Food Notes: 12/9
Sweet potato hot dish, latkes, Chicago pizza, pawpaw ice cream, fatty butter, and more!
We had too many sweet potatoes. I wanted to cook them before they rotted away. Then I accidentally ended up with sweet potatoes cooked three ways.
Just before Thanksgiving, our local grocery store had not a single sweet potato remaining. (I also grabbed the literal last box of Jiffy Corn Bread Mix, if you can believe it).
A few days later we were in Stop & Shop with our four-year-old. He was “helping” as four-year-olds due, and for some reason became fascinated with the big sack of sweat potatoes. Five pounds of sweet potatoes, in addition to the two I already had from the loose bin.
He was having a lot of big feelings. Although he was not planning on eating any sweet potatoes, they had become an important possession he wanted to buy. “With what money?” I asked.
“You buy it, papa.”
Instead of having a melt down, we just bought the sack of sweet potatoes thinking it was no big deal, surely we’ll just have roasted sweet potatoes, and then the next night, also have roasted sweet potatoes, and maybe get creative and have roasted sweet potatoes with black beans.
Well, we didn’t.
A week later we had more than a dozen sweet potatoes slowly rotting on the kitchen counter.
We needed an action plan.
I love a good sweet potato mash. I especially enjoy it alongside a squash puree and mashed white potatoes—three squishy starches in shades of yellow and orange? What’s not to love.
My wife said no. Apparently, she doesn’t “like” mashed sweet potatoes.
After some debate, we settled on creating some kind of savory sweet potato recipe that absolutely did not involve marshmallows or maple syrup. I Googled around, settled on this one, and then basically ignored it.
However, I will add at this point that before you start following (or in my case, mostly ignoring) a recipe, you should confirm you have the right size baking dish.
Our 9x13 Pyrex baking was still at my mother-in-law’s house, a hold out from Thanksgiving. I needed an alternative baking vessel. Not a problem: I had two smaller square Pyrex dishes that add up to 8x16. That’s pretty much the same size as a 9x13 inch as long as you don’t spend too much time checking the math.
With two baking dishes filled with sweet potato casserole mix, I still needed to top them off. Turns out, I also should have bought some extra walnuts at the store. I took what few nuts remained and crushed them them up. I mixed them with butter and honey, and topped off one of the casserole dishes.
That’s when I decided to turn the second casserole dish into something resembling a sweet potato au gratin situation with shaved Wisconsin Parmesan to top it off.
I know what you’re thinking: “Ian, you promised us sweet potatoes three ways and this is only two (plus you kind of cheated counting that second one anyway).” True.
But I did in fact make a third sweet potato dish. Since we were cooking up chicken cutlets, I had hot oil, plus some leftover egg and flour. And since we had so many sweet potatoes, I decided cooking just one more couldn’t hurt.
We shredded the peel sweet potato and combined it with leftover flour and egg before frying. If you’re interested, here’s the sweet potato latke recipe I made. Frying up vegetables croquettes is one of my favorite ways of avoiding food waste since you end up with a crispy fried treat AND chicken cutlets.
After a few minutes in the oven, the first two casseroles were ready to go. The only thing left was pondering: did we just make a “hot dish”? I believe, despite the lack of tater tots, that we did in fact make one.
Savory Sweet Potato Casserole Topped Two Ways
INGREDIENTS
A dozen sweet potatoes
Cream that you used yesterday but not the whole container so now its in the refrigerator, about 1/2 cup ( give or take)
1 or 2 tablespoons paprika
A little less garlic powder than I used, about a tablespoon
Walnuts, however many you have left in the pantry
Three big squirts honey
1 tablespoon butter
Desiccated “fresh” herbs from the back of the refrigerator, ideally rosemary and thyme
Unseasoned Breadcrumbs
Wisconsin Parmesan, otherwise its just a piatto caldo
INSTRUCTIONS
Peel the sweet potatoes, dice, and boil until soft
Drain the sweet potatoes
Return potatoes to low pan and mash
Turn on low heat
Stir in the cream (leave just enough that you have to put the carton back into refrigerator for later, even though you know you aren’t going to use that last splash)
Add paprika and garlic powder
Season with salt and pepper
Stir in cream until its incorporated
Divide the mash between two baking dishes of similar size
Add toppings (see below)
Bake for 15 to 20 minutes at 400F (but check to make sure your oven isn’t running hot).
Serve with chopped fresh herbs
WALNUT TOPPING
Crush your walnuts with a knife
Microwave butter and honey
Combine walnuts, butter, and honey
Spread evenly over one dish (don’t actually apply pressure, as the walnuts will sink into the mash)
WISCONSIN PARMESAN TOPPING
Grind a bit of fresh black pepper across the top
Shred Parmesan on top of the mash
Top with breadcrumbs
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