORN

Record Publisher

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving Day, and I am fortunate enough to be going to my nephew, Matt Welborn, and his wife, Brooke's, house in Wilkesboro. 

In addition to having two of the greatest kids that have ever lived, Claudia Grace and Henry, Matt and Brooke will have the kind of Thanksgiving dinner that will be a lifetime memory for all of us gathered to enjoy.  I mean it.  There have been country songs written about much lesser meals.

In addition, in their big den, a football game will be on television—after all, it is Thanksgiving Day. It won't matter much to me who is playing, but I will probably watch it for a while.

Now, this is not a sports column, but a couple of sporting events have come to mind.  First, as I watched in anguish as the Carolina Panthers managed to, once again, snatch defeat from the jaws of victory on Sunday, some other things came to mind.  First, the Panthers were playing the New Orleans Saints, and why was I surprised that their veteran quarterback, Drew Brees was picking the Panthers apart. 

But, the other thing that always comes to mind when I thank about football, are the good old days of football, when my mind races back to the days before the merger of the AFL and the NFL in 1970.  The Oakland Raiders, one of my favorite teams during the old AFL days, the days of the American Football League, then a rival to the NFL—the National Football League.  The merger I mentioned earlier completed the change into just the NFL, with two conferences, the NFC and the AFC.

It goes without saying that in those days the Washington Redskins were number one in my heart, but of the others, the Raiders and their quarterback, Daryle Lamonica, were something to watch.  And all this brings me to “the game,” famous or infamous, nonetheless it was the game that changed the way we have watched football in the 48 years since that fateful Sunday, Nov. 17, 1968.

The Oakland Raiders were playing their most intense rival, the New York Jets.  It was being played on the Left Coast, so it didn't start around here until 4 p.m., and it was a barn burner all the way. In those days, most football games were over in two and a half hours, but this game was full of scoring, penalties, timeouts and fussing about everything under the sun, and it began to run long.

This was well before ESPN, cable TV, satellites, and the like. I was watching the game with a bunch of friends from school and it truly was a great game. With just over a minute to play in the game, the Jets kicked a field goal to take the lead at 32-29, making the eighth lead change in the game.  I always thought that must be some kind of record in and of itself, but what happened next changed sports history.

After the Jets field goal, NBC broke to a commercial.  About two minutes later, when the game was supposed to come back on, we were greeted with a panoramic view of what appeared to be the Swiss Alps with a cute little girl dancing by herself and turning around in circles to the symphony of music and the aforementioned view, and, before we could say, “What the...?” we realized that we were getting ready to watch Heidi. 

Yes, Heidi, the heart warming children's  story of young girl and her grandfather in the Alps which had been made into a TV movie for NBC which was scheduled to begin showing at 7 .pm.  Well, how big a deal could it be?  The Jets were up three points, and there was only a minute to play—what could happen?

Turns out that quite a bit could happen.  After the Jets kicked off, Lamonica completed a short pass, then there was a penalty on the Jets, and on the next play, the pass Lamonica threw was caught and run in for a touchdown. But, there's more.  On the ensuing kickoff to the Jets, they fumbled the ball near the goal line and a Raider defender scooped it up and ran it in for another touchdown.  Yes.  In the space of NINE of the 65 seconds that NBC denied their viewers to see at the end of the game, the Oakland Raiders scored 14 points, and the final score was 43-32 Raiders.

It was fully 20 minutes before NBC posted the score at the bottom of the screen during Heidi, but there was such an unbelievable difference between the 32-29 score we knew about with 65 seconds to play, and the 43-32 score they posted, we simply didn't believe it. Nobody scores 14 points in a minute.

But they did.

There was such an uproar about cutting the minute off the game that came to be known as “The Heidi Game,” or “The Heidi Bowl,” that, to my knowledge, no network has cut short a game since. 

The irony of it all is that NBC had decided hold the Heidi movie and to let the game end naturally — but there were so many calls about when things were going to begin or end, that their switchboard crashed — and they couldn't get word to the folks in charge of scheduling.

The rest, as we like to say, is history.

  My Momma’s wonderful stuffing and spending time with family in the kitchen

                                             Willa Mae Lankford

By JERRY LANKFORD

Record Editor

My mother, Willa Mae Lankford’s stuffing was one of the best things I’ve ever eaten.

Momma, who was born in raised in Millers Creek, kind of fused my grandmothers’ — her mother, Fairie Huffman McNeil’s, and mother-in-law, Mollie Blackburn Lankford’s — recipes to create this magic. I’m sure she added her own special something to this, but I never thought to ask what that might have been.

The recipe goes something like this:

First bake a big cake of cornbread and prepare about three pounds of mashed potatoes. Let those cool as you boil about four stalks of finely chopped celery until the pieces are translucent.

You'll need a BIG bowl.

Crumble up the cornbread, and then crumble up three or four packs of either hamburger or hot dog buns. With the potatoes (taters), cornbread and crumbled buns in the bowl, add in your celery and pour in two jars of finely chopped pimento. Have three to four cans of vegetable broth open and ready.

Start mixing with your hands, adding the broth until the entire mixture has the consistency of a meatloaf. Put it all in a big pan — the big aluminum throw-away turkey pans work great, but you’d want to double them up because it is a heavy dish. Smooth it out like you would a meatloaf, and use your fingers to make gutters around the edges.

Put it in the oven at 350 for about an hour or until the top is golden brown.

It's a little different — one of those things you either love or you don't. My Momma taught me the recipe, and if I didn't fix it at Thanksgiving, my girls would have my head.

My oldest daughter, Jennifer, is an incredible dessert maker. Her specialty for Thanksgiving are her wonderful pumpkin pies. She usually has to make about a dozen of these. She also prepares other delicious things like sweet potato casseroles. She is really a great cook regardless of the fare.

Anna, who never enjoyed cooking like Jennifer and me, would set the table and slice the canned cranberry sauce. Gabriella, my youngest daughter, at some point took over the task of placing the tiny marshmallows atop the sweet potato dish.

I always cooked the meat. One year I went all out and fixed 40 pounds of it — two turkey breasts, two hams, and a five-pound meatloaf (which I cooked on the grill to save space in the already full oven). Of course there was homemade gravy, mashed potatoes, baby green peas and other vegetables.

Sometime we’d feed close to 20 people. But, that was a rare occasion.

And, the refrigerator was always overstuffed with leftovers long after the meal was over.

It was wonderful to share the kitchen with all these people that I love.

As my daughters have become grown women, they are creating their own Thanksgiving celebrations and traditions. But, that’s only good. Traditions teach our children the special meanings of the holidays. And making your own is paving future homegrown memories.

The Cradle of Jewish History

By AMBASSADOR EARL COX and KATHLEEN COX

Special to The Record

Recently, in a surprise announcement, U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed to the world what Bible believing Christians have always known - that Judea and Samaria belong to Israel. The motive behind Trump’s announcement was not simply to express a pro-Israel position.  By keeping Israel secure in the Jordan Valley, in the Golan Heights and on the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria, President Trump is strategically shoring up U.S. interests in the region.  A strong Israel equals a stronger U.S. influence in the Middle East which is often violent and unpredictable.  Furthermore, by bolstering Israel’s presence and position in the north, the vulnerable pro-US Hashemite kingdom in Jordan is able to rest easier at night.  Israel is Jordan’s most efficient neighbor in terms of securing intelligence information which Israel uses to systematically combat anti-Israel and anti-Hashemite Palestinian terrorists operating in the West Bank (land west of the Jordan River on which the Palestinians want to establish, in part, an independent state). Without question, Israel has the most advanced intelligence apparatus in the world and they readily share information with Jordan as well as the United States and other allies. 

Former supreme commander of NATO and U.S. Secretary of State, the late General Alexander Haig, once said that Israel represents the largest U.S. aircraft carrier in the Middle East without the need to have any U.S. boots on the ground.  Because of this, the United States earns far more than a hundred fold on our annual investment in Israel.   

Most people fail to realize that seventy percent of Jordan’s population are Palestinians whose leadership considers Jordan an artificial entity which is occupying land that belongs to the Palestinians. Deeply entrenched in Jordan is the Muslim Brotherhood which aims to replace the fragile Hashemite regime in Jordan with a Muslim caliphate.  Some ISIS members consider Jordan their home.  With serious internal and external threats, Jordan’s survival largely depends on Israel. 

Should Israel ever retreat from the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria, the cradle of Jewish history, the outcome would be total devastation.  The region would be further destabilized by possibly opening the door for Russia and Iran to strengthen their influence and physical presence.  Keeping a healthy Israeli presence on the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria is the most effective U.S. force multiplier in the Middle East and a stabilizing force in the entire region and for this we must give thanks! 

Well Done Sarah

By CARL WHITE

Life in the Carolinas

The Thanksgiving season is filled with traditions that celebrate family, food and a grateful heart.

If you close your eyes and imagine the perfect Thanksgiving gathering, chances are you will see family and friends gathered around the table with a grand meal featuring a beautifully prepared turkey or tofu turkey if you are a vegetarian.  There will be a wide variety of side dishes with a generous offering of dressings and gravy.

Everyone has their favorite side dish. I posted the question to our Facebook followers. What is your favorite side dish for the Thanksgiving meal? Variations of dressing or stuffing with gravy or cranberry sauce were by far at the top of the list.

Here are a few other favorite sides, Lynn Akers likes corn casserole, Robin Brueckmann has Mennonite heritage and enjoys corn pudding and shoofly pie. Karen Goodsell enjoys her grandmother’s recipe for squash casserole. Laura Crews is crazy about roasted Brussel sprouts with lemon pepper seasoning. Ann Graves is wild about Minnesota wild rise. Terri Reid enjoys a good Waldorf salad with her turkey. Micheal Nelson likes strawberry salad. Bill Evans loves fresh turnip greens, and Vivian Hopkins likes cranberry salad. Dena Burton-Claus loves her dad’s creamy, flavorful mashed potatoes.

The last Thursday in November is our national day to gather, be grateful, eat, play and for many get ready for the excitement Black Friday. We do this every year, and in great part we have the author of Mary Had a Little Lamb to thank for the holiday tradition that brings so much joy. The story goes like this. Sarah Josepha Hale was a widowed mother of five children; she was a poet, writer, and editor.

Sarah became the literary editor of Godey’s Ladies Book, which became the most read magazine of the 19th century and it would be this platform that would give great momentum to her big project, which was to establish an annual day of Thanksgiving nationwide. On Oct. 3, 1789, President George Washington proclaimed Nov. 26, 1789, as a day of Thanksgiving for that year.

Sarah believed that America would be well served to have a set day every year to celebrate our great American festival of Thanksgiving and for many years she would write letters to political leaders including five U.S. Presidents for this cause. It would be her letter written to President Abraham Lincoln on Sept. 28, 1863, that yielded the favorable response she was seeking. On Oct. 3, 1863, President Lincoln’s Thanksgiving Proclamation was signed. There would be other Presidential Proclamations signed. However, it was this one that set the stage for many of the Thanksgiving traditions and foods we celebrate with today.

It is not in doubt that there was an event at Plymouth in 1621, where various people gathered for a meal and prayerful Thanksgiving. There are other recorded dates on which various forms of Thanksgiving were celebrated.  

The story of Sarah Josepha Hale is one for which we can be thankful. Sarah married David Hale, and for nine years they dedicated two hours, a day to study, and it was during this time that Sarah would gain confidence in the power of her mind. David died of a stroke, and Sarah became a widowed mother of five. Little did Sarah know that she would make a difference in the lives of three hundred million Americans. Mary’s Little Lamb would bring joy to countless children around the world and the turkey, dressing and all the other delightful sides and other traditions would give us all something to celebrate.

In our collage, President Lincoln is portrayed by our friend Arthur Lightbody from Waxhaw, N.C. Photo credit: Titus Lightbody.