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Fat Tuesday fills stomachs, food pantry
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Liz Shutler shows off a pulled-pork sandwich she was serving during Fat Tuesday — Feed the Salem Community Food Pantry at the Salem Community Center. Local businesses and organizations donate food to the annual event, which raises money at $10 a plate.
SALEM
Just saying it is a mouthful, let alone eating it. Coffee-rubbed bison tenderloin on a spicy polenta crostini with a breakfast stout and molasses drizzle. Mmmm.
Kathy Anderson of Canfield, in line with her husband, Bill, to try some, has had bison before, she said, “but I can’t wait to taste this.”
The two had come to the Salem Community Center on Tuesday evening to taste the offerings of the area’s celebrity chefs and businesses as they gathered there once again for Fat Tuesday — Feed the Salem Community Food Pantry.
The Andersons, who have cooked for the event for the past four years for Bill’s business, North Coast Divers, did not cook this year, Kathy said.
“We decided to take a year off and just enjoy the cooking,” she said.
They certainly weren’t the only ones who intended to do that. Plenty of people made their way to the center for the event, which lasted from 5 to 7 p.m. and was sponsored by the center, Kiwanis Club and Salem Rotary Club.
All the proceeds raised will support the food pantry. The event raised $3,000 last year, said Janet Keene, president of the Salem Rotary Club.
This year, more than 30 vendors brought an interesting mix of delectables to the party — from the bison, which would be at home in a fine-dining establishment, to some home-cooked comfort food.
Columbiana County Career and Technical Center’s Culinary Career and Hospitality Management students Caitlin Johnston, 17, of Crestview High School, and Tamarra Boyer, 18, of East Palestine High School, created the bison under the direction of culinary instructor J.R. Straley.
“They put this together this afternoon, and it was prepared in two hours,” Straley said.
Celeste Oprean, assistant dean at Kent State University’s Salem campus, helped out at the university’s table by bringing bourbon bread pudding. You could almost still taste the bread.
Kay’s Kitchen Catering brought along a taste of the islands in Kay’s Hawaiian meatballs, while next to her, Chris Hyde, district executive of the Buckeye Boy Scout Council, was doling out an old standby favorite: green-bean casserole.
There were sausage-and-pepper sandwiches, rice and beans, pasta salads, jambalaya and pulled-pork sandwiches.
Of the more unusual entrees: Perry Township Police Chief Mike Emigh’s pheasant chili, and BYOB Catering’s leg-of-goat sliders.
On the sweet side?
Christy Solley of Precision Orthodontics found a cookie-cutter shaped like a tooth, and she and Robin Marino were giving out sugar cookies decorated with icing braces at their table.
St. Ann Church volunteers Joe Cadile and Jim Sartor were making sure people got their good-luck Fat Tuesday packzi, a doughnutlike pastry filled with jelly.
The women who live at the Fleming House, temporary housing for women recovering from alcohol and drugs, contributed with Texas sheet cake.
Linda Russell, a case manager there, was serving cake for the Family Recovery Center, which runs the Fleming House. Both are in Lisbon.
And if you thought you couldn’t cook candy in a crockpot, you were wrong. Janet Keene’s contribution to the evening was peanut clusters that had been mixed in one.
Other businesses that contributed were Salem Walmart, First National Bank, Jalisco’s Mexican Restaurant, Auburn Skilled Nursing, Affordable Catering and BBQ, Quota International, Sterling House, Visiting Angels, Papa John’s, H&R Block, Apicella Family, Tom and Patty Bauman, Catered Affair, Giant Eagle, Lyle Printing, Print Works of Salem, Kothera and Carolyn Jones, and Salem Regional Medical Center — Wayland Wong.