Cinnamon Pecan Sweet Potatoes

This year for Thanksgiving, my mother-in-law asked if I would be willing to make a sweet potato dish. I said I would be more than happy to, but was a little apprehensive because I had never in my life cooked a sweet potato. In fact, I don't even like sweet potatoes. Not one tiny bit. I think they are gross. Period.

Thankfully, she gave me a recipe to work with from allrecipes.com (one of my personal favorite sites for recipes). I jumped in to sweet potato prep with both feet, making a couple of slight modifications to the recipe as I went (doubling the recipe, adding more flour to the topping for a different consistency, using whipping cream, etc.). I have to say, I gladly ate sweet potatoes this year, because with this recipe, they turned out to be delicious, even to me! Click here for the original recipe from Heather at allrecipes.com!

• 10 sweet potatoes
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup butter
• 4 eggs
• 2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 cup white sugar
• 4 Tbsp heavy whipping cream
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 6-7 Tbsp all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1 cup chopped pecans

1. Fill a large pot with water and heat to boiling.

2. Peel sweet potatoes and cut into cubes. Boil sweet potato cubes until just tender.

3. While sweet potatoes cook, preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease a large glass casserole dish (I used a 10x14 inch dish).

4. Once potatoes are tender enough to be pierced with a fork, remove from heat and rain thoroughly.

5. In a large bowl, mash sweet potatoes. Add salt, 1/2 cup butter, eggs, vanilla extract, cinnamon, white sugar, and whipping cream to sweet potatoes and mix well to combine.

6. Transfer mixture to the greased baking dish.

7. In a medium bowl, combine 1/2 cup butter, flour, brown sugar, and chopped pecans to make the topping for the sweet potato mixture. Mix with a pastry blender or fork until the consistency resembles course meal.

8. Sprinkle evenly over the sweet potato mixture.

9. Bake for about 30 minutes in the preheated oven, until the topping is crisp and lightly browned.

Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup

Wow! It's flu season and the flu hit our little family... hard! Coughing, fevers, nausea, chills; you name it, we had it. Thankfully, we are all on the mend now, but I can't tell you how wonderful a bowl full of this simple, tasty soup felt while being so sick.

It's doesn't require all manner of fancy ingredients; I bet you have most, if not all, of this stuff in your kitchen now. Plus, it's low in fat. You just can't go wrong with this simple staple!

So, go enjoy a couple bowls of this savory soup and call me in the morning!

• 1 medium onion
• Tbsp vegetable oil
  
• 8 cups chicken broth
• 2-3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• 1 bay leaf
  
• 1 cup carrots
• 1 cup celery
• 2 cups egg noodles
• 1/2 tsp dried parsley
  
• Salt and pepper to taste

1. Chop onion and then saute in the oil in a large soup pot until translucent.

2. Add broth, chicken breasts, and bay leaf to the onions in the pot. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer until chicken is cooked all the way through and tender (about 45 minutes).

3. Remove chicken from broth and cut into bite-sized pieces.

4. Add celery and carrots to broth and simmer for 5 minutes.

5. Add egg noodles and parsley to broth and simmer an additional 5-7 minutes or just until egg noodles are tender. Don't overcook the egg noodles or they will fall apart.

6. Add chicken to soup and stir to combine and warm through.

7. Salt and pepper to taste.

Festive Halloween Cupcakes (With "Gross" and "Gruesome" Fillings)!

As you probably know by now, I love to bake. Even better than baking, is decorating your baked goods to look as good as they taste! I am always looking for something new to try and thought Halloween would be the perfect occasion to whip up some spooky sweets.

I finally decided that I would attempt a completely foreign technique to me: the filled cupcake. After some diligent internet research, I decided to go with the simple and straightforward "cone method" to fill my cupcakes (click here to see my 'how-to' post on this surprisingly simple trick, complete with pictures).

I made two varieties for a party we went to on Halloween: monster cupcakes with "slime" filling and vampire bite cupcakes with cherry "blood" filling*. Both kinds of cupcakes were frosted using a pastry bag and buttercream icing. The monster cupcakes were topped off with marshmallow fondant eyes that I hand-painted with edible dye.

They were super cute, a little creepy, and totally delicious!

Click here for the Monster cupcakes recipe!

Click here for the Vampire Bite cupcakes recipe!

Note: The two links above are not functioning right now. I will have them working as I can post the recipes.Check back soon!

*I always believe in giving credit were credit is due! While I used a different recipe, frosting, etc. I got the idea for the vampire bite cupcakes from one of my favorite sites: bakingbites.com. Check it out! It's a wonderful recipe resource!