Spicy sweet potatoes

When I was a kid, we never ate sweet potatoes. It was another one of those foods that my Irish-German, Pennsylvania-born Mom considered ‘foreign,’ and therefore not worthy of cooking, along with things like lasagna, pizza and sauerkraut.  Essentially, anything that had spices, did not have hamburger as an ingredient or that wasn’t overcooked ,bland and tasteless was never served. As a result, it wasn’t until I was in college that I was exposed to a lot of the foods I now love. Yep.  College dorm cafeteria food as a taste treat. Amazing, eh? 

That’s where I first had sweet potatoes.  Sadly for me, it was one of those vile sweet potato casseroles where the baby food consistency potatoes were drowned in way too much butter and sugar and weighed down by mountains of marshmallows which for my money, is one of the most disgusting food products invented and I’ve eaten potted meat straight from the can.  This one actually lets you taste the potatoes, but it’s still got the requisite sweetitude but with a bit of a kick.

Ingredients
2 lbs sweet potatoes, peeled
2 Tbs unsalted butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup orange juice
1/4 tsp ground cayenne
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon

Method
Preheat oven to 350.  Spray a 14x10 baking pan with cooking spray.  Half the potatoes lengthwise befor cutting into 3/4 inch thick wedges.  Cut the wedges down into 3/4 to one inch hunks before tossing into a bowl.

Melt the butter in the microwave.  Stir in the remaining ingredients and nuke for another minutes or so until it gets syrupy.

Pour over the potatoes in the bowl and toss to coat.  Throw the potatoes into the baking pan and spread into a single layer.  Bake for 40-45 minutes or until tender and the glaze has thickened and cooked down.

Serves 8-10

sweet potatoes

Photo info:
Bowl by Lamberton China for the United States Lines

Posted by Mike on Friday, December 17, 2010 at 08:34 AM
Filed in: Sides • Veggies • ◊ Permalink
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