This past weekend two Greeks and an Italian set out to cook a traditional Hanukkah meal. Considering our prior knowledge [which was little to none] of how to prepare such a meal and the fact that Hanukkah isn't anywhere close to soon, we tweaked it and made it our own.
Our main dish was sweet potato latkes. This recipe is super easy and a great spin off of the classic latke. It has ginger and scallions in it which really give it a distinct taste. The key is making sure you dry the excess water off the sweet potatoes once you've grated them. Cooking in someone else's kitchen can be a real treat, especially when they have two huge sinks, a garbage disposal and the most incredible peeler. Frying these suckers up was a cinch once Jeremy endlessly grated sweet potatoes and nearly lost a finger.
The delicious side dish that kept our orange theme going was carrot tzimmes. This was a brand new recipe to me that wound up being my favorite part of the meal. All it took was a little honey, raisins, onions, vegetable broth and carrots simmered for 45 minutes and some Barbra Streisand on the record player. We didn't realize until halfway through marathon chopping that the recipe was meant to serve 24 people. You can bet we had leftovers for days. 
For dessert we kept the sweet potato goodness coming and made a sweet potato chocolate torte. We substituted coconut flour for almond flour which brought the richness of the torte to new levels. The sweet potato mixed with the dark cocoa and coconut flour made for a dense dessert. Once it cooled, we melted down some bitter sweet chocolate with cream and made a rich ganache to top it off. Vegetables in dessert, yes please!
The night was spent in a sweet potato stupor that we enjoyed well into the evening while watching the 1990s classic, Serial Mom. If you haven't revisited that film since the last time you felt envious of Kevin McCallister, then it's a must!
Baleboosteh!
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