And sorry to have to ask, but what’s “RMO”?

(I never liked Sweet potatoes until I made them this way.)

7 sweet potatoes
1/4 C butter
1/2 C sugar
1/4 C brown sugar
1/2 Tsp vanilla
1/4 C evaporated milk
2 eggs
cinnamon or nutmeg to taste

Boil sweet potatoes in skins until done; cool, peel, mash & mix with remaining ingredients.

Place in 3 qt casserole & cover with marshmallows. Bake 15 minutes at 450.

i think about my beloved, now departed mother-in-law, who was (it is true) the best cook ever. her only culinary failing, if you will, was her insistence on making sweet potatoe casserole for thanksgiving. although it was universally reviled, at some distant point in the past one of the grandchildren told grandma (prior to ever having tasted the gooey, orange concoction) that he loved it, based only on rumor from older cousins that it was topped with marshmallows. now as we all know any three year old would profess to loving raw chicken livers if they came with the promise of marshmallows.

so year afer year we put a huge corning ware dish of this glop on the table, from which, at meal’s end, there would be two to three polite, albeit tiny, spoonfuls removed. i started my own rumor that it was actually the same casserole, recycled, year after year, frozen for twelve months with a couple more marshmallows added here and there for fill-in. (hmmm, come to think about it, my mother-in-law never denied it.)

what i wouldn’t give to have that casserole and its good-natured maker at my table now.

so pile your plate high with love and sweet memories and let all the you-know-what slide, if just for this one day.

I’m pretty much a traditionalist, though I suppose I now want your mom’s cinnamon roll recipe. Turkey, gravy, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, and green beans. Crudite. The big problem in our house was that mom never made enough mashed potatoes.