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Mary Benning of Bullock County said she can’t imagine a single person in her community who wouldn’t help her if she needed them to.

"Some people act like they’re afraid to get their hands dirty by helping folks. Those people aren’t here," she said of her Stills Crossroads community.

But she admits she didn’t get off to quite so cozy a beginning there.

"When I started seeing John, they couldn’t have asked me more questions if they’d all been lawyers," Mary said of her late husband’s friends and neighbors.

"But they were just being protective of him, and it wasn’t long before they were as good to me as they were to John. We used to say we had more honorary grandchildren than we could count," she commented.

Mary said she never felt that sense of caring more than when her husband John Benning passed away last August.

"I was so sad John was gone, but it was a joy to have so many people tell me stories about what he had done to help them and what he meant to them. He couldn’t have been any better to me, either. He was just a wonderful man," said Mary.

And she adds there’s no blessing quite like family.

"They’re just real good to me," Mary said of her children and their families.

"Somebody stays the night with me every night, and during the day I take care of Lizzy, one of my great-grandchildren, and that’s been a help to me," Mary said.

Mary didn’t grow up cooking, despite the fact her mother made a living cooking.

"Mama worked in a café, but she always said nobody would want to buy what I had messed over," Mary joked, and she said John and his friends have been a major influence on her cooking.

"He always had people around the house with us, and he knew who the best cooks in the community were. So he’d manage to get them to cook something at the house and have me and whoever else was around sit on the kitchen stools and watch," remembered Mary.

In addition to her time spent in the kitchen, she and John always had a large garden with plenty of vegetables, but she’s not sure how much she plans to plant this year.

"I’ll have me a few tomatoes and peppers and some pods of okra, but no big garden like John and I had," stated Mary.

And since her daughter-in-law Rhonda Dease works at the Pike Farmers Co-op, there’s no need to wonder where Mary will look for her gardening supplies.

"She has her own family, but Rhonda’s just as much a daughter to me as anyone could be," said Mary.

In addition to spending time with her grandchildren and great-grandchildren, Mary has a little traveling in mind.

"I have a sister in New York and a cousin in Jacksonville, Florida, I’d like to visit," she said.

And Mary also plans to carry on the tradition of having a fish fry around John’s birthday.

"We did it for years every November as a sort of birthday party for him, and we’ve done it in his honor since he passed. He was a marvelous man, and it’d be hard not to have a good life when you share it with such a good mate," Mary said.

Some of the recipes Mary shares reflect her fish fry tradition, like her Hush Puppies, Onion Rings and Super Coleslaw, and any meal would be a little sweeter when finished with her Sour Cream Pound Cake.

Pepper Jelly

1½ cups bell pepper (seeds and stems removed) and pureed
½ cup hot pepper puree with seeds
6 cups sugar
1½ cups white vinegar
1 pat of butter
Few drops green food coloring
1 box Certo

Mix all ingredients except Certo in a large pot. Bring to a boil and cook 3 minutes; remove from heat.

Add Certo and return to heat. Return to a boil and cook 1 minute. Put jelly into hot jars and seal. Makes about 6½ pints.

Sour Cream Pound Cake

2 sticks butter, softened to room temperature
3 cups sugar
6 large eggs
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup sour cream

Cream butter and sugar thoroughly. Add eggs one at a time, blending well. Add flour and sour cream alternately, blending well each time. Add vanilla.

Pour into a well-greased tube pan. Bake at 325^o for 1 hour 15 minutes.

Cantaloupe Pudding

Mexican Lasagna

2 pounds ground beef
1 envelope taco seasoning mix
1 (16 oz) can tomato sauce
1 (10 count) package soft tortillas
1 pound cheddar cheese, shredded
1 pound Monterey Jack cheese, shredded

Brown ground beef in a large skillet; drain. Add taco seasoning and tomato sauce and keep skillet over low heat.

Coat a 9x13" glass baking dish with nonstick spray. Slice tortillas in half. Place 1 layer of shells in the bottom of dish with cut edges to the outside of the pan. Top with a layer of sauce mixture then a layer of cheeses. Repeat, ending with tortillas and cheese only. Cover with waxed paper and microwave for 10 minutes or until cheese melts. Cut into squares to serve.

Deer Roast and Gravy

1 large box cook and serve pudding and pie filling mix
Vanilla wafers
Cantaloupe preserve

Cook pudding according to package directions. Layer the bottom of a casserole dish with vanilla wafers. Add a layer of preserve, then a layer of pudding and repeat until dish is full. Top with crumbled vanilla wafers. Cover and chill before serving.

Cantaloupe Preserve

1 pound sugar
2 pounds cantaloupe, cut into small pieces

Place sugar and cantaloupe in a large enamel or stainless steel pan. Cook over medium heat until tender, stirring carefully to prevent scorching. Place in clean hot jars and seal.

Hush Puppies

2 cups self-rising cornmeal
1 cup self-rising flour
1 (16 oz) can cream-style corn
2 eggs
1 onion, peeled and chopped
Chopped jalapeno pepper, optional

1 deer roast
4 cups water, divided
2 tsp salt
2 tsp black pepper
¼ cup Dale’s steak sauce
1 medium onion, chopped
1 jalapeno pepper, diced
¼ cup bacon drippings
½ cup self-rising flour

Place deer roast in slow cooker. Add 3 cups water, salt, pepper, steak sauce, onion and jalapeno.

In an iron skillet, cook bacon drippings over medium heat for 1 minute. Add flour and stir constantly until brown; add remaining water. Simmer 5 minutes or until mixture is thickened. Pour over roast in slow cooker. Cover and cook on low setting overnight.

Mix all ingredients, stirring well to ensure mixture is evenly wet. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

Heat oil for frying to 300^o. Drop batter by teaspoonful into hot oil, rolling as they cook with a large slotted metal spoon. When browned, drain on paper towels before serving.

Super Coleslaw

1 medium head cabbage
2 small carrots
½ pint sweet cubed salad pickles
2 packets Sweet and Low
½ cup mayonnaise
½ packet McCormick super slaw mix
2 Tablespoons vinegar

Shred cabbage and carrots. Place in a large bowl and toss well with remaining ingredients. Chill and serve.

Big Pops
Christmas Candy Balls

1 (40 oz) jar creamy peanut butter
3 ½ cups roasted pecans
1 (14 oz) bag coconut
1 (16 oz) package miniature marshmallows
1 teaspoon vanilla flavoring
1 cup powdered sugar
Chocolate or vanilla flavored candy-coating bark

In a large mixing bowl, heat peanut butter in the microwave for 2 minutes. In a small bowl, heat pecans for 1 minute. Poke holes in the coconut bag and microwave in the bag for 2 minutes. Using a separate large bowl, microwave marshmallows for 3 minutes. Combine all heated ingredients with powdered sugar and vanilla until mixture is well blended.

Using a melon baller, scoop candy mixture into balls and place on a wax-paper lined cookie sheet. Place in the freezer from 3 hours to overnight.

Coat with melted bark.

Note: Add strawberry syrup or strawberry jam when mixing candy ingredients for a change of flavor.

Onion Rings

4 large onions
Ice water
2 cups self-rising flour
1 cup self-rising cornmeal
Salt and pepper

Peel onions and slice into rings. Place in ice water and chill 4 hours to overnight.

Mix flour, meal, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Add eggs and enough water to make a batter that thoroughly coats onion rings. Stack coated rings on a cookie sheet.

Heat oil to 370^o. Drop onion rings into hot oil and fry until golden brown. Drain cooked onion rings on paper towels. Great with fish or burgers.