Category: culinary fun

With sweet potatoes. I am obsessed with sweet potatoes – this is a new low.

But they’re not just any sweet potatoes, they are the Pioneer Woman’s Soul Sweet ‘Taters and they are quite possibly the best things I’ve ever made.

A delicious concoction of sweet potatoes, milk, eggs, vanilla, brown sugar, sugar, pecans, butter, flour, and salt.

Amazing.

Make them for Christmas, you will not regret it. I know, I know, you don’t like sweet potatoes. Well, friends, these are not your grandma’s syrupy, marshmallow-laden canned yams. They are heaven on a plate.

Make them. And then invite me over.

And while you’re at it, whip up some of these pumpkin pie cupcakes:

White cupcakes with a graham cracker crust, iced with pumpkin pie. Yum. My I-don’t-like-sweet-stuff diabetic husband ate four.

It’s no wonder I gained 40 pounds this weekend.

Did you discover any amazing recipes this Thanksgiving? If so, share them in the comments!

I’ve tried a number of new recipes lately (thank you, Pinterest) and while they haven’t all been hits, I’ve found two I absolutely loved and wanted to share.

The first is “Tangy Slow Cooker Pork Roast” from AllRecipes.com.

This pork roast is so good, I can’t even do it justice. Andy and I absolutely loved it; he said it was better than any steak he’s had in a long time (and the kids ate it too – I told them it was chicken). And it was so easy. As you may recall, I shy away from slow cooker recipes that require more effort than tossing everything in together. If I see I have to sear the meat or some such business, I move on to the next recipe. With this one for pork roast, all I did was slice an onion, put the meat in the slow cooker, and mix together an easy marinade. I served it with egg noodles and broccoli… holy yum.

The other recipe that I loved is from Cooking Light – chili corn chip pie.

It’s an at-home, slightly-less-fattening and sort-of-classed-up version of our swim team season staple, the walking taco. As I was cooking it, I said to my dad and Andy, “I have a feeling what I’m making is really complicated taco meat, and if it doesn’t taste any better than when I through a packet of Ortega seasoning in there, I’m going to be mad!” (Note: It wasn’t complicated – remember, this is me we’re talking about.) Fortunately, it was worth the (minor) effort. It was great – we all gobbled it up. I recommend making a double batch to ensure leftovers!

Those are a couple of my new favorites, but I want to hear from you. What recipes have you stumbled upon lately, or what are your old favorites?

The title of this post is a direct quote from my friend Gina, said years ago as we enjoyed some sort of breaded delicacy in our university dining hall. Apparently, though, she is not alone (nor was she then – I know we all nodded our heads in agreement at the time) because at our local festival last weekend, forks seemed to be the only things that weren’t deep fried.

Case in point:

Yes, that’s deep fried oreos, deep fried snickers, deep fried twinkies and deep fried buckeyes.

At this (extremely small) festival, in addition to the regular fried stuff – corn dogs, chicken strips, Texas tenderloins, french fries, etc. – and the random stuff in the picture above, I saw deep fried pickles (ok I had some of those and they were delicious), deep fried bananas and deep fried apples. The latter two could be ordered “deluxe” and topped with ice cream, whipped cream, chocolate and caramel sauce, nuts and a cherry.

Obesity crisis? Nah.

(Who am I kidding, the apples with all that junk on them looked freaking amazing.)

What’s the craziest thing you’ve seen deep fried? And fess up – did you try it?