Irish potato candy

Today's recipe for Irish potato candy was my first real attempt in which I did not have a concrete recipe. I knew the ingredients I would use, but I did not have a list of measures of each ingredient. This may sound scary to some, but experimentation is fun!

Irish potato candy is a Phily thing, there's even a Wikipedia article about it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_potato_candy. There are many variations, but most don't require any baking so it seems like something that anyone can make.

The ingredients:

• One large potato
• One package shredded coconut
• One bag powdered sugar
• Cinnamon
• Butter
• Vanilla

First, cut the potato into small cubes and boil it. When it's done, you need to mash it with butter. I used about 2 tablespoons.

After the potato is mashed, add about 1 tsp vanilla and start adding sugar. Technically, you should be adding the powdered sugar until it's a consistency which is easy to roll; that's a lot of sugar. I used about 3/4 of a 2 lb bag and it was fairly sticky, so don't be afraid to add more.

Once it has reached the appropriate consistency, add in the bag of coconut. I used a 2 lb bag. At this point, you should pour some cinnamon in a small bowl and start rolling the mixture into little balls that look like peeled potatoes. After they are rolled, sprinkle them with cinnamon or roll them in the bowl of cinnamon to coat them.

That's pretty much all there is to the recipe. I let mine sit in the fridge overnight to cool and stiffen up and I sat them on wax paper, but I used less sugar than the recipe called for so mine were a bit sticky.

If you want, you can use cream cheese instead of potato, but feel free to experiment. Happy cooking!