Boil potatoes in water with no salt. Drain, mash, and then cool the potatoes. Combine sugar, coconut, mash potatoes, vanilla and salt in a large bowl. Mix well. Refrigerate the mixture until cold. Form into 1 x 1-1/2-inch logs or to your preferred size. (You can also create a couple long logs and then cut into sections after frozen.) Place logs onto baking sheet and freeze. Microwave candy coating (1/2 lb. almond bark to 1 (12 oz.) bag of chocolate chips.)* Dip coconut logs into chocolate coating. Place onto wax paper to harden. For a glossy chocolate coating, add 1 tbsp. of paraffin wax to chocolate coating.
Cookies and Bars
Cream butter and sugar; add eggs and vanilla, sift remaining ingredients and mix until well-blended. Put 2/3 of batter into a greased 11-1/2×17-inch jelly roll pan. Spread pie filling over batter. Drop remaining batter by spoonfuls on top of pie filling. Bake 25-30 minutes at 350-degrees. Mix powdered sugar, butter, milk and almond flavoring, then drizzle over cooled bars.
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Mix 1/4 c. butter and cake mix with fork or pastry blender to coarse crumbs. Press in bottom of ungreased 15×10-inch jelly roll pan. Top with pecan halves. In a large heavy saucepan, combine brown sugar, 1 cup butter and honey. Bring to a full rolling boil over medium heat,stirring constantly. Boil 3 minutes. Remove from heat. Stir in whipping cream until well blended. Pour evenly over pecans. Bake 17-22 minutes or until entire surface is bubbly. Cool and cut.
COOKIES: Melt margarine, stir in cocoa and cool. Add sugar, eggs, vanilla and flour. Mix well. Drop 1 tsp on each section of a heated waffle iron and bake 1 minute. Cool and frost. CHOCOLATE FROSTING: Mix ingredients and add 1 tbsp hot water and make a creamy frosting.