What Not To Do: Sweet Potato Fries

Last month, I bought a couple of orange (kumara) sweet potatoes from my local Woolies but left them lying in the pantry for awhile because I couldn't figure out what to do with them. I normally eat the purple variety steamed, but didn't want to just eat a steamed kumara. Then it struck me that I should try to make sweet potato fries!

When I was vacationing in America, many places I ate at served sweet potato fries with ranch sauce/dressing*. Even their salads usually come with ranch dressing, and deep fried chicken wings aren't the same if not dipped in ranch dressing. This is probably why I gained 4kg in a month.

But ahem, no ranch dressing in my house and I wanted to make a slightly healthier option by baking instead of frying the sweet potatoes. Not such a great idea.

Nevertheless, here is the recipe I used.

Baked Sweet Potato Fries (Serves 2, or 1 if you're hungry)

Ingredients:
2 kumara (orange sweet potato)
1 tsp thyme
1 tsp rosemary
2 tbsp olive oil
Salt


1. Rinse the kumara and set on a chopping board.

2. Peel the skin off the kumara using a potato peeler, and cut in half.

3. Cut into 1cm thick strips.

4. Season with herbs, salt and a drizzle of olive oil. Cover with foil and bake in the oven (or grill, which I did) for about 20 minutes, then remove the foil and keep baking for a further 10 minutes or until soft and golden.

Unfortunately, following this recipe didn't yield great results. Yes it was tasty, but the texture was all wrong for fried chips. They were limp and soft :(

I think next time I'll just lightly batter them with cornflour or potato starch and shallow fry them. I'll need to keep experimenting to see how I can make baked sweet potato fries crispy on the outside, soft and fluffy on the inside.

Asian plates!

When choosing a sweet potato, first check it all over for rotten bits and ugly spots. Then give it a good weigh in your hand; it should be fairly heavy, and also a good squeeze to check firmness. Next, try choosing sweet potatoes with even lengths and widths. Avoid buds sprouting on the sweet potato (the same rings true for normal potatoes as well), but if they come up after you've brought them just gouge them out with the tip of a small knife.

I stored my kumaras at room temperature near my fruit bowl. DO NOT PLACE THEM IN THE FRIDGE. You can, however, freeze them after they've been cooked.

Baking sweet potatoes can easily burn them. Keep the foil on longer if they start to brown too quickly. You can easily check whether or not they are cooked if you taste one =p


*If you've read my previous post about mayonnaise, you'll know what I mean when I say ranch dressing is one of the fattiest sauces you'll ever eat, with a very high percentage of fat. Nutritionally speaking, it's a heart attack in a bottle/jar.


Choosing sweet potato at supermarkets referenced from NC Sweet Potatoes and eHow.