We remember the chill we felt years ago when we were asked to bring something "sweet potatoey" in a casserole to a potluck Thanksgiving dinner.

"Do whatever you like with it," chirped our hostess.

Instead of feeling comforted by her open-ended invitation to step into the kitchen and let loose with four pounds of sweet potatoes and a casserole, we were catatonic. As Northerners who thought baking was the beginning and end of things you could do with sweet potatoes, the idea of putting them in a casserole was more than we could manage.

If you go to Google and type in "sweet potato casseroles" you'll come face to face with thousands of recipes and lots of words such as "sticky-sweet" and "spirited."

Then, we remembered a mashed sweet potato concoction with crushed pineapple and marshmallows that we had once eaten, and our Thanksgiving recipe started to take shape.

In addition to the sweet potatoes, which were mixed with brown sugar and butter, we added Southern pecans, a little vanilla and a slug of bourbon. The details are fuzzy but we do remember that in the end, it resembled Kentucky Bourbon Sweet Potato Casserole.

Look for Relish magazine, celebrating America's love of food, each first Wednesday in The Augusta Chronicle. For more Relish recipes, to sign up for our biweekly newsletter or to leave us a note on our message boards, log on to relishmag.com.