A good chunk of this past week’s weather involved drizzling and cool temperatures, and believe me, it was more than welcomed here. I was thankful that there was no torrential downpours or gale-force winds, just stillness and cloud cover. If it was extreme, I wouldn’t have been able to go outside a little and take some photos, and I love taking photos. 
This weather obviously calls for more comfort food! Which leads me to the 10 lb. sack of organic sweet potatoes that I got at Costco recently. That’s a lot of freakin’ sweet potatoes.
So, I decided to roast them, as I do with almost everything else in the Fall and Winter seasons. But, in the midst of doing so I get a text from my friend Tristan, “Soup Coffee Pie Let’s gooooo!!!”, to which I responded, “I’m actually making soup right now!” I then invited him over to join me in my feasting and decided that corn bread should be made, because duh, it’s cornbread. This is where I paused, because I don’t have a go-to cornbread recipe.
Using my favorite tool, Google, I came upon Pickles & Honey’s Simple Vegan Cornbread recipe and couldn’t wait to switch it up a bit. I honestly changed quite a lot of the recipe, using coconut oil instead of canola, adding 2 tbsp. pickled jalapeños, and using 1/2 cup water with 1/2 cup creamed corn instead of non-dairy milk. In the end I think I could have added a little more maple syrup or salt in it, and next time use a little more corn meal instead of a 1:1 ratio; but, it was still pretty tasty with a little vegan butter on top. It’s even better crumbled over this delicious, smoky sweet potato soup.
Hints of chipotle, smoked paprika and cayenne pepper for a kick, warm you up quickly. While a touch of maple syrup brings out the slight sweetness of the sweet potatoes and carrots. Roasting everything before letting it simmer in broth really caramelizes the veggies and gives their flavors more depth. I used an immersion blender for this recipe, but you can always blend in batches to reach a thickness and texture of your preference.
