Sweet Potato Casserole with Marshmallows

Our family has a pretty traditional thanksgiving dinner, yet somehow (I blame our mom and her health food obsession), we never had a sweet potato and marshmallow casserole. Lola finally had one last year and she's been talking about how amazing it was ever since. So there was a lot of build up to my first sweet potato marshmallow casserole (which we had for dinner a couple days before thanksgiving), but it lived up to the hype. It was all I had dreamed of and more.

Sweet Potato and Marshmallow Casserole recipe from cooks.com
Serves 8

*8 sweet potatoes

*1/2 cup hot milk

*1/2 teaspoon salt

*1 cup chopped pecans or walnuts

*1/2 pound marshmallows

mash potatoes, add spices, butter, and milk, mix. Fold in nuts and put the mixture in a buttered baking dish. Put the marshmallows on top. Bake at 350 degrees until golden brown.

-Rita

african ground nut stew

yo! i hope you all had a fabulous fourth of july weekend. we spent ours in arizona, rafting down a river in 106 degree heat. then we got home to san francisco, where it is foggy and grey, just the way we like it. also, perfect stew weather!
from cooking light. the only change we made was to sub plain greek yogurt for the sour cream. because sour cream is gross.
African ground nut stew with sour cream [or greek yogurt] and chive topping (i accidentally left off the g when i first typed that. you can call it toppin' if you're hip like me)

Yield: 6 servings

Ingredients

• 1 cup fat-free sour cream
• 1/4 cup minced fresh chives
• 2 teaspoons canola oil
• 1 1/4 cups thinly sliced yellow onion
• 3/4 cup chopped red bell pepper
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 cup chopped unsalted, dry-roasted peanuts
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 to 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper
• 4 cups (1-inch) cubed peeled sweet potatoes (about 1 1/2 pounds)
• 2 1/2 cups quartered small red potatoes (about 1 pound)
• 2 1/2 cups organic vegetable broth (such as Swanson Certified Organic)
• 1 (28-ounce) can diced tomatoes, undrained

Preparation

Combine sour cream and chives in a small bowl; cover. Refrigerate 2 hours.

Heat oil in a Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add onion and bell pepper; sauté 3 minutes or until tender. Add garlic; sauté 30 seconds. Stir in peanuts, salt, and crushed red pepper; sauté 2 minutes. Add potatoes, broth, and tomatoes; bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer 1 hour and 10 minutes or until the potatoes are tender. Place 1 2/3 cups stew into each of 6 bowls; top each serving with about 2 1/2 tablespoons sour cream mixture.

Mark Scarbrough, Cooking Light, MAY 2007
-Lola

vegetarian meatball sandwiches

get ready for a super unattractive photo...
counter covered with random stuff+bad lighting+paper plates+sandwich that looks like...actually i don't know what it looks like...but it looks weird=appetizing.
i've never actually had a meatball sandwich before, so i don't know exactly what should go into it. we made ours with wheat bread, marinara sauce, frozen "italian-style" meatless meatballs, and mozzarella (which tasted good, although i think provolone would melt better. melted in the oven at 400 for about 10 min, just check every 5 min until the cheese is melted how you like it). warm, toasty, and delicious! served with potatoes and sweet potatoes, roasted in the oven at 450 for about 45 minutes in olive oil, salt, and pepper.
-Lola
check out this giveaway!

peanut butter and sweet potato toast + cinnamon blackberry oats in a jar

two simple and scrumptious dishes...
toast a piece of bread, top with peanut butter and roast sweet potato slices (slice a sweet potato and roast it in the oven for about 45 minutes at 400 degrees F, or until soft on the inside--poke it with a fork to test). YUM! that is all i have to say about that.
Oh. Em. Gee. and that is not a phrase i use often, so you know this was some seriousness goodness.
cook 1/4 cup steel cut oats in 1/2 cup milk (or soy, for any vegan readers) + 1/4 cup brewed darjeeling tea for 10-20 minutes (mine was about 15 min). stir in some blackberries, raisins, and a generous spoonful of cinnamon. serve in an almost empty peanut butter jar and top with a small scoop of peanut butter (I used about 1/2 a tablespoon)and 1/2 a crumbled cinnamon graham cracker.
if i made this again, i would replace the raisins with more blackberries (i only had 3 left and i wanted to get more fruit in, hence the raisins) and either replace the tea with more milk or water or replace some of the milk with more tea (was that confusing? the tea flavor didn't really come through, so either omit it entirely or use more tea, is what i mean).
-Lola
ps. check out chocolate covered katie's coconut butter giveaway
and emily has a giveaway too!

sweet potato oatmeal

i've always felt that i should like oatmeal. first of all, its healthy, and i've always associated it with a general healthy lifestyle. like maybe if i were the type of person who liked oatmeal, i could also be motivated to do things like take up jogging, or floss my teeth daily. also, its scottish. and if i can find love in my heart for bagpipes and haggis, you'd think oatmeal would be no problem. but despite my best efforts (ok, i tried it like twice, once plain and once with pb&j mixed in) the appeal of oatmeal remained a mystery to me...until now! =) i've been seeing all kinds of tasty looking oatmeal recipes around the blogosphere (as we hip bloggers say), and i decided to give it another try. originally, i wanted to try pumpkin oats, but Trader Joe's was out of pumpkin, so i decided on sweet potato puree instead.
sweet potato oatmealserves 2-4(being an oats novice, i didn't realize how insanely filling they are and made the box's directed 1/2 cup of oats per person serving for each of us. this made a ton! the portion pictured is half the recipe. i ate most of it, but i would have been satisfied with half of it, meaning 1/4 of the recipe)
*1 cup quick cooking oats (we used mccann's)
*2 cups plain soy milk
*1 cup sweet potato puree
*1-2 Tablespoons cinnamon
*1 handful walnuts and/or walnut pieces
*1 granny smith apple
1. put soy milk in pot over medium heat. heat until very hot, but not boiling, about 2 minutes.
2. while milk is heating, chop of apple into bite-sized pieces.
3. add oats and apple to milk. stirring constantly, continue to heat until thickened.
4. remove pot from heat and cover. let sit 1-2 minutes.
5. add sweet potato, most of the walnuts, and 1 Tablespoon cinnamon. stir.
5. add more cinnamon to taste, if desired. divide into 2-4 individual servings. top each with a few more walnuts.
yum. i am officially an oatmeal convert. now i just have to work on that jogging thing...
p.s. thanks to everyone who wished us a happy birthday! here is my present back to you: the best top chef recap ever! enjoy.

black bean and sweet potato tacos

My sister and I are both completely obsessed with sweet potatoes. For some reason I can't fathom, my dad hates them, so we never have them at home. But now, free from his senseless anti-sweet potato stance, we can have as many as we want! We've mostly been making Asian dishes, inspired by my favorite dish at Chef Jia's, the sizzling Hunan bean curd with yams. But the other day, I decided to change it up a bit by making Mexican food. It turned out delicious. Sadly, we are out of sweet potatoes now, but I plan to get another huge bag as soon as possible.
Sweet Potato Tacos
Serves 1
-1 small sweet potato, cut in half lengthwise
-1/2 an onion,chopped
-1 clove garlic, chopped
-butter or butter substitute (I used Earth Balance)
-2 teaspoons cayenne
-cumin to taste
-1 tortilla, toasted on the stove for a few seconds
-about 1/4 cup black beans
1)Spread some butter onto each 1/2 of the sweet potato and sprinkle each 1/2 with 1 teaspoon cayenne. Bake at 400 until soft (test with a fork), about 40 minutes.
2) Heat up some butter in a non-stick skillet and add the garlic and onion. Cook until onion is very soft, almost caramelized, about 20 minutes. About 10 minutes in, add cumin to taste.
3) Add beans to the onion and garlic and heat them up. Taste it again and add more cumin and cayenne if necessary.
4) Chop the sweet potato into bite size chunks.
5) Put everything together onto the tortilla. You may need 2 tortillas, depending on what size they are.
6) Eat it. This is a very important step, don't forget it!