When is a vegetable not a vegetable?  When it’s dessert! My family has a long history with sweet potatoes on Thanksgiving.  In fact, I’ve never known a Thanksgiving at home without both sweet potato pie and “candied sweets”: thinly sliced sweet potatoes baked with cinnamon and brown sugar, swimming in butter. I learned the basic recipe for sweet potato pie from my mother and have made only minor modifications to the filling over the years… and one major modification this time around: no pie crust.  This dish is meant to be cooked in a ramekin and there’s just enough for a couple or small family.  Another thing I love about this?  It tastes great hot from the oven or cold from the fridge. Too good to serve only once a year. 🙂

INGREDIENTS
FILLING
1 large sweet potato (at least 6 inches long)
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 egg, beaten
1/4 cup milk
2 tablespoons salted butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

CRUMBLE
1 cup flour
1 cup sugar
6 tablespoons cold salted butter

TOOLS
paring knife
medium (2-quart) pot, filled with water for boiling
fork
2 medium (3-quart) mixing bowls
measuring cups and spoons
3 ramekins

METHOD
1. Cut sweet potato in half and boil until fork tender — about 45 minutes.
2. Transfer sweet potato to refrigerator until cool enough to handle — about 30 minutes.
3. Set oven to 350 degrees. Slip off skin from cooled sweet potato. Place sweet potato in first bowl and mash with fork.
4. Add remaining FILLING ingredients and mix well.
5. In second bowl, mix together flour and sugar.
6. Cut in cold butter with paring knife.
7. Stir with fork until mixture is crumbly.
8. Divide sweet potato mixture between ramekins.
9. Top with CRUMBLE mixture. Cook 30 minutes.

NOTES & TIPS
• It’s okay if the FILLING mixture has small lumps. These will cook down as it bakes.
• I prefer to use a toaster oven for these because it helps the crumble crisp up nicely. If you use a conventional oven, place these under the broiler for a few minutes after taking them out of the oven.

READY IN
1 hour

YIELD
3 servings