Your Roots

I didn't have my first sweet potato pie until I was well into adulthood, which, I suppose, simply proves that I did not grow up in the South. In fact, I don't even think I had many sweet potatoes at all until then, either. They were, I believe, mainly something that we had for the holidays, baked with sugar into a landmine of delicious syrupy sweetness. You know how there are just some foods that, in your brain, are not everyday food? Thanksgiving sorts of foods all fall into this category for me -- things like stuffing (or dressing, depending on where your mama is from), pumpkin pie, and whole turkeys. Whole turkeys! Up until a few years ago, I don't even think I realized you were allowed to prepare a whole turkey if it wasn't Thanksgiving.

A few years ago, when my dear friend Meghan still lived here in Chicago (you may remember her and her bulldog, Tug, from such antics as the sausage factory) I found myself in her lovely, steamy kitchen one afternoon to find her preparing -- that's right! -- a turkey. As in, a whole turkey. A massive, entire turkey. And it wasn't even Thanksgiving! Or Christmas! Immediately I realized: A.) that she was even more brilliant than I ever thought and B.) that I wasn't as smart as I thought. Turkey! Did they even sell turkeys when it wasn't November or December? Did whole turkeys even exist the other ten months out of the year? I mean, I liked turkey, especially when it wasn't a cold cut, and now, well, now I could have a new relationship with it. As Meg stuffed her non-holiday, un-celebratory bird with oranges, rosemary, and onions and smoothed it with butter under and over the skin, it glistened smartly and offered me new poultry promise. And I felt brand new!

Sweet potatoes have been like this for me, too. Once I finally released them from their holiday shackles, I was able to see their true potential, and they made their way into breakfasts, lunches, and dinners throughout the year. They made their debut as hashbrowns, french fries, soup, tempura, a pizza topping, curry, chips, cakes, and, of course, in pies. This pie, if you've not had it, is similar to pumpkin pie, and the two could certainly spend a weekend at an identical twins convention and no one would even bat an eye. Besides being similar to the pumpkin, the sweet potatoes are certainly as versatile as their dear friends, The Regular Potatoes, but as you've no doubt learned, they are wildly nutritious. You know, especially when they are fried. Or when combined with heavy whipping cream and sugar. I mean, nutrition is nutrition, for crying out loud. Especially when it's not Thanksgiving.

Your Holiday and Non-Holiday Sweet Potato Pie

2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1" chunks
1/2 C sugar
1/2 t ground ginger
1/2 t ground cinnamon
1/4 t ground nutmeg
1/4 t salt
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 C heavy (whipping) cream
1 pie shell (unbaked)

Place the sweet potatoes in a large saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to medium, and simmer until potatoes are very tender, about 20 minutes. Drain well and place in a large bowl.

Preheat oven to 375. Mash potatoes and then stir in the sugar, spices, salt, eggs, and cream.

Place the pie shell on a baking sheet and ladle in the filling just to the rim. Bake for 20 minutes. Reduce the temperature to 350. Bake about 30 minutes more or until filling is set (it won't jiggle around anymore, the crust will be golden,  and a toothpick inserted in the center will come out relatively clean).

Serve with marshmallow fluff, or whipped cream, or caramel sauce. Or plain! It's really nice when it's just plain. Oh, and keep this thing in the fridge when you're not eating it.

Pie Shell (if you're feeling it)

1 1/4 C AP flour
1/2 t salt
1/2 t sugar
1 stick cold unsalted butter, cut into chunks
3-4 T ice water

Mix the dry ingredients in a food processor until combined. Add the butter and process until it resembles coarse meal. Add ice water very slowly and stop when the dough starts to come together. The next part is where I am a bit of a cheater: typically, one is instructed to roll the dough out a bit into a thick disk, refrigerate in plastic wrap, and then roll it out. I find that it's much easier to roll out while it's warmer and softer, so I form it into a ball immediately and then roll it out into a large enough circle to fit in a pie pan. Then, poof! Into the pie pan, then into the fridge (covered in plastic wrap) for about an hour to set up.

Potato Potahto

Do you smell that? Sniff the wind! There! That! Did you get it? Crunchy, whirly, burning leaves! Earthy, sweet, honeyed apples! Mothball-scented cozy wool sweaters, creased from months of storage! And, of course, I'm sure you're getting those soup smells, wafting from my kitchen straight into your nostrils. Right? Okay, well, one fine day, when real technology finally kicks in, you'll be able to scratch and sniff all the photographs on your screen -- but, until then, you'll have to do it all the old-fashioned way, which means making the soup yourself and then sniffing that. Deal?

So. This soup will do several things: make your belly really happy, make all your friends really happy, and officially call upon autumn to show its darling face. It's the kind of soup that will even satisfy all your must-eat-meat guests, and it will be so easy that you will actually have time to play with them when they arrive, rather than having to poke around at the stovetop while they sit in the living room, getting really drunk without you and talking about how much they miss you. Plus, as with most soups, it just keeps getting better as it ages in the fridge and as the fall days go on.

Soup. So many soups! I made a list yesterday of all the soups I want to make next week. Grand total = 26. Hmm. We'll see how that goes. I predict that it might be wise to hold off on, oh, say, maybe 25 of those? At least for now. It might also help me if I could learn how to make smaller batches of soup. Plus, then the new issue of Saveur came in the mail, and I added even more to the list. That barley soup! That dumpling soup! O, soup! Marry me! But, for now, let's stay focused on the matter at hand. Soup #1 of the season. Deemed by a certain someone as "the soup that has everything I want in a soup." Enough said, right? Okay. So here ya go.

Potato Soup
3 large baking potatoes, peeled (or partially peeled) and diced or chopped into chunks*
6 T unsalted butter
1 large yellow onion, diced
3/4 C flour
3 C vegetable broth
1 C milk
1/2 C half & half or cream
1/2 t Tabasco or other hot sauce
1 t salt
1 t pepper

Melt butter in a big pot and, when it gets sizzly, add the onions and start to cook them down on medium-high heat. Cook them until they are the way you want them for your soup -- I tend to like them on the more-cooked side, edging on caramelization, but if you just want to cook them until they are translucent, that works, too. Stir in the flour with a wooden spoon and cook for 1 minute. The mixture will be very thick and dry, but keep moving it around in the pan so that the flour-taste can cook out. Add broth, hot sauce, milk, and half & half. Stir well. Add potatoes and adjust with salt and pepper. Cook down a bit until you reach desired consistency. Add more milk if it seems too thick, and cook longer if it seems too thin.

Serve with lots of baked-potato-ish toppings: bacon, scallions, hot sauce, croutons or toasted bread crumbs, blue cheese, or cheddar cheese.

*If your potato pieces are large, you'll want to steam them for a bit before adding them to the soup, or else it'll take ages for them to soften in the soup. If the pieces are small, you can probably get away with putting them into the soup raw. BUT if you are in a hurry and you want to make the soup really fast, I would recommend steaming or microwaving the diced potatoes first.

How To Get A Pickle

O! October!