spicy sweet potato mash

 This is the recipe that showed me just how messed up my oven was when I first moved into my apartment... so obviously I had to make up for that disaster by trying it again. And it was totally worth it.  I upped the spices and the hot sauce. This would make about four big side dish portions.

4 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into large chunks (about 6 per potato)
1-1 1/2 tablespoon olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 stick butter
1/2 cup half and half* To taste. Original recipe called for 1, I used 1 1/2 and kept adding until it was spicy enough (ended up with about 3). But my standards for spicy are pretty high.2-infinity tablespoons sriracha sauce*

Preheat oven to 375ºF. Put the cut potatoes on a baking sheet (on top of parchment paper, if you have it--cleanup will be much easier), flat sides up. Drizzle with the olive oil and dust with salt, pepper, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Bake until they're soft, 40-50 minutes.

Place the potato chunks in a large mixing bowl. Peel off any burnt edges (or don't... they taste kind of caramel-y and I like them), add the butter in large chunks, half and half, and sriracha. Use an electric mixer to beat the potatoes until the butter is all melted. If you don't have a mixer, mash the potatoes a bit before adding the butter and stuff. Garnish with some hot paprika.

I had these with a honeycrisp apple and some leftover chunks of calabrese salami (not pictured, but delicious). The sriracha flavor really came through in the potatoes, and so did the nutmeg. Might leave out the cinnamon next time in favor of some sweet paprika. Overall, delicious and seriously easy. Make immediately.