#and for almost everything theres a regular ass equivalent!!

[eosofspades]

my incredibly controversial fantasy genre take when it comes to writing is that you Do Not Actually Need to use high fantasy language and make up words for stuff, and sometimes it can be better if you don't

like. maybe it's just me but i find it a lot harder to get immersed in a story when the worldbuilding is SO intricate and detailed you need a glossary or have to pour over a thousand years of history in the span of a couple pages. i would MUCH rather read a high fantasy novel where the magic kingdom is just called The Garden or the deserted string of floating islands is just called The Wastelands or magic is just called magic instead of unpronounceable words and terms that have to be memorized.

especially for me, when it comes to writing, my stories are SO grounded in character relationships and dynamics, that trying to dig into the specific lore and structure of the world around just breaks the immersion and takes away from the characters themselves.

i know some writers are gonna insist this is just "being lazy" but i firmly believe that sometimes it is the best writing decision to allow simplicity and ease of understanding in your high fantasy setting, and that it can actually make the character complexities and relationships hit harder, because you're not distracted at all with remembering fantasy terminology.

[thenobullshtblog-blog]

I Yam what I Yam.

Sweet Potatoesssss are the first thing I’m gonna show you how to make. Although I didn’t buy these with yesterdays trip to the Shop of Rite I did get them last week. Again, fairly in expensive, I want to say they are roughly 79 cents per pound? You may also see sweet potatoes listed as “yams” or “sweet yams” don’t worry, they are part of the same family with nearly the same nutritional value (it’s the equivalent of comparing yellow bell peppers to red bell peppers).

*disclaimer* I know this prep seems extensive in terms of instruction but I really have a lot of instafriends that have no idea how to cook AT ALL. Theres nothing wrong with that. Everybody has to learn, and they all start somewhere. If you’re more experienced and are just looking for the choice of spicing-skip through. If you need the extra help-I gotchu fam.

Prep time: 10-15 mins (say wahhhh)

Cook time:20-40 minutes

Ingredients you’ll need:

2 generous sized Sweet potatoes (I normally pick ones that are about the size of my two fists put together sidebyside.)

Olive Oil (preferably the non thotty kind-Extra Virgin)

Minced Garlic (I buy the minced garlic in a jar, it’s so much easier to deal with)

Cinnamon (ground cinnamon, any brand)

Nutmeg (ground nutmeg, not required-highly recommended)

Dill weed (dried, any brand- comes in a small spice jar)

Paprika (regular (not smoked),any brand)

Salt (table salt)

Pepper (ground)

Vanilla Extract (I prefer McCormick, but any will do)

Butter (I use Land O Lakes-if you use country crock, or I cant believe its not butter gtfo my blog, please)

Cooking Items you’ll need:

Cutting board

Chef Knife (used for chopping and dicing)

Spoonula (the silicone spatula things, yes that is their technical name)

Aluminum Foil (or if you call it tin foil)

A standard sized baking pan (make sure it has the sides on it, not the flat cookie sheet)

Before you do anything with the food: Wash your hands, dirty ass.

Preheat your oven to 400degrees.

Cover your baking pan with tin foil

Take your potatoes, and give them a good rinse under running tap water. use your hands to help scrape off any extra dirt that isn’t easily falling off.

Pat the potatoes dry with a paper towel, make sure your hands are completely dry before handling the Chef Knife. (Don’t be a fu*king Susan and pick up a knife with wet hands-serious party foul.)

Cut the tips off the potatoes..just the tip.

Cube the potatoes (if you don’t know what this means, slice the potatoes into roughly 1 inch slices, so you have little potato wheels, take those wheels, lay them flat and cut them into quarters or 6ths so you have little cubes or wedges-they obvi won’t be perfect cubes.)

As you cube the potatoes, throw them on the foil lined baking pan

Once you’re done cutting them up, you’re going to take all the spices and literally just throw them on top of the potatoes on the pan. Seriously.

Okay I NEVER use measurements or a recipe, #fact. I base every amount of spice I use on smell and just knowing what the flavoring of each spice is. I truly feel like this is the best way to cook things that you enjoy eating-a recipe may call for a dash of cinnamon but maybe you fu*king love cinnamon and want half the jar. Do it. Its your food. You can make it taste however you want. Use a recipe as a guideline until you get more comfortable with the taste of certain spices and their potency.

For all intent and purposes I will try my BEST to give you amounts of each ingredient. YES I did list the ingredients twice in this blog BECAUSE the few times I did use an actual online recipe I hated having to keep scrolling up to see what I needed vs the directions on how to use it, and it was just a bitch. So here you go, I saved you some scrolling.

1.5 tablespoons of Olive Oil

1.5 tablespoons melted butter (put some butter in a small dish and pop it in the microwave for literally like 7 seconds and then pour it on top of the potatoes)

½  teaspoon of vanilla extract (vanilla extract is an extract, which means its highly concentrated. Less is more)

1 spoonful of minced garlic (literally just dip a small spoon into the jar, pull it out and bam. usually the equivalent of ½ tablespoon)

¼ teaspoon nutmeg (nutmeg is a VERY potent spice. Use sparingly until you figure it out)

1-1.5 tablespoons cinnamon

½ tablespoon of the dried dill weed

½ teaspoon paprika

Salt and pepper- a light sprinkle over the pan. (don’t be an animal. Your food shouldn’t taste like salt)

Once you've thrown all the dry and wet spices/ingredients onto the pan/over the potatoes-take your spoonula and mix that shit in. Reallyyyy well. You want to make sure every potato has a generous covering of everything. You don’t want one potato to have like half a spoonful of garlic on it and the rest of the pan is bare-its gonna taste like dogshit if you do that. Mix and incorporate everything together really well.

Now that you’ve mixed everything-pop your pan in the oven (on the middle rack), and set a timer for 20 minutes. (Usually I take this time to clean my mess up, multitasking for the win)

After 20 minutes, with your oven mits, open the oven-pull the center rack with the pan on it, half way out so you can reach the potatoes with a fork without burning yourself .

Stick a fork in a few of the potatoes-your potatoes should be “fork tender” meaning, you can stick a fork in them easily with little to no resistance. It should almost feel like sticking a fork in butter. If you can’t break through easily and they seem hard- push the rack all the way back into the oven, close the oven and set a timer for another 7-10 mins.

If after another 7-10 minutes, they still aren’t quite done-only put them back in for 5mins at a time.

Usually your potatoes will cook to perfect temp within 20-40 mins. I know 20 minutes difference seems super variable but it really depends on your oven (gas or electric) and how many potatoes you had on the pan/how big the cubes are. So, just keep an eye on them until you do this a few times and get to know your oven.

Okay, finally they’re done-pull them out. Let them cool for about 10 minutes and then dig in.

Healthy, and delicious. If they’re not delicious, you probably low key fu*ked something up- oh well, they’re still edible! Try again next time. That’s the beauty of cooking, you always have more opportunities to perfect, and get it right.

Comment if you’ve tried them and let me know what you think!