We love autumn. It’s our favorite season. Sure, each day inches us closer to the hellish abyss known as winter. But, that’s how a pessimist views the world. We prefer to think about the pleasant things: crisp evenings, turning leaves, fall vegetables. Oh, pumpkins and squash and sweet potatoes, aren’t they great?

Wikipedia tells us that sweet potatoes classify as “tuberous roots.” That sounds odd. Luckily, the sweet potato doesn’t taste odd. It tastes like Thanksgiving, which tastes like America.

If you don’t like sweet potatoes, you’d best keep that quiet. Otherwise, you might find yourself banished; the authorities might ship you off to China. The joke, of course, would be on you because China leads the world in sweet potato production.

We digress. It’s autumn. Sweet potatoes abound. We made sweet potato coconut curry soup using a recipe from MinimalistBaker.com. It was rich, spicy and perfect for November.

We paired the soup with a crispy quinoa salad. We diced one red pepper and one yellow pepper. We mixed it with two handfuls of arugula. We cooked a cup of quinoa. Then, to crisp it, we spread it on cookie sheet and baked it for 15 minutes at 350°F. We placed the crispy quinoa atop the salad, which we dressed in a mixture of olive oil, salt, pepper and lemon juice.

That’s a meal that would please any red-blooded American—or someone from China or Uganda or India. Really, everyone.