Pan Roast Sweet Potatoes

I large sweet potatoe per person
Boil potatoes in a rolling boil for 20 to 22 minutes, Remove potatoes from pan and lay out on a towel or paper towels to dry and cool(about 3 hours)

Peel potatoes under cold water and cut into 2 inch chunks(irregular shapes)

Heat deep fat frier to 350 degrees and deep fry potatoes to a golden crisp tecture.

Meanwhile, melt 4 tbs butter, 1/2 cup brown sugar, 2 tbs water, 1 tsp cinnamon, and 1 tsp vanilla. Stir until blended and thickened.
Serve over sweet potatoes

(Pan roast is an expression my Mom used for cooking potatoes right along with the roast in the pan. It has
carried over in the family for years. Sorry if it is incorrect.)

Uh, this sounds good, but....

When does the pan roasting part come in?

I'ts unfortunate that many recipes try to deceive us by using such terms. Many times you will see the term "roasted" to hide the fact that there is deep-frying involved. Even though in this recipe the potatoes are boiled, then deep-fryed and the sauce is prepared in a separate pan to pour over.

Also - In this case - the potatoes can easily be peeled and chunked after boiling, transferred to pan and "roasted" with butter, etc. without the step of deep-frying. There is a possibility that the original recipe did not call for deep-frying and that is why it was called Pan Roasted. "Tweaking" recipes can change a lot - including the name or the meaning of the name.

Roast Roasting is a cooking method that utilizes dry heat, whether an open flame, oven, or other heat source. Roasting usually causes caramelization of the surface of the food, which is considered a flavor enhancement. Meats and most root and bulb vegetables can be roasted. Any piece of meat, especially red meat, that has been cooked in this fashion is called a roast. Vegetables and poultry prepared in this way are referred to as roasted (e.g. roasted chicken or roasted squash); the purpose of roasting is to create a golden brown crust on whatever it is we are roasting and, at the same time, make sure the meat, fish, or vegetable properly cooks in the center. When roasting, no liquid such as broth, wine, or water comes in contact with the food?only hot air, or, if the roast is being basted, hot fat.

Don't get me started, Mama, on the misuse of terms and techniques. It's far too prevalent.

My favorite example is when the healthy-foods folk jumped on the idea of sauteeing in juice, wine, or water. Bzzt! Wrong! Thanks for playing. By definition, sauteeing means to cook very quickly in a little oil. "Saute" is French for "to jump." And that, of course, is what the food does in the pan.

However, it's being suplanted in my heart by the misuse of the word "confit," as in, "confit of carrots" or the like. Again, by definition, you cannot have such a think, becaust to confit something means to poach it in its own grease. So, you can have duck confit, and chicken confit, and, to push the point, even confit of lamb. But unless there's a new breed of carrots, with a lot of natural oil, you cannot have carrot confit.

And then there's carpaccio (sp) which has to do with raw meat (in the purest sense of the word, raw veal but the concept's been stretched). But nowadays you see menu items like zucchini carpaccio. Uh, huh!

And of course......well, I told you not to get me started.

Face it KY - there's not a thing we can do about it! With my 50+ years of cooking and baking, teaching chefs, cooks, etc. - it sickens me to see what they are doing with terms/terminology.

I do not believe in it - and I am against it. And I am also to the point where I would like to choke the living crap out of the birdbrain idiots that are substituting words like braise, saute, etc. and replacing them with "fry". Just as an example. Fry is used for anything in a pan these days - like fried in the oven. I've heard it all!

It's not right that today they don't even know what dry heat cooking is. And I had a woman in her 30's write me - what is an open flame? You think I haven't been asked questions that sound like a joke? What is a rolling boil? And since boiling/simmering water is the same to many - why isn't steaming and boiling the same? You'd be surprised what I have come across in all these years and it is getting worse. And they just can't get it. I am sick to death of hearing that their mother/grandmother just did this or that. Amazing how so many haven't died of food poisoning as well.

They take home ec out of the grammar schools where it should be learned (especially if the child comes from a home where cooking is practically non-existent!) and then they remove the terms from the culinary dictionary because no one knows what it is - let alone do a procedure properly!

So let's beat them at their game - COOK IT OR BAKE IT - because that is just where we are heading!

Yer preachin' to the choir, Mama

Boy oh boy do we see eye to eye on this one.

>And since boiling/simmering water is the same to many - why isn't steaming and boiling the same? <

At least this one makes some sort of sense, in a "if this, therefore that" kind of reasoning. If boiling and simmering are the same, therefore, boiling and steaming are the same. Logical! Of course, logic is a house built on sand, but that's another problem.

>You'd be surprised what I have come across in all these years and it is getting worse.<

No, I wouldn't be surprised. And yes, it is getting worse. Unfortunatly, as long as people like Sandra Lee have access to millions of people worldwide, the dumming down of the culinary arts will just accelerate.

>So let's beat them at their game - COOK IT OR BAKE IT - because that is just where we are heading!<

Nah, that won't work. It just brings us back to the concept of dry heat.

So many terms are being lost, forgotten, unused, pushed to the side, ignored - etc. as well as s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-d beyond the limit and we have the so-called "experts" (like Sandra Lee - who actually is a big baby playing in a kitchen) that are leading today's cooks down the path of "HUH" ?????

And to think that they are going to be teaching our futures cooks!

Scares me.

I am dead-set against it - but I cannot change the world. I teach - and I teach exactly as it is supposed to be taught. Don't like it? There's the door - don't let it hit you in the butt on the way out. When I am teaching - I don't care who told you what - it's my way or the highway. Period. You think you know it all - teach your own classes and see just how far you will get. My first lesson is the toughest - and the worst anyone can imagine. Make it through that class and you're on your way. They all come back for the second class - amazing. But they learn and they know to do everything the way it should be.

I do not put out into the world - Sanda Lee's and the like.

Unfortunately - someone is probably out there trying to figure out how to beat Sanda Lee at her game - and so another following will begin.............