Sweetpotatoes or Yams?

All of our friends always get together the Saturday after Thanksgiving and have a big party. We basically do another Thanksgiving feast and everyone brings their favorite dishes and our hosts deep fry the turkey outside. The men really enjoy this part because there is always the threat of danger when deep frying a turkey. Thankfully they know what they are doing and haven't burned the house down. This year I am bringing my little sweetpotato pies. The recipe is simple and my family always devours every one of them.

We plan our parties by email. We are quite effiecient at planning that way, since we are all so busy. A controversy started when my dish was listed under dessert instead of side dishes on the menu. Someone said we didn't have any yams. Someone else stated they remember seeing sweetpotato pie on the menu. Someone else said pie and sweetpotato spuds are not the same and yams were completely different. It was also pointed out that we still needed yams because pie would be a mungie concoction and collection of ingredients blended to a pulp. While a whole yam or sweetpotato cooked the way God meant it to be-baked at 350 until ready (about an hour) was also still needed on the menu. I guess everyone has their own opinion as to the best recipe for sweetpotatoes and/or yams.

Just to be clear according to the Sweetpotato Council of California all yams in the United States are actually sweetpotatoes. They belong to the morning glory family and are native to tropical areas of the Americas. Apparently the sweetpotatos and yams that we always see in the grocery store are actually both sweetpotatoes. Yes, even the dark orange one is a sweetpotato. I guess that's why I'm always confused as to which is which when I go to the store. Yams actually come from a different plant species and is a native of Africa. They are not usually grown in the United States nor are they marketed here. Although they are very similar and can be substituted for sweet potatoes in most recipes.

So we will be having both "yams" and sweet potato pie, but I will be using the orange sweetpotato for my pie because it's a little sweeter.

Here's my mom's recipe for little sweetpotato pies. It's never really been written down before so I'll walk you through it. You bake whole sweetpotatoes, I use the orange ones, at 350 for about an hour until they are cooked through. Let them cool off enough to handle and scoop the insides out into a bowl. Mash it up. Then you fill individual serving size graham cracker crusts with the sweetpotatoes, add a pat of butter and sprinkle with brown sugar. Bake until heated through and butter and sugar melt in a 350 oven, about 15-30 minutes depending on if your potatos were still warm or had cooled completely off. So, no, it's not a mungie concoction and collection of ingredients. I don't even think mungie is a word, but it wasn't my word!

No matter how you serve your sweetpotatoes or yams this Thanksgiving, I hope you spend it the people you love. Have a happy Thanksgiving!