Now there’s another way to read Tennessee Connections online! Using ActiveMagazine technology, you can flip through the actual pages of the magazine on your computer screen.
A Roundup of Favorite Finds
Welcome to the Connect to Tennessee Products page, where we showcase products from the Volunteer State including food, wine, clothing, jewelry, soaps, lotions, toys and more. It all ties into the buy-local philosophy that ultimately translates into energy savings. If you’ve come across a Tennessee-made product that you love – or if you have one you’d like us to consider highlighting – please send the name of the item, a brief description and contact information to tnceditor@jnlcom.com – or send a sample to Tennessee Connections editor, 725 Cool Springs Blvd., Suite 400, Franklin, TN 37067.
Click here to submit the information for your product.
Spicy Sauces With a Twist
Grilling season is in full swing, and Tennessee has plenty of great home-grown sauces to spice up your meal. If you have an adventurous soul, check out Tennessee Gourmet’s Hot Apple and Spice sauces. These unique all-natural sauces – useful for grilling, marinating and dipping – come in a range of intensities, moving from Sensible to Sneaky Hot to the award-winning Stupid Hot. They also have an apple base – a new twist for barbecue fans. Check the Web site, www.tngourmetsauce.com, for attractive custom gift boxes, as well as specialty barbecue cookbooks and a selection of snappy sauces, jellies and salad dressings with all-natural ingredients based on apples, apricots, peppers, roasted peanut oil and spices – with habanero and Scotch bonnet peppers in the hotter versions. The Web site also offers recipes for main dishes, sides, desserts and appetizers. Sauces are in the $7 price range.
Memories From the Midway
Sue Nichols of Pegram has worked in the amusement industry since 1981, and she’s still drawn to the heady sights and smells of the midway. These days she captures images from amusement parks, carnivals and fairs in watercolor, and she also paints traditional landscapes, houses, barns and storefronts.
“I think people respond to the nostalgic quality of my watercolors, the sort of dreamlike features, even though my work is pretty detailed,” she says. “The subjects and the bright colors bring smiles to a lot of faces and memories to many more.”
Nichols’ work has received some exciting exposure recently: Six of her rural Tennessee scenes appear
in a café scene in Quentin Tarantino’s 2007 Grindhouse movie, and four of her designs were licensed for a scrapbooking catalog. Her original prints are for sale, and many have been reproduced on note cards, prints, ceramic and
wooden tile boxes and more. Nichols accepts commissions for just
about everything except people. Prices range
from about $25 for the tile merchandise items up to $800 for a commissioned large painting. Check out Nichols’ work on her Web site, www.5centride.com.
Homemade Pies in Minutes
Denise Caffey of Woodbury has always received rave reviews and requests for her chocolate pies, and she thought there must be a way to make some money without cooking all the time. Her answer? Pie mixes. Now her company, Down-Home Fixin’s (www.piemix.com), makes “bagged pies,” cleverly packaged microwaveable filling mixes for favorites like chocolate, lemon, chess and buttermilk pies – and even chocolate gravies.
Her all-natural pie mixes can be found in all Tennessee Publix grocery stores, along with some Whole Foods Market stores and specialty shops such as The Old Mill in Pigeon Forge. The mixes take about 15 minutes to make – just add the liquid ingredients, mix, microwave and add to an oven-browned pie shell. Now Caffey is working on pie-mix recipes for people with diabetes. Down-Home Fixin’s is headquartered on the family’s 80-acre Rivers Edge Farm. Each bag makes one pie and sells for $4.
