Growing up, Marlin Cheyney would watch her mother prepare delicious casseroles for weekly church potlucks, hefty dinners for her family and heftier meals to feed the many friends who often invited themselves over for dinner.
“Everyone said that the best restaurant in town was my mother’s kitchen table,” says Cheyney.
Her mother, Katy Saintenoy, was a classic Southern cook who prided herself on the recipes that she learned from her mother and passed to her daughters and shared with the community.
While Cheyney’s kitchen table might not get as much traffic as her mother’s did, judging by the 15 batches of cheesy potatoes that she made for the Grandview Center early last year, her take on her mother’s dish could give the best restaurant in town a run for its money.
Just like her mother, she is a dedicated member of her community, volunteering her cooking skills in the Grandview Heights High School marching band’s concession stand for 11 straight football seasons and now serving residents her famous potato dish at every Grandview Center event.
“When I taste my version here, I go, ‘Oh yeah,’” says Cheyney. “But really, the best is my mother’s version."
Cheyney admired her mother’s ability to draw a crowd with her food. She reminisces on the Sundays when the boys at their church’s potluck would steal her mother’s chicken noodle casserole, take it to the corner and scarf it down. Now, each time her friends at the center flock to her potatoes when they hit the counter, it makes her feel closer to her mother.
“People will rush to get the cheesy potatoes here or ask 100 times if I’m bringing it, and it reminds me of all the adolescents and the adults at church that used to say (to my mother), ‘Are you bringing your chicken noodle dish?’ [to her mother],” says Cheyney. “And she’d say, ‘Of course I’m bringing my chicken noodle dish.’”
And while Cheyney might not cook even half as much as her mother once did, she has just as much space in her heart - and her kitchen - for the Grandview Heights community as her mother had for hers.
“I’m always in the kitchen doing something, helping out,” Cheyney says.
Recipe: Cheyney’s Cheesy Potatoes
Ingredients
- 5 cups frozen hash brown potatoes
- 8 oz. sour cream
- 1 cup grated sharp cheddar cheese
- 5 Tbsp. melted butter (can use unsalted to reduce overall amount of salt)
- 1 can cream of chicken soup
- Optional: ¼ to 1/3 cup chopped onions
- 2 cups corn flakes
- 1 Tbsp. butter
Directions
- Put corn flakes into bag and crush until about half the size of a normal flake.
- Cook in skillet with 1 Tbsp of butter.
- Stir corn flakes until crispy. Remove from heat and let cool.
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Combine hash browns, sour cream, cheese, soup and butter in large mixing bowl (add salt and pepper to taste).
- Transfer to greased pan and spread mixture out until level.
- Sprinkle cornflakes on top.
- Bake for 35 to 45 minutes until underside of casserole is light golden brown.
* To make the recipe like Cheyney’s mother did, add chopped onions to mixture, substitute cream of chicken soup with cream of mushroom, cook, peel and grate five cups white potatoes instead of buying hash browns, and grate the cheese by hand.
Tatyana Tandanpolie is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at feedback@cityscenemediagroup.com.
