- [Host] This episode of Binging with Babish
is presented by The Singleton.
It's great neat, over ice, or mixed into a cocktail.
The Singleton is perfect if you're new to scotch.
Today, I'm mixing it up in an old fashioned
with maple twist, which would be a welcome addition
to any heavy Thanksgiving meal.
Now let's get started on these sweet potatoes.
I'm taking them one step further
by including the Singleton 12 year old
as a secret ingredients.
- Screw, it, bring on the yams.
(audience laughs)
- Will, but you've worked so hard.
- Yams! - Okay.
(audience laughing)
- Will, I just want to say that I'm real sorry
for whatever I did to you in high school.
- Oh, it wasn't just me.
We had a club.
- You had a club?
- That's right.
The I hate Rachel Green club. - [Host] Hey, what's up guys?
Welcome back to Binging with Babish
where this week we're taking a look
at the yams from Friends,
which I'm guessing we're not yams at all,
but sweet potatoes like these ones.
Here in the states, the word yam and sweet potato
are used interchangeably,
but they are an entirely different genus of things.
And since real yams are typically imported
from tropical climates, the domestic sweet potato
is going to be our weapon of choice.
I've got three large ones here, about four pounds worth,
that I'm going to peel and cut into one inch chunks.
It doesn't have to be an exact science.
You want them to be roughly the same size.
So they cook at roughly the same rate.
As we cook them the way we would most potatoes,
in cold water brought to a boil.
Once we've heavily salted these guys
and brought them up to a simmer
we're cooking for 12 to 15 minutes
until completely cooked through and showing no resistance
when stabbed with a paring knife.
this is going to be the foundation
for our super basic sweet potato casserole.
Go ahead and drain these and put them in a big old bowl,
along with some enhancements.
Eight ounces of light brown sugar,
four ounces of unsalted melted butter,
a teaspoon of vanilla extract,
a generous pinch of kosher salt and get to mashing.
Now sweet potatoes are pretty fibrous little tubers,
so you're not going to get these
super smooth with a potato masher,
but they'll still be very, very good.
Generously grease a 9 by 13 pan with non-stick spray,
spread them out nice and evenly,
but it doesn't matter if you get them super smooth
because we're going to top them with
something I wasn't allowed to have
on my yams as a child, marshmallows.
An entire 10 ounce bag of the mini variety.
Spread those out nice and evenly,
and then this guy's headed into a 325 degree Fahrenheit oven
with the rack set in the lowest position
for anywhere from 25 to 30 minutes
until the marshmallows are golden brown
and have coalesced into a pebbly marshmallows singularity.
Let that sit for five to 10 minutes before serving
and that's all there is to it.
A super simple, unbelievably delicious
sweet potato casserole.
Now, despite going from raw sweet potato
to casserole in under an hour,
it's gotta be the best sweet potato casserole
I've ever tasted, maybe because I've never tried it
with marshmallows before.
So what could we possibly do to improve
on an already perfect food?
Well, we're going to have to get pretty nit-picky.
Now this recipe is going to be
kind of an amalgamation of improvements.
You can take any one of them and apply it
to the last recipe and it will have an effect.
First up, instead of boiling our sweet potato cubes,
we're going to sous vide them.
Food scientist Harold McGee has pointed out
that sous vide-ing sweet potatoes at 170 degrees Fahrenheit
activates some kind of enzyme or something
that makes them naturally sweeter.
So we don't have to use quite as much sugar.
This is going to be far and away the most optional step,
because it is the biggest pain in the ass,
especially when you accidentally make your bag too big.
So go ahead and subdivide your potatoes
into two smaller bags, maybe with a cinnamon stick or two,
and then drop them into a 170 degree Fahrenheit water bath
for one and one half hours, weighing down if necessary
to make sure that they're submerged.
Now, this is going to do that enzyme sweetness thing,
but it's also going to mostly cook the potatoes
so that they're ready to mash up
when they come out of the sous vide.
So while these guys float,
we're going to make some brown butter.
Dumping five ounces of unsalted butter
into a medium saucepan, swirling pretty constantly
over medium heat until the milk solids separate
and start to turn a nutty brown.
Set aside to cool.
And then 90 minutes later,
we got ourselves some potatoes.
Go ahead and fetch these
out of Davy Jones' miniature locker,
and place them in a large bowl,
along with more enhancements.
Our brown butter,
make sure you get all those little brown bits.
Four and a half ounces of light brown sugar,
four ounces of creme fresh,
two tablespoons of maple syrup,
one tablespoon of vanilla paste,
or a teaspoon of vanilla extract,
a half teaspoon ground cinnamon,
quarter teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg,
generous pinch of kosher salt.
And for both structure and richness, three beaten egg yolks.
Go ahead and mix those all together with a paddle
until evenly distributed,
but you'll notice that I'm not mashing
and that's because I'm going to puree.
The only way to break down all that fibrous junk
in the sweet potatoes is with the power of a food processor.
Blitzing for about 60 seconds in batches
until dreamily smooth.
Once again, we're placing this in a 9 by 13 casserole,
this time generously lubed up with unsalted butter.
Spread it around nice and evenly
and whatever you do, don't taste it,
because it has eggs in it.
Andy, Andy, I said, no, tasties,
God, you're difficult.
So now for an added flavor explosion,
we're going to make ourselves a pecan streusel,
combining four and a half ounces of all purpose flour,
six ounces of brown sugar,
and four and a half ounces of roughly processed pecans.
This kind of undoes any sugar savings
that we got from our sous vide process,
so do this at your own risk.
Once all the dry ingredients are combined,
we're going to add two and a half ounces of melted butter,
adding more as necessary until the streusel
has the texture of very wet sand.
Press it together and crumble it
over the top of the sweet potatoes.
And then this guy's headed into
that 325 degree Fahrenheit oven
for the same 25 to 30 minutes.
During which time we can make
our whiskey marshmallow topping.
We're starting by dissolving half an ounce
or two packets of unflavored gelatin
and five ounces of cold water.
Setting that aside to se and then making a sugar syrup.
Into a small saucepan goes six ounces of sugar,
two ounces of water, one ounce of light corn syrup,
and two ounces of the Singleton
12 year old single malt scotch whiskey.
Whisk this together gently to combine
and place over medium heat,
covering and bringing to a simmer.
Once it's simmering, take off the lid,
and then we're going to cook this to 255 degrees Fahrenheit,
otherwise known as the firm ball stage.
Once that temperature is reached,
kill the heat, add a little splash of whiskey
and set aside to cool down to 212 degrees Fahrenheit.
During which time we're going to set our gelatin
over a double boiler to melt it and combine it
and our 212 degree Fahrenheit sugar syrup
in the bowl of a stand mixer.
Then using our wire whisk attachment,
we're going to whip this guy on medium-high speed,
starting off slow, of course,
for up to 10 to 15 minutes
until it's damn near quadrupled in volume
and it's reached the stiff peak stage.
And with that, my friends, you have made
homemade whiskey marshmallow,
which you could pour into a casserole
and cut cubes for traditional marshmallows.
Or before it sets, you can pipe it
onto your slightly cooled casserole.
You want it just cooled enough
that it doesn't melt the marshmallow.
Then you can let this set for an hour
and put it in a 350 degree Fahrenheit oven to brown it.
Or if your casserole is still hot
and you want to eat it right now, you can use a torch.
And there you have it.
The ultimate super smooth, super sweet, super crunchy,
super creamy, super marshmallow-y, sweet potato casserole.
I don't have footage of it,
but we picked that this throughout the day
and the three of us almost finished the entire thing.
Now, all we need is an accompanying cocktail
for our holiday meal.
I'm thinking of maple old fashioned,
for which I'm going to make
a quick little orange peel garnish,
and then I'm constructing this cocktail in the glass.
So I've got a big old ice cube here.
Then over top, I'm going to pour one and a half ounces
of the Singleton 12, a little splash of club soda,
which I like cause it kind of lightens things up.
A few dashes of your favorite bitters
and about a teaspoon of maple syrup to taste.
This plays really nice as a sweetener in an old fashioned.
Mix everybody together thoroughly
by virtue of your bar spoon,
garnish with your orange twist.
And there you have it, a maple old fashioned.
A perfect pairing for our sweet potato casserole
or whatever else Thanksgiving throws at you.
Thanks again to the Singleton single malt scotch whiskey
for partnering with me on this episode
and the other episodes this year.
If you're intimidated by scotch, don't be.
The Singleton 12 year old is easy to enjoy
and mixes so well into your favorite cocktails
because it's light and slightly sweet.
These same flavor notes work wonderfully
in the sweet potatoes.
When you gather with friends and family this holiday,
reach for any of the bottles in the Singleton family.
There's something for everyone's taste preference.
To get a bottle for yourself,
head to the link in the video description.
Thanks again to The Singleton
for a great partnership this year.
(light music)