Marshmallow Madness

As mentioned in my last post, I went to a Thanksgiving dinner with an American family on Thursday. It was a hot turkey dinner, of course, with all the usual stuff except sweet potatoes (most Americans call them "yams" but not these folks) which had gone bad. Anyway, even though this family never goes so far as to bake their sweet spuds with marshmallow, they do turn it into a quasi-dessert by mixing it with apples, pecans and cinnamon (which meant we had a cinnamony apple-pecan mixture with our main course, not as a dessert). I asked the cook about the sweet potato-marshmallow abomination I'd heard of and she agreed that other Americans are crazy to make their veges so sweet but somehow failed to see that her apples and cinnamon were doing the same thing.

I saw that the supermarket was low on marshmallows and wondered whether this was because so many people were cooking that dish for their Thanksgiving dinners but I also saw that they were on sale so I bought a packet. When I got them home I noticed this recipe on the back:

Whipped Sweet Potato Bake
Prep time: 10 minutes
Total time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:
1 can (40 oz.) yams, drained
¼ cup (½ stick) butter or margarine, melted
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
½ tsp. salt
¼ tsp. ground nutmeg
24 marshmallows (about 3 cups)

Directions:
PREHEAT oven to 350°F. Beat sweet potatoes, butter, cinnamon, salt and nutmeg in medium bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until well blended.

SPOON lightly greased 1 ½ qt. baking dish; top with marshmallows.

BAKE 15 to 20 minutes or until sweet potato mixture is heated through and marshmallows are lightly browned.

Makes 10 servings, ½ cup each.

I hate to admit it but I'm just a little tempted to try it, just for the sake of a gastronomic adventure.

And while we're on the subject, marshmallow also comes in jars here, i.e. as a spread. When first I saw it at the supermarket I didn't really understand what it was. Then the other day my friend Sean, who's from Boston, explained that they have a sandwich there called a "fluffer-nutter" with peanut butter and marshmallow spread on it (similar to the ubiquitous PB&J, I guess). But, whatever you do, don't look up "fluffer" in the Urban Dictionary! (Seriously, you don't want to know.)