The Magic of Creating Recipes

Once you know a few basics about cooking, such as that yeast is not the only leavening agent for bread, it is a natural thing to start putting your own spin on your cooking. By customizing your cooking you can save money, meet the nutritional needs of your family in a better way, and feel the joy of doing things your own way.  Each time you are successful at doing things your own way you are enhancing your magical abilities, becoming a stronger person and making your life less stressful.  There is a new buzzword going around, 'locovore '.  That refers to eating food from your own area as much as possible.  It will be fresher and therefore more nutritious and often less expensive.  I want to share a recipe that my daughter created last year that we quite like.  It is a wonderful spin on mashed potatoes.    Boil separately (as they cook at different rates) white potatoes and sweet potatoes or yams. Yams have a brighter color so I recommend them for this.  Mash them together and add  onion pieces, corn kernels, and diced red peppers. You can substitute sour cream or cream cheese for the butter in the mashing.  Cover with cheese and put in the oven until the cheese melts. Serve and enjoy.  For a family of four; 1 onion, 1 package of frozen corn or a couple of cobs from your garden, 1 red pepper and 3 yams and 3 white potatoes (Idaho, Russet, or Yukon Gold).  It is your choice of cheese; cheddar, Colby, Swiss or what ever you like.  You will want leftovers because it is wonderful the second day as well. I recommend to all wise magicians that you do all you can to take charge of eating tasty, low sodium, nutritious meals.  If you live in a food desert, in which you don't have good stores near you nor access to home grown food, join with your neighbors to correct that.  Sometimes stores will move into a neighborhood if petitioned. Doing magic is taking action to bring good to your life.  Bring the joy of good eating to your table.  May the spark be with you.