Sweet Potato Fries (Baked)

These sweet potato fries are delicious and they are baked.  My one year old thoroughly enjoys them and so do I.  Plus, they’re easy!

Ingredients:

• 24 oz sweet potatoes
• olive oil, salt, and pepper

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.
2. Cut the potatoes into sticks (like French fries).
3. Toss with olive oil, salt and pepper.
4. Spread the potato onto a baking sheet.  Try not to overcrowd the pan.  Spread into a single layer.
5. Bake, stirring halfway through, for 25 minutes.

Miso-Roasted Vegetable Salad

Ingredients serves 2

• 1 bunch kale
• 1 sweet potato, about 1/2lb (Japanese sweet potato recommended)
• 1 purple top turnip (8oz)
• 2 scallions, white part only
• 1/4 cup sweet white miso paste
• 1 Tbsp sesame oil
• 1/2 tsp spice blend that includes white sesame seeds, black sesame seeds, kibbled nori, and aleppo pepper)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 450°F.
2. Prep the vegetables.  Thinly slice the scallions on an angle, separating the white bottoms from the green tops. Remove and discard the kale stems; roughly chop the leaves. Cut the turnip and potato into 1/4-inch rounds.
3. Mix together the miso paste and 1/4 cup of water.
4. Place the  sweet potato and turnip on a sheet pan and drizzle with the miso-water mixture.  Toss thoroughly to coat.  Arrange in an even layer and roast, stirring halfway through, 20 to 22 minutes, or until tender when pierced with a fork.
5. Combine the kale, sesame oil, white bottoms of the scallions, roasted vegetables, and spice blend.  Season with salt and pepper.

Original recipe from Blue Apron.

Afternoon Snack: Sweet Potato with a Dash of This and That

Yes. this is a picture of a decimated sweet potato skin. This is what I do to food the second I return home from work.  First there’s the traffic, time to contemplate just how hungry I am, and then there is the shoveling sustenance into mouth.

Often I crave sweet at these ravenous moments.  My after work snacks frequently interfere with my dinner appetite, are usually calorie-laden, and are almost always nutrition-light.  But, and here’s the key point, this snack takes less than seven minutes to prepare!  Also, it’s delicious. To top it all off, the sweet potato is the most nutritious vegetable according to a 1992 study by the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

So here’s my new go-to snack….

Ingredients

• 1 sweet potato
• [optional] butter or honey (not both)
• Macadamia nuts, chopped
• crystallized ginger, chopped
• Shredded, unsweetened coconut flakes
• a dash of cayenne pepper
• a dash of nutmeg
• a dash of cinammon
• a pinch of sea salt

Directions

1. Wash and scrub sweet potato.  Puncture with a fork a few times and pop into the microwave.  Microwaves vary, I put it on high for 5 minutes, check, and often add another minute.
2. Meanwhile, chop up two macadamia nuts (just two, you ask.  Yup, just two) and a small piece of crystallized ginger.  You should have about twice as much chopped up nut as ginger.  Mix together with a pinch each of the following: nutmeg, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, and sea salt.  Sprinkle a bit of shredded unsweetened coconut into the ingredients.  Stir together.
3. Cut open the sweet potato and mash flesh with fork.  I add a small pad of butter, but if you’re worried about the calories, you can certainly make do without or substitute honey.  Then mix in the ingredients.  Basically, you’ve made a delicious mashed sweet potato meal in the microwaved skins of one lucky veggie.  Eat and enjoy.

Why is a sweet potato so healthy?

• Sweet potatoes are an excellent source of vitamin A, vitamin C, manganese, dietary fiber, vitamin B6. potassium, iron, and antioxidants.
• Sweet potatoes are good for the liver.
• They can help the body avoid  developing diabetes because they are good at stabilizing blood sugar levels and lower insulin resistance.
• A small sweet potato, baked, is only about 90 calories.

Special Sweet Potatoes

I picked this recipe up during an excellent cooking class at The Institute of Culinary Education in NYC.

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 lbs sweet potatoes
• 1 Tbsp minced crystallized ginger
• 1/8 tsp nutmeg
• 1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
• 2 Tbsp honey
• 1/4 cup macadamia nuts, finely chopped
• 1 tsp salt

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325ºF.   [The following is for mashed potatoes, but you can also bake the topping and make the topping– totally delicious!)
2. Set salted water to boil.  Meanwhile, peel and chop potatoes.  Boil until tender.
3. Mash potatoes (I use a Kitchen-Aid Mixer, but use whatever you have).
4. Add everything else. Mix thoroughly.
5. Put in oven proof dish, cover with foil, and bake for 20 – 30 minutes.