This quick and easy sweet potato casserole recipe is a great dish for holiday dinners and potlucks as it can be made the day before and baked the next day!
Tasty Sweet Potato Recipes
This sweet potato casserole recipe is a great dish for holiday dinners and potlucks. It is an amazingly delicious addition to any meal, but is especially wonderful with traditional Thanksgiving and Christmas meals. If your family isn’t fond of nuts, you can leave out the pecans.
Sweet potato dishes are a perfect addition to late fall and winter meals, making them a perfect recipe for your Thanksgiving dinner or Christmas dinner. Sweet potatoes are generally harvested in September and early October, but since they take up to eight weeks of curing and storage after harvest to sweeten, Thanksgiving is the perfect time to start using them! This is why so many of us have fond memories of our grandmothers or mothers serving sweet potato casserole and other sweet potato dishes at Thanksgiving and Christmas!
If you’re expecting things to be hectic or if you’ll be short on time, you can make the sweet potato casserole the day before you need it and then just bake it the next day. When you’re preparing a lot of holiday dishes, it is great to spread out the work over a couple days so you’re not overwhelmed doing it all at once.
Sweet Potato Casserole With Pecans Or Marshmallows?
The sweet potato casserole recipe below is our original recipe with a tasty carmely topping made from pecans and brown sugar. It is still my favorite way to make it but not all of my family appreciated the pecans. You can just leave the pecans out of the recipe and it will still turn out delicious.
If you prefer, you can easily add a marshmallow topping instead. To do that, simply make the sweet potato casserole recipe with mini-marshmallows instead of the pecan topping. After mixing the main casserole ingredients and placing them in the casserole dish, spread a bag of mini marshmallows over the top and bake as directed below. The marshmallows should turn a golden brown.
The gooey browned marshmallows add a nice flavor to the sweet potato casserole, which my kids have always loved.
If you’re feeling extra adventurous, you can also make the sweet potato casserole recipe with pecans just as the recipes calls for and THEN add the mini-marshmallows and bake! Oh YUM! Talk about a sweet and nutty flavor explosion!
The BEST Sweet Potato Casserole Recipe
This is the best sweet potato casserole recipe ever! It is so quick and easy and makes a tasty dish, perfect for holiday dinners and potlucks. And it’s easy to make the day before you need it and bake just before serving!
Ingredients
3 cups sweet potatoes, mashed
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter or margarine, melted
2 eggs
1 Tbsp. vanilla
Topping:
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1 cup pecans
1/2 cup flour
1/3 cup butter, melted
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°.
- Mix all of the casserole ingredients.
- Put everything in a buttered 9×9 casserole dish.
- Mix topping ingredients.
- Sprinkle topping over the top of the sweet potato mixture.
- Bake uncovered at 350° for 20 minutes.
Notes
If your family isn’t fond of nuts, you can leave out the pecans and it will turn out just fine.
For Marshmallow Topping:
If you prefer, you can easily add a marshmallow topping instead. After mixing the main casserole ingredients and placing them in the casserole dish, spread 1 (10.5 oz.) package miniature marshmallows over the top and bake as directed. The marshmallows will turn a golden brown.
For Pecan And Marshmallow Topping:
Make the recipe according to the directions above. Before baking, spread 1 (10.5 oz.) package miniature marshmallows over the top of the casserole and the pecan topping and bake as usual.
This sweet potato casserole recipe is from volume 1 of our cookbook! For more easy and delicious recipes like this, check out our cookbooks here!
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If you’re in the mood for something different, here’s an easy candied sweet potatoes recipe you can also make to take advantage of the extra sweet potatoes you bought. This recipe is also good for holiday meals, but I often serve it throughout the winter as a side to some of our other easy family dinners.
Candied Sweet Potatoes Recipe
This candied sweet potatoes recipe gives a yummy new twist to the classic traditional sweet potatoes with a little “red hot candy” flavor! It’s perfect for holiday and seasonal meals or any time you’re craving sweet potatoes!
Ingredients
1 cup sugar
1 cup water
3/4 cup red cinnamon candies (red hots)
1/2 cup (stick) margarine
3–4 sweet potatoes (enough to cover the bottom of large skillet)
1/2 cup pecans (optional)
Instructions
- In a large skillet, heat the first 4 ingredients to boiling.
- Peel and slice sweet potatoes into pieces about 1 1/2 inches thick.
- Place sweet potato slices in a single layer in the syrup.
- If desired, sprinkle the pecans over the top.
- Cover and cook slowly over medium heat until the sweet potatoes are done and the syrup is thick (about 1 hour). Baste a few times with syrup while cooking.
I make sweet potato casserole. My recipe is very similar. Everyone loves this and requests it each year. It’s almost like a dessert. I can’t wait for next Thursday…yum!!!
These look so good. Will try. Thanks.
Does anyone have a sweet potato casserole recipe that uses honey bunches of oats cereal and pecans for the topping?
It did not seem to have a lot of extra sugar but had good flavor. I had this at a potluck dinner of over 200 people but could not find the cook to get the recipe.
Thanks
Teri
Teri in Nebraska looking for recipe using honey bunches of oats cereal and pecans for topping sweet potato casserole.
Find the maker of the cereal and go to the web site. Most if not all cereal companies have many good recipes on line. I’m guessing you’ll find what you are looking for there. You might also want to try your favorite streusel topping recipe and substitute the honey oat cereal for the flour in the recipe.
Can you use something else besides butter in these recipes? My husband is allergic to butter and margarine.
You maybe could use Crisco. What do you usually substitute in your recipes? Those might work.
Carol, If your husband is allergic to milk products only, you can use Fleischmans unsalted margarine and just add a 1/2 tsp salt for each stick. My son has been allergic to milk all of his 22 years!
I am going to make this tomorrow. I made it around Christmas time and it was a HIT! My husband and kids loved it! even my mother wanted me to make it again!–which is saying something because everything I know about cooking, I learned from her:)
Sweet Potatoe Casserole has been a hit with my family for year. When I first started making it, I called it Sweet Potatoe Surprise. We all love it! Just wish I could find a version with less calories!
For Carol, whose husband is allergic to butter and margarine, I don’t know anything definite about this but I know vegans use it. Earth Balance Spread might be a possibility because it has no milk in it if it’s the milk he can’t have. There also might be something in natural foods he can have I think there is a butter like spread made out of tofu I have seen at our store. I’m not a vegetarian or a vegan just a disclaimer here but you might check it out if you have a natural foods store or supermarket section near you.
Hey, I got walnuts by mistake. Could those substitute well for the pecans? I’m not terribly fond of pecans anyways.
yes!
Stopping by to share your sweet potatoes in my roundup. This casserole looks so delicious.
Blessings,
Diane Roark
pubx
I will try first recipe as I would have to tweak second one as I am allergic to Red Hots.
You could use mini marshmallows in place of sugar. I tried it recently and it was good. My 90 year old neighbor liked it too. I served it with meatloaf (using the recipe from Dining on a Dime) which was also highly praised!
Our family absolutely loves this sweet potato casserole and is requested every Thanksgiving and Christmas. I add a little rum extract with vanilla extract to the recipe. Always delicious!
Thank you for letting us know Mary Beth. I don’t eat sweet potatoes but I do eat this recipe too
Hi there!
Sweet potato or candied yams has been a tradition in our family for at least 70 years. As an adult cook I began making it different ways myself from 1 year to the next. I’ve added cranberries, sliced apples, walnuts, almonds, and of course pecans, and raisins. I’ve added rolled oats to the topping sometimes, and soaked the raisins or apple bits in brandy before adding them. The brandy adds amazing flavor!! Maple syrup can also be added as a drizzle over it all ( may want to use less sugar).
AS a vegetarian, I use Myokos non-dairy cultured butter
— which is delicious and totally interchangeable with butter in my recipes. Try it on toast if you have any doubts! It is not a margarine. Most of the big grocery chains carry it, but you can guarantee that you’ll find it at health food stores and Whole Foods. It is healthier for you, but not low calorie by any means –just like butter. And it is about the price of premium butter.