Coconut Mashed Sweet Potatoes and More Thanksgiving Possibilities

Three weeks ago, my pal came over to bake.  Armed with a new vegan boulangerie cookbook, we set off on the quixotic task of making egg-white-free macarons.  Still not possible.  But over the course of our disappointing (and expensive) kitchen mishap, we had time to catch up and share the details of the meals we'd eaten recently.  She told me about the noodles she loved at Shojin and the pre-Thanksgiving feast she enjoyed at Madeleine Bistro.  I pumped her for details.  She obliged.  And I have not been able to shake the idea for this side dish since.  Much like how other people get songs stuck in their head, and how the German word for breakfast was stuck there for the weeks previous, I have found myself, for the past 21 days, mentally stuck on the idea of coconut mashed sweet potatoes.  

On Tuesday I finally did something about it.  With plenty of time to think it through, here was the plan - mashed potatoes - but with sweet potatoes in lieu of russets, coconut butter for the fat, coconut milk for the creamy liquid, season with salt, pepper, and a pinch of nutmeg.  

But I never got around to it.  Because the first thing I do when I'm hitting the kitchen without a previously proven recipe is to google it.  No point reinventing the mashed-sweet-potato-wheel.  

Especially when Eating Well already published a perfect recipe 4 years ago that turns out to be a traditional Hawaiian dish called piele (Really?  I can find no outside confirmation of this.  I hope I'm not just perpetuating internet misinformation.  But in slightly related news, if you're interested, my Hawaiian dictionary does say that pelena means crackers, piku is fig, and piki is the word for both beet and peach.)  

Coconut Mashed Sweet Potatoes
adapted from Eating Well magazine

• 3 pounds sweet potatoes (or 6 medium - look for ones that are similar in size and shape for even cooking)
• 1 1/2 cups coconut milk (light will totally work, and bonus they sell it at Trader Joe's)
• 2 tablespoons grated ginger
• 1 teaspoon salt

Heat the oven to 425.  Wash your sweet potatoes and poke them a few times with a sharp knife.  Place in a baking dish and roast until soft, about an hour. 

When the potatoes are cool enough to handle, slip off their now loose skins, place in large bowl with the coconut milk, grated ginger, and salt, and mash.  

That's it.  

But I'll add that you might enjoy them with a lentil pot pie (Thank you Julia!) and some simple roasted brussels sprouts:

And homemade jellied cranberry sauce.  (Why didn't anyone tell me how easy it is to make jellied cranberry sauce!?  Well you did, Canal House Cooking, and I thank you.)

As does my Thanksgiving recipe taster.  (He was wild for the cranberries and sweet potatoes, not so much the brussels sprouts or lentil pie.  Desmond snacked on the salty, crunchy brussels sprouts while he watched Kipper and I finished making dinner.  He was not hip to the pie on its own, but when I mixed in some sweet potatoes, he polished it off.)

 And you, what are you making?