Maple Sweet Potato Casserole

With a vegetarian/clean eating mom and four kids who like all different things, dinner can quickly turn in to a debacle. We are just thankful that dad comes from a family of eight kids and will eat whatever is on the plate before him. We're working on getting the kids there, but realistically it may not happen for a few years with the littlest of our littles. I'm trying to keep track of all the kid friendly meals I've been making lately, but I wanted to record this recipe before I forget what I did to create it. :) It will come in handy for Thanksgiving, too, if you need an extra dish to bring.

I love sweet potato casserole and I always feel like mine never comes out quite right. You know, a lot of times it comes out like this.

But this time...gracious. It was SO good. I think I've finally cracked the code on sweet potato casserole mastery. 

Here's what I did. 

First things first. It's not because I'm lazy, it's because I'm left-handed. I don't like peeling sweet potatoes. It's a huge pain and I usually end up slicing my hand in one way or another or dropping a potato down the garbage disposal. So, I didn't peel the potatoes. I baked (four of) them in the oven (pierced and wrapped in foil - 400 degrees for like an hour or hour and a half). 

Once the potatoes were nice and tender (and only slightly scalding hot), I sliced them in half and scooped the potato out into my baking dish. Instead of egg (remember my irrational salmonella fear?) I added half a cup of Greek Yogurt (I didn't really measure it, but I was aiming for half a cup). Then I seasoned the tar out of all of it with cinnamon. After I cinnamonized it, I came to the moment of truth. Do I lace this sucker with brown sugar or try a "clean" alternative. I just so happened to have pure, local, maple syrup. I would say I used 1/4-1/2 cup of maple syrup and stirred to combine. Omgosh. So good. I added about 1/2 tsp of sea salt as well. Next, I scooped in the rest of the butter in the butter dish (about 2T and then added 1T of coconut oil). Mmm..... I stirred all well to combine and baked at 325 for about 30min or so. Once my salmon patties were about done, I added some mini marshmallows and allowed those to burn and set off the smoke detector melt beautifully on top of the casserole. 

It was SO delicious. I have to think the maple syrup and coconut oil had something to do with it. I hope you'll try this recipe. It was seriously the best ever...after I removed the charred marshmallows and made a second attempt. 

Here's what you need: 

• 4 big sweet potatoes
• 1/4c pure maple syrup
• Cinnamon
• 1/2tsp tea salt
• 1/2c plain greek yogurt
• 2T butter
• 1T coconut oil
• Tons of mini marshmallows

Now, go make it and enjoy!!! :)

Busted biscuits and a baby on the table. A day in the life...

I have the worst ADD in the world when it comes to grocery shopping. I don't make a list. I don't meal plan. I don't look at ads. I shop on cravings and daydreams. I always realize there's something I want clear across the store by the time I'm almost finished shopping. Oh, and, I always have at least two littles with me. Did I mention that none of this bothers me? I know you super planners out there are cringing, but I rather enjoy flying by the seat of my pants. It keeps things interesting. Today was no exception, friends. Today, I was the jerk who began unloading groceries for my family of six...onto the lane that was for FIFTEEN items or less. Ahem. As you may realize, it takes more than fifteen items per week to feed my frequently-ravenous brood. I didn't see the sign; I really didn't. The cashier was super nice about it, but as people lined up behind me, I felt their piercing glares through the back of my peacoat. 

So, after that ordeal was over, I came home and unloaded the groceries. I was tossing two ideas back and forth for dinner - Pioneer Woman's Beef Stew OR Pioneer Woman's Tortilla Chicken Soup. When I finally realized that it was time to make a move, I started with the stew. Something about the crisp fall air; the colors of the leaves; oh, and the fact that I picked up two cans of flaky buttermilk biscuits, told me that we were having stew tonight. So, as the stew cooked up, I realized that cook time was a lot longer than I planned. It looked like we weren't going to be eating until almost 8. Oops. We usually eat around 5. So, I decide to go ahead and start the soup, too. Surely that would take less time and if the children started turning into the ravenous beasts that they usually are by 6pm, I could just feed them that. 

Or, you know, cookies. Because by 7:00 pm, neither meal was near finished. 

Pioneer Woman's Beer and Paprika Stew - Amazing.

I love classic fall eats.

While we were waiting, and because the kitchen was already a disaster area, I decide to make a pumpkin pie. You know, the couch-full of unfolded laundry over yonder could just go ahead and take a number. 

The house was really starting to smell delicious. After the pie came out, I decided to bust open a can of biscuits, literally. Somehow my grocery store ADD carried over to the kitchen. I began opening the biscuits with my fancy new can opener, instead of popping center of the can with a spoon. I'm going to blame the clean eating lifestyle. We don't buy biscuits anymore, really, and it just slipped my mind. Yeah, that's it.

I also love laughing at my own culinary mishaps.

Pretty soon, I was getting tired. Timers were going off everywhere. I lost track of what was supposed to be finished when, but it all ended well. Nothing got burnt or otherwise ruined. The stew was mighty delicious, as were the biscuits and pumpkin pie. By the end of the night, I was all for the baby eating whipped cream off her brother's plate; in her PJs; on the kitchen table. You know, whatever floats your boat, kid. Mom's exhausted.

Hopefully the tortilla soup will make a tasty lunch for tomorrow and my marathon cooking experience will not be in vain. Hopefully. 

To be continued...

I really need to re-take Home Economics...

You guys, I almost had a baking emergency FOR REAL last night. About an hour before company showed up for our son's birthday, I decided to do a baking experiment (you know, what's one more last-minute kitchen mess?). I was trying to re-create this awesome sweet/salty chocolate chip cookie that I had at a coffee house a few nights ago and have been obsessing over since. After I scanned Google for a recipe I thought may work, I ran into my first problem.

I was out of this recipe's "secret" ingredient, corn starch. No worries, right? Tapioca starch has to be the same. Right?! (It's not 1:1, btw, I didn't take the time to read that on the package before using it...)

Next problem, this recipe requires 30 minutes of refrigeration. Usually, ain't nobody (ME) got time for that. I decided to try to do the right thing here and went along with the refrigeration.

Annnnd, then I heard some clanking. From our Kitchen Aid mixer. Maybe I didn't lock the bowl down before turning it on? Oh no, it's better.

A steak knife that I laid atop the bowl fell in, sharp side up, after I turned the mixer on high speed. I see this knife being tossed around the bowl - threatening to fly across the kitchen at every spin of the beater. I get that prickly-heat nervous feeling through my body and the kids start screaming in horror. I was trying to decide how best to quickly intervene while being barrier between the knife and the children and trying not to end up with an ER trip myself. I was scarrrred, you guys.

The knife was removed safely and we went on with life.

I get the cookies in all their un-clean, refrigerated dough glory into the oven and - eight minutes later - they look like COOKIE SOUP on the stinking pan.

WHAT?

I walked away and came back five minutes later. Still soupy. After texting my frustrations to a friend, I notice the oven ISN'T ON, but is still warm from the cake I just took out. Sweet.

I turn the oven on. Ten minutes pass. Now the cookies are (as my dad said), cookie brittle. Ok, ok, I'll write those off to a baking error, let's try the next batch. I phone Willing Cook for sympathy.

You guys. I don't know. They baked, but they also got glued to the pan and a little bit darker than the dark chocolate GHIRADELLI chips I used in them. Yeah, I wasted good chocolate on these suckers.

No less, I scraped what I could off the pan and (using an old trick) consoled myself with the super dark, ugly, chocolate-y, cookie brittle. Sigh.

While my cookie recipe was a total bust, at least no one was injured and the party went on. Maybe that will teach me to make non-clean cookies. Now, about scrubbing those cookie sheets...