Channeling My Inner Paula (Deen)

Tis the season to... BAKE!

Baking makes me jolly, so tis the season to be jolly and bake. I was a baking mad woman queen tonight- finishing a total of 4 pies, a casserole, and 3 dozen cake pops (I had an order, otherwise I would not be insane enough to make them on such a busy night!)

I cannnnnnottt waiitttt to share these easy and amazing recipes! They're my "staple contributions" for every Thanksgiving dinner. It's a given that I'll bring these, no questions asked! They are so easy I bet for under $10 you can make 2 pies to take to your dinner! Consider yourself warned though, because once your family tastes these versions, you might be obligated to bring them every year!!

The OCD's Sweet Potato Casserole 
(I obviously made that name up, but being OCD it makes for a beautiful casserole with the order and the lines in it!) 


Ingredients

• 4 1/2 lbs. sweet potato (around 5 medium sized)
• 1 Cup Sugar
• 1/4 Cup Milk
• 1/2 Cup Butter, Softened
• 2 Large Eggs
• 1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract
• 1/4 Teaspoon Salt
• 1 1/4 Cups Cornflakes, Crushed
• 1/4 Cup Chopped Pecans
• 1 Tablespoon Brown Sugar
• 1 Tablespoon Melted Butter
• 1 1/2 Cups Mini Marshmallows

Preparation

• Peel your sweet potatoes (some people peel it after baking, since I boil, I do it before)
• You can choose to bake or boil your sweet potatoes, I personally like the control boiling gives me (checking every now and then to poke and make sure it's as soft as I need). if you're baking, bake at 400 degrees for about an hour. If you are boiling, boil in a large pot for about 45-50 minutes until tender. 
• Mash the sweet potatoes after they have cooled and add sugar, milk, butter, eggs, vanilla, and salt and mix with an electric mixer until smooth. Spoon sweet potato mixture into a greased 11x7 inch baking dish (or any "pretty/festive" casserole dish you think is big enough, this recipe is easy to just take what you need to fill a dish)
• Combine cornflakes cereal, pecans, and butter in a small bowl. Sprinkle diagonally over casserole in rows 2 inches apart {see OCD...}
• Bake at 350 for 30 minutes. Remove from oven. Let stand 10 minutes. Sprinkle alternate rows with marshmallows; bake additional 10 minutes. Let stand 10 minutes before serving.

As time consuming as this recipe is (most of the time going into softening the potatoes) it is fairly simple! ok, it's extremely simple, who am i kidding. I just want to act like I am capable of bringing a difficult recipe to the table haha. Here's how it looked tonight:

boiling the taters

adding the ingredients (i switched to a bigger bowl, don't worry)

adding the cornflake mix

OCD kicking in...

yum!

baking frenzy

what's he doing here?! (don't worry, this was after baking, i'm sanitary!)

What it should look like when you're done!

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