People, Places & Events

SAR honors Deputy Harris
Special to The Monitor
ATHENS–The Athens Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution recently awarded the SAR Medal for Heroism to Henderson County Sheriff’s Deputy Kevin Harris for risking his life to save two deputies who were killed while answering a disturbance call. Deputy Harris was injured during the gunfire.
The medal recognizes outstanding bravery and self-sacrifice in the face of imminent danger, particularly acts which involve great personal courage and risk to the recipient.
It includes law enforcement personnel who, faced with an emergency, boldly respond to the need, while placing their own lives in peril.

Sweet potatoes: a near perfect food
By Brian Cummins
Van Zandt County Extension Agent
CANTON–The sweet potato should be more than a holiday treat, it should be a part of a year round nutritional program because of its nutritional qualities.
The sweet potato has yellow or orange flesh, and its thin skin may either be white, yellow, orange, red or purple.
Sometimes this root vegetable will be shaped like a potato, being short and blocky with rounded ends, while other times it will be longer with tapered ends.
There is often much confusion between sweet potatoes and yams; the moist-fleshed, orange-colored root vegetable that is often called a “yam” is actually a sweet potato.
How sweet it is for your health to eat sweet potatoes! Not only do they taste like dessert, but they possess antioxidant effects and are considered an antidiabetic food.
Recent studies have shown sweet potatoes to contain some unique root storage proteins that have been observed to have significant antioxidant capacities. These proteins had about one-third the antioxidant activity of glutathione-one of the body’s most impressive internally produced antioxidants.
More studies are need to further prove the sweet potatoes claim to being the “near perfect” vegetable.
According to the George Mateljan Foundation, a non-profit organization free of commercial influence, the sweet potato also has recently classified the sweet potato as an “antidiabetic” food. Sweet potatoes have been given this label because of some recent animal studies in which sweet potato helped stabilize blood sugar levels and lowered insulin resistance.
(Insulin resistance is a problem caused when cells don’t respond to the hormone insulin, which is supposed to act as a key and unlock the cell in order to allow sugar to pass from the blood into the cell).
Some of its blood sugar regulatory properties may come from the fact that sweet potatoes are concentrated in carotenoids.
Research has suggested that physiological levels, as well as dietary intake, of carotenoids may be inversely associated with insulin resistance and high blood sugar levels.
Once again, more research is needed in this area, but the stage is set for sweet potato to show unique healing properties in the area of blood sugar control.
The numbers for the nutritional sweet potato speak for themselves: almost twice the ecommended daily allowance of vitamin A, 42 percent of the recommendation for vitamin C, four times the RDA for beta carotene, and, when eaten with the skin, sweet potatoes have more fiber than oatmeal. All these benefits with only about 130 to 160 calories.
Here are the facts on sweet potatoes (for one medium size sweet potato) from the USDA:
Calories 130
Fat 0.39 g
Protein 2.15 g
Net Carbs 31.56 g
Dietary Fiber 3.9 g
Calcium 28.6 mg
Sodium 16.9 mg Potassium 265.2 mg
Folate 18.2 mcg
Vitamin C 29.51 mg
Vitamin A 26081.9 IU
Among root vegetables, sweet potatoes offer the lowest glycemic index rating.
That’s because the sweet potato digests slowly, causing a gradual rise in blood sugar so you feel satisfied longer. It’s time to move sweet potatoes to the “good” carb list.
For more information on sweet potatoes contact your local Extension office.