Thanksgiving at Clinic Sofia
Food has a way of bringing people together, particularly during the holidays!
As you sit down to your annual feast this week or celebrate the season in the coming month, what special dishes do you serve each year? Do you have a recipe that has been handed down through the generations or do you serve a unique twist on a traditional dish that your family loves?
For Dawn Miles, triage nurse at Clinic Sofia, that special dish is a sweet potato casserole or “hot dish” that has become an annual Thanksgiving tradition. She started making the dish, which includes baked sweet potatoes topped with an oatmeal cookie crust, when she and her husband moved from New York to the Twin Cities several years ago.
“Since it was just me and my husband, I spent the time to make it a special Thanksgiving for us,” Miles said. Now we have many new friends who we celebrate with, and they tease that if this dish is not on the table for Thanksgiving, they will not come. It has become our tradition to have this every year. I give them what they ask for because they have become my new family here in Minnesota.”
We’d love to hear what recipes your family enjoys during the holidays. Please visit us on Facebook and share your stories and recipes! Clinic Sofia staff will be posting some of their favorite food memories and traditions they share with their own families.
Dawn’s Recipe for Sweet Potato Casserole
Ingredients:
Casserole
- 4 1/2 to 5 pounds fresh sweet potatoes (yams) or 2 (40-ounce) cans sweet potatoes (yams)
- 4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) butter
- 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/2 cup dark brown sugar
- 1/4 cup heavy cream
- Nonstick cooking spray
Oatmeal Cookie Crust
- 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 cup dark brown sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup quick-cooking oats
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 pound (1 stick) butter, at room temperature
- 2 cups miniature marshmallows
Instructions:
Casserole
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Wrap sweet potatoes in foil, place them on a baking sheet, and bake for about 1 hour. After 1 hour, test by piercing with a fork; if you can pierce them easily, they are done baking. If not, bake them a little longer and test again. Allow the sweet potatoes to cool until you can handle them, remove foil, and remove skins by simply pushing off the skins from the flesh of the potato. Place the cooked potatoes into a large bowl. If using canned sweet potatoes, skip the baking. Just open the cans and drain off the syrup.
Mash the sweet potatoes with the butter using a pastry blender or a potato masher until mostly smooth. Add the eggs, salt, cinnamon, vanilla, and nutmeg and beat until you have a uniform mixture. Add the brown sugar and cream and mix well.
Oatmeal Cookie Crust
Combine the flour, brown sugar, salt, oats, and cinnamon in a medium bowl and stir together well. Stir in the butter with a fork until you have a crumbly mixture.
If you had turned off the oven, heat it again to 350 degrees. Lightly coat a 9×13-inch baking pan with cooking spray. Spread the sweet potatoes in the pan. Top with the marshmallows, then crumble the oatmeal crust on top of the marshmallows. Bake 30 to 45 minutes.
