Saturday, September 24, 2011

52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History - Week #39 - Least Favorite Foods

Week #39 – Least Favorite Foods

Week 39: Least Favorite Foods. What was your least favorite food from your childhood? Did your parents make you eat it anyway? Do you still dislike the same food today? How have your tastes changed since your youth?

This one was so easy!

My least favorite food as a child was sweet potatoes. And my m other made sweet potatoes every holiday! She'd smother them in butter and brown sugar and mini-marshmallows.


I'd pick the marshmallow off the top and eat that. Leaving the sweet potatoes behind, and would do my best to scrape my plate in the garbage before Mama could see!

Just the smell of sweet potatoes cooking would send shivers down my spine!

Ooh - yuck!!!

Sometime after I turned thirty however, I suddenly found myself actually craving sweet potatoes one day. And not the sweet potatoes Mama used to cook on holidays with all the sweet, ooey-gooey marshmallow on top! But rather, an honest to goodness boiled sweet potato.

Today, I make the rich sweet potatoes a whole lot like Mama did for holidays. But during the rest of the year? You will find them boiled, mashed and on Shepherd's Pie instead of white potatoes. Fried with onions. Baked with butter on top. And even cut into fries and baked in the oven instead of white potatoes! Hubby and daughter have come to realize that if a white potato can be used, I'll try the recipe with a sweet potato every time!

On occasion, I've even used sweet potato to make bread [using the same recipe I'd use for pumpkin bread!], and I've made custard and pies with it, again using the same recipe I'd use pumpkin for, simply substituting the pumpkin with sweet potato.

I don't know what caused me to change so drastically when I was around 30, but I sure am glad I did!!!

2 comments:

Amy Coffin, MLIS said...

Great post! My family is strongly divided on the sweet potato issue. At holidays, you are forced to pick a side, and be playfully shunned by the other side. I've been anti-sweet potato for decades. How I married a pro-sweet potato is beyond me. :)

Joan said...

I too like sweet potatoes almost any way but with marshmallows and brown sugar. Of course, hubby and children love the gooey sweet potato dishes that I eschew.