Rooted Here in Sweetness
Reminder to place your order, offerings, updates, and reflections on sweet potatoes!
Reminder to Order + Market Offerings
Here’s your reminder to place your order for the week! We have some delicious produce, baked goods, jams and jellies, prepared meals, potted plants and more! Check ‘em out, and don’t forget to place your order before Monday at noon.
All about sweet potatoes
Sweet potatoes are one of my favorite foods, ever. They are extremely versatile. You can eat them for every meal of the day, even dessert. They’re my comfort food and my recovery food. I just love them. They're nutritious, delicious, and rich in vitamins and antioxidants. They support immune health and digestion. Learn more about the benefits here.
In addition to being a delicious superfood, sweet potatoes are also culturally significant across the world, and especially to Black communities. Enslaved people carried yams with them on the transatlantic journey, but they could not survive in the soil, so sweet potatoes took their place. Since then, sweet potatoes have served as symbols of resilience and abundance, thought to be the world’s oldest crop. Learn more here.
McGreger, author of Sweet Potatoes, writes “Without hyperbole, all Southerners basically owe their lives to sweet potatoes” (Quine, Our State). Their rich nutrients have nourished and sustained generations through hardship, slavery, and poverty.
Sweet potatoes are also North Carolina’s state vegetable. We in Tennessee do not have a state vegetable… Consider this my petition to make it the sweet potato.
In April McGreger’s cookbook, Sweet Potatoes, McGreger writes about the beautiful vegetables’ complex history and shares fifty sweet potato recipes around the world. Check it out!
“Sorrow is Not My Name” by Ross Gay
No matter the pull toward brink. No matter the florid, deep sleep awaits. There is a time for everything. Look, just this morning a vulture nodded his red, grizzled head at me, and I looked at him, admiring the sickle of his beak. Then the wind kicked up, and, after arranging that good suit of feathers he up and took off. Just like that. And to boot, there are, on this planet alone, something like two million naturally occurring sweet things, some with names so generous as to kick the steel from my knees: agave, persimmon, stick ball, the purple okra I bought for two bucks at the market. Think of that. The long night, the skeleton in the mirror, the man behind me on the bus taking notes, yeah, yeah. But look; my niece is running through a field calling my name. My neighbor sings like an angel and at the end of my block is a basketball court. I remember. My color's green. I'm spring.
In other news…
Springtime calls for abundance
The groundhog, Punxsutawney Phil, called for six more weeks of winter, but it kind of feels like Spring outside with the warmer weather and daffodils blooming. We expect to have spring produce from Bountiful Harvest in the next week or two!
CAC Community Meal this Friday, February 27!
Please come to the Community Action Committee’s community meal this Friday, February 27 at 12 at St. Mark St. Paul Parish Church! It is free to attend and a wonderful way to connect with neighbors.
Please also consider donating to the CAC. You can do so directly through our website by “purchasing” the donation. This helps sustain the partnership between Rooted Here and the CAC and enables the CAC clients to have access to fresh and healthy food.
CRAFT Greenhouse Workshop at Crabtree Farms in Chattanooga, TN!
Come learn some tricks and trips for planting your spring plants in the Greenhouse! The workshop will include hands-on learning, a potluck, and a tour of Crabtree Farms.
Save the date for Ag Day on the Hill on March 17, 2026!
Join the Southeast Tennessee Young Farmer’s Coalition chapter as we prepare for Ag Day on the Hill! The day will include tabling, a picnic lunch, visits with lawmakers, and meetings with farmers. There will be two virtual prep-call opportunities for the day: March 4th and March 9th at 3:30. Email setnyf@gmail.com to sign up.
Recycling with the SCFM
Did you get your order in a nice produce box or a sturdy paper bag last week? Don’t know what to do with it? We want them back so we can reuse them all year!
The SCFM relies on community contributions of paper bags and cardboard boxes to fulfill our orders — we really appreciate all your efforts to bring us your paper recycling. Thank you for helping make the market possible!
Volunteering with the SCFM
In case you didn’t notice, pickup day can get kinda busy! If you would like to come help out as a volunteer and earn a $5 market credit per every 2 hour shift, please sign up below.
Thank you, as always, for supporting the South Cumberland Farmer’s Market. You can further support local food initiatives by purchasing donations for our CAC partnership, the Open Food Network, or for the SCFM operating costs. We appreciate YOU!