Sweet Potatoes

Sweet potatoes is one of my favorite things about fall and the holiday season. Yes, seriously. I love these things. I know you can pretty much have them all year round, and we do enjoy them other times of the year. But, this time of year, I really take it to another level. I have started the last few Thanksgivings bringing the sweet potato dish. My mom doesn't care for them, and never had them at her table, so I started bringing them. They deserve to be at the Thanksgiving table!!!!

Two years ago, I made these. (This is the recipe, but obviously NOT a picture. Way to go, Food Network.) They were fun, different and turned out good. Putting the sweet potato mixture in the orange cups was a great idea, but only for smaller get-togethers. If you were having 20 people at your dinner, it would get pricey to make that much sweet potato mixture AND buy 20 oranges!!

This year, I am doing roasted sweet potatoes with a brown sugar and butter glaze. I am testing them today, so you get the pics and the review before Thanksgiving!

Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Brown Sugar and Butter Glaze
1 sweet potato for every 2-3 people (depending on the size of the sweet potato and how many sweet potato-obsessed people like me you have at your table)
brown sugar
butter
honey
salt and pepper

I boiled the sweet potatoes for 5 minutes."What's the point of that?", you ask. I just wanted to try it, because I always have a really hard time slicing and peeling raw sweet potatoes. I liked this very much, it definitely made it easier to peel and slice.

Peel and slice sweet potato.Put them on a baking sheet with olive oil, sprinkle with salt. Roast at 400 for 15-20 minutes.

This is why I wanted to roast them, because they would get this nice color, and even a little crispy on the one side. If I just baked them with the glaze, they would get so soft, you might as well just mash them. They won't stay in the sliced shape, so I thought if I roasted them first, THEN baked them in the glaze, they might stay together better.
Brown Sugar and Butter Glaze
This is more like a paste, because I did not melt the butter. I used softened butter, brown sugar, a little honey and oil to combine it. The butter will melt anyway in the oven, so might as well save yourself a step and just combine it. (For 2 sweet potatoes, I used 1/2 stick of butter, 1/4 cup brown sugar, dollop of honey and oil to combine. I also added a pinch of salt.)

I moved the sweet potatoes to a baking dish, and spooned the brown sugar paste on each potato slice. I also poked holes in the potato so the glaze would (hopefully) go inside. Bake for 15-20 more minutes.All done!Oh, Lordy! People, these are awesome!!! They totally kept their sliced shape and the butter and brown sugar- well, how can that be bad??? Today, I only did 2 sweet potatoes as a test run, but when I do 6 on Thursday, I will do the higher cooking times.

Now, I am going to have another helping...

Another great thing to do with the incredible sweet potato is sweet potato biscuits. No, really! These are also really good, especially with some honey butter.
Sweet Potato Biscuits
1 1/4 c all-purpose flour
2 heaping Tbsp. sugar
4 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 c mashed cooked sweet potatoes (about 2)
1/4 c (1/2 stick) softened butter
2 to 4 Tbsp. milk (depending on the moisture of the potatoes)

Preheat the oven to 450 (I think this is a little high, I would do 375 or 400, depending on your oven). Sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. In another large bowl, mix the sweet potatoes and butter. Add the flour mixture and mix, it should be a soft dough. Add the milk a Tablespoon at a time. Turn the dough onto a floured board and toss lightly until the outside of the dough looks smooth. Roll the dough out to 1/2 inch thick and cut with a biscuit cutter. Place biscuits on a greased pan and coat tops with melted butter. Bake for 15 minutes.

Honey Butter
1 stick of butter, softened
1/3 to 1/2 c honey
Stir together and store in an air-tight container in the fridge. (This stuff will last FOREVER)
This is our turkey. We are doing (one of) the turkey's this year. AHHH! My husband got a turkey fryer for Christmas last year, and we intended to do a fried turkey sometime this year, so Thanksgiving wouldn't be the first time we used it, but of course, we never got around to it. My husband is a little nervous, but it's supposed to be pretty easy. I'll definitely let you know how it goes!!!*Sidenote- I bought two turkey's this year. At Kroger, if you spent over $20, you got the turkey for 39 cents a pound. I went to the store twice and got a turkey both times. Both turkey's were under $6, and now we have a turkey for sometime in the future. I'm so excited!!