0 Potato Candy

Monday, April 29, 2013
Tomorrow we are losing one of our dearest co-workers. She is getting a promotion and being re-located. She has been the oil that has kept our well oiled machine running though others have compared her to the glue that holds  us together. I don't even know what her formal job title is... but I know that no matter what is going on, what questions I have, who/what I am looking for, she knows all the details without looking them up and always points me, or whoever is inquiring, in the right direction. She is the person who knows everything about everything. I'm not really sure what we are going to do without her, but I know that I will not be full-time after May so that is my consolation. I work at an elementary school with over 730 kids. She knows all of them, their names, their siblings, who their parents are and what class you can find them in.

 As sort of a going-away thing, we are having a pot-luck lunch tomorrow.
 I am part of the department that always gets told "bring whatever you want". Most departments get assigned dishes, i.e. 3rd grade teachers bring veggies, 5th grade brings desert, etc.. I would much rather them tell me "hey Sam, bring an apple pie" or "hey Sam, bring mashed potatoes" but of course, they can't even narrow it down a little bit for me. I really shouldn't complain, it leaves my horizons wide open... this however gets a little overwhelming and I realize I am over-thinking our little pot-luck.. But, I decided to make potato candy. I have heard tell of it but never a description of flavor or even appearance, I simply knew that there was something called potato candy, my grandma has made it before, and it was supposedly really good. Without a description of any kind I decided that it was in fact what I was going to make, a quick internet search to compare ingredients of several variations eliminated the need to make a grocery run (thank goodness). So off I went to my kitchen after throwing a couple potatoes in the oven and pulling out the rest of the required items, I began haphazardly throwing together what I imagined would be the most amazing pot-luck dish ever... 

What I used:
Potatoes: two small golden potatoes, baked and smooshed
Butter, about 3/4 of a tablespoon
Milk, just a splash
Powdered sugar, literally all the powdered sugar I had
Vanilla, just a little bit
Mix, mix, mix...
Then mix some more. This is where it started to look like it was going to maybe start thinking about thickening... I was terribly unprepared for the amount of powdered sugar this required.
I stupidly turned it out when I thought it was dough-y... It wasn't.
After that, I added flour since I was out of powdered sugar and it had turned into a  mass that I began to consider naming B.O.B.
It literally was everywhere and much like the character it sort of just refused to hold shape.
I then managed to get it into a consistency reminiscent of the play-dough my Grama used to make for me after school.. 
I rolled it out and sliced it into two manageable size slabs and spread the peanut butter over it 
Then began rolling it up
After it was rolled I wrapped it in foil and stuck it in the freezer to chill for a little bit (while I typed this up and made my sacrifice to the kitchen gods)
Once it has chilled it can be sliced, I ended up with a pretty thick roll and got fairly large, cookie size slices, in a do-over, I would roll the dough thinner and keep the roll skinnier to make smaller, more bite-size slices. This is very rich. the dough itself tastes like sugar which is unsurprising considering it basically is just that. With the peanut butter inside, it tastes very much like peanut butter fudge in a very sugary kind of way. I was pretty happy with the outcome however after my sacrifice to the kitchen gods I immediately ate an entire two baked potatoes in attempt to counteract the inevitable sugar hangover and to suppress the very real threat of my body rejecting the shear amount of pure sugar I just consumed. In the candy's defense I definitely over-did it by a LOT.. My advice to you: Do not attempt to eat a cheeseburger size portion of this all at once.