Tag Archives: sisters

Pan-Fried Cumin Sweet Potatoes

 

Greetings everyone! This morning my husband and I are hopping in my sister Heidi and her husband Mike’s truck and skedaddling off to Stevens Point, where our blond bombshell of a sister Erica is getting married on Saturday! I have high, high hopes of a McDonald’s breakfast sometime during our travels. I think they put some kind of addictive grease-drug in those sausage McMuffins, and I love every bite. And the hash browns . . . don’t get me started on the hash browns. It’s like Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Valentine’s Day all wrapped up into one golden little cakety-akety. I would eat ten of them if that didn’t cause a tornado of pain to ravage my stomach. One will have to do. Or would two be risking it? I’m thinking two.

As we roll on over to Wisconsin, I’d like to say that I’ll be providing realtime reporting via this blog, with live video-feed of all the wedding to-do’s and up-to-the minute journalism detailing every nanosecond of the excitement, family eccentricities, and bridalwear.

Alas, it is not meant to be.

However, I do commit to wielding my camera and shooting like a madwoman so that I can bring forth pictures in the weeks to come. Pax?

In the meantime, I have prepped a few recipes to feed the blogmonster in my absence and get me through Monday morning. See, I’m afraid of what the blogmonster will do to me if he becomes hungry, and it’s best not to find out until I’ve really built up his trust. And though I’m using this recipe for Pan-Fried Cumin Sweet Potatoes to appease him, you’ll have to trust me: it’s not just a fill-in post. It’s actually incredibly delicious. Let’s get started.

I’ve had 2 sweet potatoes languishing in my fridge for the past month. Every time I opened the crisper, they looked at me accusingly–was I going to let them go to waste? Motivated by guilt, I searched out other languishing vegetables in my refrigerator and tossed them all in my cast iron skillet. The results were good enough not only to dispel my guilt, but also to send me into seventh heaven.

Ingredients

(Serves 4)

2 TBS olive oil

2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and diced into small cubes

1/4 c water

1/2 red onion, chopped

1 jalapeño, de-seeded and minced

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp black pepper

1/4 tsp cumin

Chives or cilantro to garnish

First, gather your ingredients into a friendly assembly. Encourage them to talk amongst themselves and ask some basic “getting to know you” questions.

 

Now, chop them up. Take any tension in your life and apply it to these vegetables using a sharp knife. Aaaaaah.

 

 

Heat the oil over medium-high heat. Add your sweet potato cubes and fry 3-4 minutes.

 

Add the water, turn down heat to low and cover. Cook for 3 minutes. When you uncover the skillet, the water should be gone–if not, cook uncovered until the water evaporates. Now add your salt, pepper, cumin, onion, and jalapeño. Add more oil if needed. Cook for 5 minutes over medium heat.

 

By now, your potatoes should be tender but not falling apart, and the jalapeño and onion should be crisp and tender. Put the lovely pile of delights into a serving dish and top with a sprinkling of cilantro or chives.

 

This dish is good as it is, but if you serve it with Spicy Garlic Sauce (recipe coming tomorrow) you will die and go to garlic heaven. And I say–live dangerously!

Flirting with Death via the Spicy Garlic Sauce

Click here for printer-friendly version: Pan-Fried Cumin Sweet Potatoes

Baby-making petition: sign it today!

To Erica and Dave: a friendly suggestion a command from heaven

My sister Erica and her fiancé Dave go to the chapel on July 24th. They’ve been engaged since the end of May, so it’s all a flurry of planning that would never have hopes of coalescing into an actual ceremony were it not for this woman:

Mom. All together now, one-two-three: Thank you Mom!!

I’m contributing a lot to the wedding as well. Or rather, I’m contributing some. OK—I’m going to do the slide show. And that’s something, right? An essential component, I would say. Oh, and I went shopping for a bridesmaid dress. For myself. So that’s two ways that I’ve helped. Yep, I’ve always been a team player (Erica, you can thank me later).

Heidi and Mike (as we have already covered) are electing to procreate immediately, which is a wise choice due to their unbelievable cuteness when they themselves were small ones. So I thought I would encourage ye ole soon-to-be-married couple by showing them pictures of their own extreme cuteness in the hopes that they will respond with “Wow we were cute—gosh honey, it really makes you think—you know what, our duty has become clear to me: let’s have a baby! Golly dang whillikers, let’s have 5! Let’s have a whole football team of ‘em!!!!” Because if there’s one thing that I know about Dave, it’s that he needs a football-team-sized posse of children. Dave? Dave? Are you listening? This is the voice of reason speaking. Don’t ask—just reproduce. It’s your moral duty to this good earth that we all share.

Now whether Erica or Dave will actually use the phrase “golly dang whillikers” is currently up for debate, but let’s not stray from the spirit of the thing, which is: I have aunt-hood needs. My collection of nieces and nephews must be ever-expanding. Stack them to the heavens!

I’m starting a petition, and when we reach 10,000 signatures I think we can legally bind Erica and Dave into releasing their progeny into the world with no delays. Who’s with me? Anyone want to sign? Anyone? Hello?

Will you sign if I show you these Very Persuasive Pictures?

Baby Erica

Little Erica

Baby Dave, inna box

Baby Dave, jowls included

Not only do we need to get this petition thing on the road, but I call on the ranks of the extended family to brainwash these two into a baby-induced haze. In fact, forsooth, I call for a secret meeting during the rehearsal dinner to discuss our hypnotizing schemes and subliminal messaging techniques—we’ve got to come up with something brilliant. Because if this doesn’t work … well, we’ll have to revert to Plan B. Which is “peer pressure”. And that means that Heidi and I have to outnumber Erica. Heidi being pregnant already, you put 2 and 2 together …

Please, extended family. Use your persuasive magic! Don’t let Plan A fail! Don’t send me spiraling into baby time just yet! I need a little longer … just a little longer … though they are kinda cute, eh? With their little chubby knees and their doughy/poofy cheeks and their wrinkly little buns? I could name them Pinkity, Dinkity, Cornelius and Scrubbity-Dubbitty. Mmmmmm … (alert, alert: have unwittingly brainwashed/hypnotized self)