When Mira and the original kids in my cooking class were three, I wanted to create a special recipe for them to make at Thanksgiving time that they could make and love year after year.  After experimenting with different options, a special recipe for sweet potato casserole with coconut milk, beautiful caramelized pecans, and the kid favorite-mini-marshmallows made all of the cuts.  We made it in class, and both the kids and the parents raved.

The next year, when Fall Feasting time rolled around, requests were made to make the Sweet Potato Casserole with Caramelized Pecans and Crunchy Marshmallows again.  We started the tradition of making it every year in class, and it is the only recipe that we repeat at all.  Over the past three years, I have changed  some little things.  As a happy accident, we left out the extra melted butter from the original recipe, and nobody missed it at all.  In fact, we liked it better.  The updated recipe is below, with its tweaks and extra crunch.

I have made our casserole with both Mira and Liev’s various school groups- from two-year-olds to kindergardeners.  Most of them were completely delighted by it.  My mom even requested that I make it for our Christmas Eve dinner last year!

Growing up in Georgia, our family had very few official traditions.  At Thanksgiving, we would all get together, and we would eat the usual suspects-stuffing and turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, pies and whipped cream.  Only one dish was made every year, to my knowledge, and it is a wonderfully bizarre dish called “Seven-Up Salad”.  It seems to be something that my mom has made since the 1960’s and involves gelatin, pecans, pineapple, maraschino cherries, and, yes, Seven-Up.  It stood, wobbling ever so slightly, on our Thanksgiving table year after year.  We all loved the strangeness of it, this relic pressed into the mold with the star on top.

In my own home, I have never made Seven-Up salad though I do love to remember it each Thanksgiving and do miss it’s unique flavor and amazing sea green color studded with the fruits and nuts.  Around here, we have made the sweet potato casserole the traditional dish and a pomegranate and orange salad, too.  The rest of the dishes, we experiment with until we might, one day, find the ultimate, the favorite.

Each year, too, the children are included in making both the Sweet Potato Casserole and another dish of their choosing so that they have memories of sitting with me and learning the recipes by heart.  Will any of these recipes become heirlooms?  I dearly hope so.  But, mostly, I hope that I pass on my love for the act of making the food itself, for infusing what we eat with care.  Sprinkling in the love.

Can you let your mini-chef into your kitchen today and tomorrow to help out with one special dish?  To roll out the pie crust or throw the turkey brining ingredients into the big bag?  That, my friends, is something both you and your children will be thankful for, even if it takes longer or creates a bit more of a mess.  Slow down, have fun, and enjoy being together.  The kitchen is a warm place.

Here are our favorite recipes that might just make your Thanksgiving list year after year:

List of Fall Favorites

• The Original Sweet Potato Casserole with Caramelized Pecans and Crunchy Marshmallows
• Acorn Squash Filled with Pomegranate Rice Pilaf
• Sweet and Savory Ricotta Bruschette
• Green Beans in a Luscious Warm Rosemary Vinaigrette
• Light and Fluffy Eggless Cornbread
• Carrot-Apple-Ginger Spread
• White Bean and Lebanese Cous Cous Stuffed Squash
• Purple People Eater Mashed Potatoes (I can envision turkeys made out of the same ingredients!)
• Easy No-Bake Thanksgiving Appetizer: Dates Stuffed with Parmesan and Asiago Cheese
• Green Salad with Pears, Fennel, and Pear Vinaigrette
• Fall/Winter Vegetable Tagine with Cous Cous
• Pear-Pomegranate Lassis
• Fall Lasagnas
• Horton’s Corn Risotto with Sage
• Israeli Cous Cous with a Warm Cumin Vinaigrette
• Black Bean and Sweet Potato Hummus Faces
• Pumpkin Sandwich Cookies with Cream Cheese Filling
• Carrot Cake with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

Sweet Potato Casserole 2010

• 4 large sweet potatoes, skins still on but washed
• 1/2 c. coconut milk
• heaping t. cinnamon
• 1/3 c. freshly squeezed orange juice
• 1/4 c. (unpacked) brown sugar
• 2 eggs, room temperature
• small pinch of salt
• 1 T. butter for greasing the pan
• 2 c. mini marshmallows
• optional: 12 amaretti  cookies
• caramelized pecans (from original recipe)

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F.
2. Have your mini-chef poke holes with a fork in several places all over the sweet potatoes.  Wrap them in parchment paper first and then in aluminum foil, sealing them completely so that no steam escapes.
3. Bake the sweet potatoes for at least an hour and up to an hour and twenty minutes, till completely soft all the way through.
4. Turn the temperature of your oven down to 350 degrees F.
5. Open up the foil and parchment, being careful since they will be steamy.  Cut the potatoes in half to let some of the steam release.  When they are cooled slightly, peel away the sweet potato skins.  Discard (or eat!) the skins.
6. In an upright mixer, place all the sweet potatoes and turn the mixer on at medium speed for about 3 minutes, so that the potatoes lose any sort of stringy texture.
7. Add the orange juice, coconut milk, brown sugar, small pinch of salt, and the eggs, mixing well and turning the mixer off to scrape down after the addition of each ingredient.
8. Place the amaretti cookies in a large sealable plastic bag.  Using a rolling pin, have your mini-chef either roll over the cookies or pound on them to crush them into crumbs.  Leave some crumbs larger than others to create a crunchier texture.
9. Grease an 9×11-inch pan with the soft butter, painting all around the bottom and sides.
10. Pour the sweet potato mixture into the pan and smooth the surface with the back of a wooden spoon or rubber spatula.
11. Top with the amaretti crumbs first and then the mini-marshmallows.
12. Big Person: Bake the casserole for about 25 minutes, till the mini-marshmallows brown on top.  Press the caramelized pecans onto the top.
13. Cool for a few minutes before serving.  Enjoy!