On Friday, September 12, 2024, Tasty Table’s new HOST Kitchen will be home to the annual Charity Chopped in the BORO fundraiser for Amelia’s Closet, Habitat for Humanity, Second Harvest Food Bank, and this year they are adding Read to Succeed.
Laura Gossett, owner of Tasty Table, is opening her new kitchen to Charity Chopped this year because proceeds go to the four components that help people get out of poverty – clothing, shelter, food and literacy. The Gossetts built a 1,400 square foot commercial kitchen off of Almaville Road in January 2024 from which they run Tasty Table Catering. And they are renting the space to other people in the culinary world.
“One thing that COVID taught me is that the key to success or to move through anything, be it a recession or some other event that can hurt financially, is to be able to have partners in the same business and it is not a competition,” said Gossett. “That is one of the things that kept us alive, having allies in the business. We all supported each other. And so, I want to give that back to people who are trying to start their culinary business. That is the premise [of the commercial kitchen], I want to help other people live their dream.”
Gossett has been in the culinary world since she was 18, working as a server at Demos’ Steak and Spaghetti as a single mom. Then she worked her way from kitchen staff up into management. It wasn’t easy being a female in the food industry in management. She worked for several different companies in Murfreesboro learning how to run a food business. While a manager at Newk’s, she started her catering business when her daughter went off to college to help cover expenses that her many scholarships were not able to cover.
“So, I started cooking for people.,” explained Gossett, “then we got our first wedding. We would cook out of our kitchen. That’s how it started.”
Six years after starting Tasty Table, she left the corporate world. Her first kitchen was on Medical Center Parkway, a space she shared with Olive Branch Bakery. A year later Barbara Thomas offered the building on North Church that had been B. McNeel’s. When the lease was up on that building in 2023, Gossett decided to go back to her first love, catering, while keeping a toe in the restaurant business by agreeing to run the Soda Shoppe at Reeve’s Sain.
Now Gossett is reaching beyond her kitchen. She just completed a pilot show with the help of Paul Chilsen, an Associate Professor in the Department of Media Arts at Middle Tennessee State University, called “Eat to Live.” Because she had limited income as a young adult raising two kids alone, it is important to Gossett to help people learn to eat healthy on a budget. She sees people living on government funding, some by choice some not, pumping processed foods into their bodies because it is perceived to be affordable. But too much processed food leads to health issues like diabetes and heart disease, then the government has to pay for their health care.
“It is a cycle,” said Gossett. “And I thought, what can I do to help break that cycle? The first ‘Eat to Live’ we did was turkey meatloaf with mashed potatoes. We were able to do the whole meal for $36. Twenty dollars fed four people one dinner, and then I was able to make two more meals out of what was left over. So, for that $36 we were able to feed four people three meals. It is dear to my heart.”
Tasty Table’s Healthy Turkey Meatloaf
1.5 lbs ground turkey
1 cup chopped fresh spinach
1.5 cups oatmeal
2 eggs
4 tbsp smoky sugar-free barbecue sauce
1 tsp kosher salt
1 tsp black pepper
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Combine the ground turkey and add all ingredients except two tablespoons of the barbecue sauce. Blend well. Once all ingredients are mixed well, make a ball out of three ounces of mixture. Place the ball in a sprayed cupcake baking dish. This recipe should make eight balls. Once the balls are placed into the cupcake pan, press them down. Place equal amounts of the remaining barbecue sauce onto the top of each of the eight mini loafs.
Bake at 350 degrees for approximately 25-35 minutes. Make sure it is cooked through but not overcooked. This provides eight 3-ounce servings.
Finishing touches are being added to both Charity Chopped in the BORO and on the “Eat to Live” video that will be available on Tasty Table’s Instagram when it is completed. Information about Chopped in the BORO can be found on Tasty Table’s Facebook page.
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