Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Kale and Boursin Cheese

I made mac and cheese every day this week. Every day. It is the only thing I can cook right now, the only recipe my hands will agree to, the only dish that does not feel like a betrayal of the grief but rather an expression of it. The mac and cheese is not for eating, though I eat it. The mac and cheese is for Marcus. Every pot is his pot. Every serving is his serving. Every bite is the bite he cannot take, and I take it for him, standing at the counter, tasting him in the cheese the way communion tastes of grace — not literally, but in the faith that something invisible is present in the physical act of eating.

Calvin has been watching me cook with the expression of a man who is witnessing something sacred and does not want to disturb it. He eats what I make without comment because he understands, in the way that long marriages understand, that this cooking is not about him. It is about Marcus. It is about the dream. It is about a mother's hands finding their way home through cheese and butter and the muscle memory of a recipe that has been made so many times it has become part of her body, inseparable from her bones, unkillable.

On Wednesday I added something else to the mac and cheese. I made cornbread. Just cornbread. Not because anyone asked but because the cornbread wanted to be made, because my hands moved toward the cornmeal the way a compass needle moves toward north — inevitably, without conscious direction. The cornbread came out golden. It came out right. It came out the way Mama's cornbread comes out, which is the way all cornbread in this family comes out, because the recipe is in the blood and the blood does not forget, even when the cook has been dead inside for two months, even when the world has ended, even when the stove was cold for weeks that felt like years.

Thursday I made collard greens. Not Mama's recipe from the pot she brought — my recipe. My greens. My vinegar, my smoked turkey neck, my salt, my time. The greens simmered for three hours and the kitchen smelled like a kitchen again, not like nothing, not like the absence of food, but like the presence of something. The presence of cooking. The presence of Loretta Simms, still here, still standing, still at the stove where she belongs, even if the stove feels different now, even if every meal carries a weight it did not carry before, even if every pot I stir has an invisible ingredient called grief that I did not add but cannot remove.

Destiny called Thursday night and I told her I made collard greens and she was quiet and then she said Mama, Marcus would be happy. And I said I know, baby. He would be happy and he would be hungry and he would eat three plates. And we both laughed and the laughing turned into crying and the crying turned back into laughing and the laughing was the kind that only people who share a loss can share — wet and raw and alive with the specific joy of remembering someone who was joyful.

After a week of mac and cheese and cornbread and greens — after all of it, after Marcus, after the crying that turned back into laughing — I wanted something that held those same flavors but felt like a step forward. Greens and cheese and something sweet from the earth. These mashed sweet potatoes with kale and Boursin are not Marcus’s dish, but they’re mine, which means they carry him in them the same way everything I cook does now. If your kitchen has been quiet too long, start here.

TRANSITION_START

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 30 minutes | Total Time: 45 minutes | Servings: 6

Ingredients

3 pounds sweet potatoes (about 4 medium), peeled and cut into 2-inch chunks
1 bunch curly kale (about 8 oz), tough stems removed, leaves roughly chopped
1 package (5.2 oz) Boursin Garlic & Fine Herbs cheese, at room temperature
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided
1/2 cup whole milk or heavy cream, warmed
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes (optional)
1 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

Instructions

Boil the sweet potatoes. Place sweet potato chunks in a large pot and cover with cold salted water by about an inch. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce to a steady simmer. Cook until completely tender when pierced with a fork, about 18 to 22 minutes. Drain well and return to the warm pot.
Sauté the kale. While the potatoes cook, heat olive oil and 1 tablespoon of the butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add garlic and red pepper flakes if using, and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add kale in batches, tossing to wilt each addition before adding more. Once all the kale is in the pan, add the apple cider vinegar and a pinch of salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the kale is tender and any liquid has evaporated, about 6 to 8 minutes. Set aside.
Mash the potatoes. Add the remaining 3 tablespoons of butter to the drained sweet potatoes. Mash with a potato masher or hand mixer until mostly smooth. Pour in the warm milk gradually, mashing and stirring until you reach a creamy, fluffy consistency. Do not over-mix or they will turn gluey.
Fold in the cheese and greens. Break the Boursin cheese into pieces and stir it into the hot mashed potatoes until fully melted and incorporated. Fold in the sautéed kale, distributing it evenly throughout. Taste and adjust salt and black pepper as needed.
Serve warm. Transfer to a serving bowl. Finish with a small pat of butter in the center if desired, and a final crack of black pepper. Serve immediately as a side dish or a light main alongside crusty bread.

Nutrition (per serving)

Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Kale and Boursin Cheese — When the Kitchen Finds Its Way Home