GRAY’S CREEK – Slip the notch in your belt down by one.
No need for a snug-fitting skirt.
Those country cooks from “down at the branch” are busy this week preparing for the 56th annual Gray’s Creek Woman’s Club Buffet and Bazaar from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Thursday at the newly remodeled Gray’s Creek Community Building.
Come hungry.
Sit a spell.
The cost of attendance is $12 for dining in or eating takeout.
The autumn rite is a smorgasbord of mouth-watering country cooking from the country ham to the chicken and pastry. Other delights include collard greens, steamed cabbage, green beans, butter beans, black-eyed peas, potato salad, sweet potatoes, deviled eggs and homemade cornbread muffins. And don’t forget to save room for dessert.
“The country ham will be prepared by Dennis Walters and his fellow cookers Walter Clark, Roger Ross, Clifton McNeill and Bill Melvin,” Club President Joy Cannady said. “The chicken tenders, a new item this year, will be cooked by Bobby Jackson of Raging Rooster Catering in the rear of the community building.”
Cannady and Mable Hurley are handling the collard greens “with help from Kinlaw’s Welcome Grill.” The dish is one of the main reasons people turn out for the meal, Cannady said; the pan is being donated by the club’s oldest member, Dean Pate, and the collards are right out of Poke and Mable Hurley’s garden.
The sweet potatoes will be prepared by Cannady and Kambrie Gaddis, while Ted Lambert and Catherine Bass will serve as chicken and pastry cooks. The cooks will use chickens that were home-cooked by members, as well as the resulting chicken broth.
Pepper Woodard, Karen Graham and Deena Pittman are stirring up pots of blackeyed peas along with help from Cannady.
The potato salad team includes Roberta Waddle, Karen Graham, Helen Brockett, Sue Cooper, Deena Pittman, Joan Smith, Joy Smith-Jones and the mother-daughter team of Pats and Ashland White.
Thursday’s buffet will include 28 dozen eggs from Tracey McKoy, Dean Pate, Mable Hurley, Debbie Cashwell, Karen Graham, Nancy Honeycutt, Linda Parnell, Helen Brockett, Deena Pittman and Catherine Bass.
Those homemade cornbread muffins, Cannady said, will be baked by Linda Parnell, Catherine Bass and Melissa Marsh.
Time-honored tradition
Suffice it to say, the kitchen won’t be short of those country cooks to include Tracey McKoy, Susan Walters, Debbie Cashwell, Linda Parnell, Helen Brockett, Catherine Bass, Nancy Honeycutt, Joan Smith, Beth Medina, Holli Phillips, Nancy Hope and Kathy Daugherty.
“A lot of these women and men work at the buffet because their parents did and it’s a memory they want to carry on,” Cannady said about the club, established circa 1916. “Even after all this work in preparation prior to the buffet, everyone has a specific job during the buffet from ticket-takers to table washers to keeping the pans filled with food. The ladies and some of the men all have made desserts for the buffet table as well as pound cakes, candies, nuts and assorted pies for the Country Store.”
The Country Store has home-canned items and crafts for sale, and don’t forget the raffle, where you can bid on the Gray’s Creek Woman’s Club handmade quilt or Frank Melvin’s pound cake from his mother’s family recipe.
“As 2 p.m. finally rolls around and everyone has talked to neighbors they haven’t seen in ages, it’s finally time to have the quilt raffle drawing,” Cannady said. “This raffle quilt originated many years ago and was reinstated around 2013-14 by Gray’s Creek Woman’s Club member Maureen Grim.”
“An original handpiece quilt is sewn each year and raffled off at $1 per ticket," she continued. "It has been a very popular activity. Money generated from the quilt goes to college and trade school scholarships at Gray’s Creek High School each year. This year’s quilt was created by Nancy Hope, chairman of the quilt committee, Tracey McKoy, Karen Graham, Maureen Grim and Cannady."
Other proceeds from the buffet and any other club fundraisers, Cannady says, are earmarked for local fire departments, schools, families in need and the Gray’s Creek Christian Center.
Plenty of politicking, too
As attendees might imagine, there will be plenty of folks grazing through “the garden” on Thursday.
“New this year is the ‘Queen’s Table,’ which will be a coveted area for our longtime members that will this year be socializing with patrons as they make their way through to the buffet line,” Cannady said. “The community building will be an unexpected surprise as it has been remodeled with the help of a $100,000 state grant from N.C. House Reps. Diane Wheatley and Marvin Lucas and former delegation members to include Rep. Billy Richardson, Rep. John Szoka, Sen. Kirk deViere and Sen. Ben Clark.
On the subject of politicians, there likely will be plenty in attendance Thursday; early voting is scheduled to begin Friday and runs through Nov. 4, with the general election set for Nov. 7 in Fayetteville, Eastover, Falcon, Godwin, Hope Mills, Linden, Spring Lake, Stedman and Wade.
“It’s an off year,” said Dennis Walters, whose knowledge about the buffet and bazaar dates back to the late 1960s. “It’ll probably be a bit light this year. But you’ll see some state House legislators. The old, true politicians will be here.”
Come hungry
So come hungry.
Sit a spell.
“We look forward to seeing you,” Cannady said.
Bon appetite.
And save room for dessert.
Bill Kirby Jr. can be reached at billkirby49@gmail.com or 910-624-1961.
