Latest news with #Katona
Yahoo
17-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Meet the candidates running for Marshfield City Council District 10 in the April 1 election
MARSHFIELD − Incumbent Andrew Reigel will face challenger Debbie Katona for the District 10 seat on the Marshfield City Council in the April 1 election. Marshfield alderpersons serve two-year terms with half of the council's seats up for election each year. In 2025, the even-numbered districts, 2 through 10, are on the ballot. To learn more about registering to vote and to find your polling place, visit My Vote Wisconsin. The Marshfield News-Herald asked each of the candidates to address important issues in the district and why they are running for the position. Residence: Marshfield Age: Candidate did not respond. Occupation and education: Retired, previously employed by Marshfield Clinic for over 40 years; bachelor's degree in business/management from Upper Iowa University Relevant experience: While I have not held an office, I feel my management experience understanding budget processes, listening and dealing with people at all levels is a plus. Campaign website/Facebook page: Katona For Alderman on Facebook Residence: Marshfield Age: 38 Occupation and education: Attorney Relevant experience: Two years on Marshfield City Council Katona: As a property owner, I feel direct impact to decisions made in city government. Also, I have availability to address any concerns expressed to me by constituents in District 10. Lastly, I feel there should be choices for the people, not just one person running for the office. Reigel: To continue to make improvements to the local government and make difficult, but well-informed decisions for the citizens of Marshfield. Katona: I feel my availability is a strong factor. Also, I have lived in Marshfield for approximately 50 years. I have experienced the many changes the city has gone through. Reigel: I am able to understand complex issues and comprehend how these issues will affect Marshfield and its citizens in both the near term and long term. I have not been afraid to asked difficult questions and make difficult decisions to ensure that we can maintain the current services offered by the city with minimal negative impact on Marshfield citizens. I also offer a unique perspective as one of the youngest council members and bring wide breadth of experience. Katona: Financial stability is currently the most pressing issue. If elected, I would work with the other council members to evaluate revenue avenues and spending. Reigel: The budget. I will continue to ask difficult question and make difficult decisions to intelligently balance the budget, while impacting services provided as little as possible. Katona: Financial stability and roads seem to be a consistent theme. Reigel: The concerns are essentially one: how to maintain the same level of services provided by the city without negatively impacting Marshfield citizens. This is currently the greatest challenge and can only be addressed by careful review and analysis of current services provided, how these are provided, current government practices and identifying alternatives. Katona: My goal is to work with all members of the Common Council to address these issues. No one wants cuts, but they don't want higher taxes. We need to address wants vs. needs, keeping common sense and evaluating safety and long-term effects of the decisions. Reigel: The tight city budget can only be addressed through creation of new development within the city and careful, thoughtful review of current city services and how those services are offered. This means that we must encourage new business growth while ensuring that government expenditures are both necessary and fruitful. More election news: What Marshfield voters should know about the public safety referendum on the April 1 ballot Local development news: City selects developer for Weinbrenner Shoe Co. factory building in downtown Marshfield Erik Pfantz covers local government and education in central Wisconsin for USA TODAY NETWORK - Wisconsin and values his background as a rural Wisconsinite. Contact him at epfantz@ This article originally appeared on Marshfield News-Herald: April 2025 election: Marshfield City Council District 10 candidates
The Independent
19-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Nisha Katona's new show is all about lentils, life lessons – and a lot of alpaca poo
If you've ever picked up one of Nisha Katona's cookbooks, or seen her on Great British Menu, you'll know she's super glam and super sharp. What you don't imagine is the businesswoman, Mowgli Street Food empire founder and former child protection barrister assessing alpaca poo. 'I judge animals on the size of their poo, and alpaca poo is very manageable,' says the 53-year-old with a laugh, and she means it. When deciding whether to buy her three alpacas, she remembers: 'I just stood and watched them go to the toilet for about an hour and thought, 'How tough is that to clean?'' The British Indian chef is as passionate about her animals as she is about teaching people 'humble cooking, the stuff you throw together with what's dying in the fridge, what's rotting in the veg rack and what's in the freezer'. Her new ITV1 show, Nisha Katona's Home Kitchen, combines the two in what she calls a 'preposterous privilege'. The series gives us a glimpse into the Wirral-based chef's farm, where she whips up chicken Dhansak and dahl in her outdoor kitchen, and those cuddly alpacas roam, joined by four horses, two tiny dogs (one is sat beside her during our Zoom chat), guinea fowl, chickens and ducks ('We hatch them from eggs, raise them and they come in the house and hand feed'), and potentially in the future, a miniature donkey, poo dependent. And don't worry, you can become emotionally attached to her animals; they are absolutely not on the menu. 'I don't even eat the eggs my chickens give,' says Katona. 'Every single night I go out and just stand with the animals, sit with the goats or the alpacas. They are honestly part of my family. I couldn't eat them, I love them.' The series kicks off boldly, focusing on one of the most unassuming of ingredients that many of us deliberately avoid: lentils. To Katona, they're a delicious kind of magic and 'the cornerstone of Indian cooking'. 'Lentils are possibly the cheapest and most delicious thing you can eat,' she says. 'Showing people how you can create a million flavours in 15 minutes with these dried things in your cupboard, literally, that's alchemy.' Episode one is also packed with tips: swap coriander for lemon zest if someone hates it, freeze ice cube trays of blitzed garlic and ginger to save time, slosh your dahl back into the pan you tempered your spices in 'because we literally don't want to waste one seed'. This is pure Katona, trying to upskill us in every moment. 'I don't want people to just blindly follow things. I want to give them the skills. It's almost like teaching them the neural pathways of an Indian grandmother,' says Katona. 'The more you can give people a story behind why something happens, they're not then clinging to a recipe. I never want people to think, 'I've got to get the recipe book out' to do something. I want it to be in their memories and their stories, in their heads and their fingers.' Throughout the show, Katona shares stories from her own family, from her dad's love of spreading dahl on toast, to getting her Hungarian mother-in-law into the kitchen with her. 'I was very nervous about that because, being on telly, it's one thing for me who voluntarily does it, but my family being caught on telly, you just don't know how they're going to feel about themselves,' says Katona. 'Everyone who sees themselves on telly hates themselves. You hate your voice, you hate the way you look. It's awful! And that's all right, me punishing myself like that, but I don't want that for my family. I was really worried about it. But I've watched some of the clips of us together, and I can just see that I am my happiest self.' Aside from wanting to join the Katona clan, you may find yourself Rightmove-ing 'the Wirral' after seeing the sweeping drone shots of the area's countryside, farmland and vast beaches. 'I am really pathologically passionate about heralding how brilliant it is beyond the M25,' says Katona, who built her first 23 restaurants outside of London (she now has one in the capital, with another opening soon), in places like Preston, Sheffield, Leicester, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Glasgow. 'Cities that I think need social capital. Programmes like this just enhance that mission of mine, which is to show people that there is a great life to be had at a non-punishing rent outside of London,' she buzzes. 'London is the best city in the whole world for food, for me,' she adds, 'but in terms of quality of life, of space where you might want to raise a family, or even if you don't want a family, where you might raise a smallholding and get a nice plot of land and you've got your own patch of stars, that's an amazing thing.' In November, Katona stepped down from the Great British Menu on BBC, and if you're upset, you aren't half as upset as she is. 'I'm so sad! I was FaceTiming with [co-judge] Tom [Kerridge] last night!' she says. 'It makes me want to cry to know I'm not working with them. I love them so much.' But she explains she's got to 'pick my battles'. 'This year, I'm building another five or six restaurants, and I wasn't seeing my family. I wasn't living life – what's the point working that hard when you're sitting and eating on your own in a hotel in the evenings? That's not life. So I had to step off that stage. It's got to be one of the hardest decisions I've made, because I love them and the show. Forget the show. Those humans make my mouth water!' Katona lost a close friend, who was only 56, in November to a heart attack. 'It made me think, you've got one life. You've got to be with the people that matter and do the things that matter. It sounds so stupid and trite to talk about a TV show mattering, but it does matter to me to teach people to be able to cook, and to be able to do that, combined with me actually living a life and feeding my goats, that is a gift I cannot be more grateful for.' She adds: 'We don't need soaring achievements. We don't need massive prowess in life. What we need is contentment.' And ideally, an alpaca to look at the stars with. 'Nisha Katona's Home Kitchen' launches on ITV, ITVX, STV and STV Player at 11:40am on Saturday 8 February.
