Sweet Potato Casserole Recipe Ingredients
And the best part? This easy sweet potato casserole recipe comes together with basic pantry ingredients! Heres what youll need to make it:
- Sweet potatoes, of course! I blend them with almond milk to make the filling nice and smooth.
- Pecans and walnuts I pulse some into the crumble topping and leave a few whole for garnish.
- Old fashioned oats Along with the nuts, they give the crumble topping plenty of hearty texture.
- Ginger It adds a refreshing kick to the creamy sweet potato filling.
- Fresh rosemary, sage, and dried thyme If Im cooking with sweet potatoes in the fall, chances are, Im using rosemary, sage, and thyme as well. Theyre the perfect autumn flavor combination.
- Garlic Along with the herbs, garlic is key for giving this sweet potato casserole its delicious savory taste.
- Pure maple syrup It adds a touch of sweetness to the nutty topping. I may not love sweet potatoes and marshmallows, but sweet potatoes and maple are a combination I can get behind.
Just grab some olive oil, salt, and pepper, and youre good to go!
Find the complete recipe with measurements below.
Mashed Sweet Potatoes Recipe Ingredients
My favorite thing about this recipe is that it really lets the sweet potatoes shine. Unlike in a classic sweet potato casserole, you wont find any marshmallows, brown sugar, or maple syrup here. The sweetness comes from the potatoes themselves. Then, these ingredients add richness and depth of flavor:
- Olive oil or melted butter Take your pick! I love the fruity olive oil in these mashed sweet potatoes, and it makes this recipe vegan. But if you prefer butter, its rich flavor is delicious here too.
- Milk I use almond milk because its what I keep on hand, but cows milk or another type of plant-based milk would work as well.
- Rosemary Rosemary and sweet potatoes are one of my favorite cold weather flavor combinations! It makes this mash cozy, aromatic, and complex.
- Garlic For sharp, savory depth of flavor.
- Ground ginger It adds subtle warmth.
- And salt and pepper To make all the flavors pop!
Find the complete recipe with measurements below.
How To Baked Sweet Potatoes:
Here is my favorite method for how to make baked sweet potatoes in the oven
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How To Microwave Sweet Potatoes
Microwaving sweet potatoes is a cooking short-cut, though it should be noted that microwaves tend to heat foods unevenly, which can cause some parts of the sweet potato to cook faster than others. How long it takes for sweet potatoes to cook in the microwave depends on the size of the potato and the make, model and typical cooking times for your microwave. A medium sweet potato will take about 5 minutes to cook in the microwave.
Heres a basic primer on how to cook sweet potatoes in the microwave.
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How Can You Tell When A Sweet Potato Is Done
Sweet potatoes cannot keep a secret. When theyre done, the whole world will know it.
They start to ooze out their sweet caramelized juice, wrinkle up a bit, and if you want to for sure make sure, just stab one with a fork or knife. The knife should slide in easily when a sweet potato is fully cooked.
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Theres So Many Reasons To Love Baked Sweet Potato
Who doesnt love a baked sweet potato during the fall and winter months when the weathers cold outside? Its warm, filling, nourishing and couldnt be easier to make. Its also super versatile eat it plain as a side dish with a little pat of butter or jazz it up and turn it into BBQ chicken stuffed sweet potatoes for a filling meal.
And theyre good for you too! Sweet potatoes are a rich source of fiber and theyre loaded with iron, calcium, vitamin B, vitamin C, and beta-carotene, an antioxidant which gives the potato its vibrant orange color.
Delicious Fillings And Favorite Toppings For Sweet Potatoes
- Add a pat of butter, along with a sprinkle of cinnamon and brown sugar.
- Maple syrup is a delicious indulgent treat.
- Smear your favorite nut butter into the center.
- A little olive oil or butter with a sprinkling of salt is simple and delish.
- Go the classic route! Add shredded cheese, sour cream and chives.
- Check out this Stuffed Sweet Potato Recipe for a bunch of stuffing and topping ideas that will fill you up! Hint: black beans, chicken and shredded chicken included!
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How To Serve Baked Sweet Potatoes
This recipe can be used in so many different ways to create a variety of nutrient-dense meals, from breakfast to lunch to a dinner main meal or side dish. Here are a few ideas:
- As a side dish, enjoy the fiber-rich sweet potatoes with a healthy fat like butter and cinnamon or pepper. Serve the potatoes alongside grilled boneless chicken thighs, a roasted whole chicken, grilled steak, or your favorite protein.
- For a dinner, top a sweet potato with homemade chilifor a stuffed sweet potato meal.
- For a lunch, make buffalo chicken stuffed sweet potatoes by tossing roasted and shredded chicken with a buffalo sauce , then top the roasted potato with the chicken and a dollop of sour cream and cilantro. You can also do this with Instant PotBBQ chicken.
- For a protein breakfast, spoon nut butter over the potato and top with banana slices and cinnamon and a teaspoon of hemp seeds . This is one of my favorite breakfasts! Serve with fluffy scrambled eggs, a simple cheese omelette, or one of 15 different ways to make eggs for breakfast.
How To Make The Perfect Baked Sweet Potatoes
Without a doubt, sweet potatoes are a food I cant live without.
They make the perfect canvas for so many meals, and are loaded with tons of vitamin A, vitamin C, iron, and potassium. Sweet potatoes are a great source of fiber, meaning they help keep you full.
When I want a baked sweet potato, I want one that is baked until ultra-creamy and almost sticky inside. I learned to bake sweet potatoes from my grandma, who bakes them like this on Thanksgiving. I watched her poke at the sweet potatoes, and with patience, hold off dinner, until she was satisfied that they had properly reduced to be sticky-soft inside.
For the perfect baked sweet potatoes, you only need:
- Sweet potatoes look for some with nice unblemished skins!
- Olive Oil or Avocado Oil
- Himalayan pink salt or sea salt
- Parchment paper to line a baking tray
You can wrap sweet potatoes in aluminum foil, but I prefer to just line a baking tray with parchment. This way, youll end up with crispy skins, which is definitely a part of the whole experience!
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How To Make Baked Sweet Potatoes
Prep the sweet potatoes. Wash your sweet potatoes and pat dry. Poke all over with a fork to allow the steam to escape. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.
Bake at 425ºF. Bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour. This will depend on the size. Medium sweet potatoes can be checked for doneness after the 45-minute mark. Large sweet potatoes will take an hour.
How to Check for Doneness. Theyre ready when easily pierced with a fork or knife.
How To Bake A Sweet Potato In The Microwave
Prepare, wash, and dry the sweet potatoes the same way you would if you bake them in the oven and pierce them 3-4 times with a fork.
Place the potato on a microwave-safe plate and microwave for 5 minutes, turning halfway through. Check for doneness by poking with a fork. If it isnt fork-tender, continue to microwave at 30-second increments until cooked through.
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Dont Wrap Your Potatoes In Aluminum Foil
I grew up with my mom wrapping potatoes in foil before baking, but Ive since learned that not only is it unnecessary, it also steams the potatoes and makes the skin soggy and soft rather than crisp the way I like it. I know it feels weird to put a naked potato in the oven, but trust me they taste so much better this way. Its also better for food safety because theres potential for bacteria to grow if you leave the potatoes in foil and let them cool down while still wrapped in the aluminum foil.
Some people will recommend placing the potatoes directly on the oven rack for baking, but I do recommend placing them on a baking sheet . This is especially true when baking sweet potatoes because they tend to release sticky, sugary juice while baking and it can make your oven pretty messy.
Sweet Potato Casserole Recipe Tips
- Bake your sweet potatoes until theyre super tender. You want the filling of this casserole to be luscious and creamy, without any chunks. Make sure that a fork can easily slide through the potatoes when you take them out of the oven. This way, theyll blend into a perfectly smooth puree.
- Save some whole nuts for garnish! The best bites of this casserole combine creamy sweet potato with big, toasty nuts. When you blend up the crumble, reserve a few whole nuts to dot on top. Youll thank yourself later.
- Make it ahead. Like all great Thanksgiving recipes, this healthy sweet potato casserole is easy to prep ahead of time. You can do almost everything a day or two before your feast: blend up the sweet potato filling, pulse together the crumble topping, and store them in separate containers in the fridge. Right before serving, sprinkle the crumble over the filling, and bake!
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How Long To Boil Sweet Potatoes
The length of time it takes to boil sweet potatoes depends on whether they are cooked whole or cut into pieces, as well as the size of the pieces. Generally, diced sweet potatoes take 7 to 12 minutes cubed sweet potatoes take 12 to 15 minutes and whole potatoes take anywhere between 20 to 50 minutes, depending on size. Youll know the potatoes are done when they reach a fork-tender consistency, or when the flesh easily yields to the tip of a sharp knife.
How Long To Bake A Potato
The cooking time will vary depending on size, but a fair estimate is that baked potatoes will take for about 1 hour to 1 hour and 15 minutes. If you have a bunch of potatoes you may need to add another 10 to 15 minutes or so to the cooking time, or again if the potatoes are quite large. They are done when the skin is firm and crisp, but when squeezed the inside feels soft. You can also insert a knife into the potato when there is barely any resistance once you poke through the skin, the potatoes are done.
Remove the potatoes from the oven, and let them sit for a minute or two. Make a slit on the top lengthwise from one end to another. Squeeze the potato on each end and it will open up .
You can fluff the insides with a fork if you like, and then it is ready to serve topped with whatever you like. A traditional loaded baked potato will have a bit of butter, some sour cream, a sprinkle of chives or sliced scallions , and some crumbled cooked bacon.
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How To Cook Sweet Potatoes
Bake, boil, steam and microwave sweet potatoes like a pro.
Twice Baked, Stuffed Sweet Potatoes with Melting Butter and Cracked Pepper
Layla Khoury-Hanold is a contributor at Food Network
Sweet potatoes are a fixture on Southern menus and Thanksgiving tables nationwide, but theyre also an everyday staple that pack a nutritional punch. With their natural earthy-sweet flavor profile, sweet potatoes are also versatile, lending themselves to different cooking methods to create a variety of dishes, from casseroles to pies to French fries. Whether you want to bake, boil, steam or microwave them, the following how-to primer will answer all your pressing questions.
Whats The Difference Between A Sweet Potato And A Yam
Sweet potatoes and yams are both root vegetables, but theyre actually quite different. To make matters confusing, most yams sold in supermarkets in the United States are actually sweet potatoes, just marketed under the wrong name yikes.
Yams tend to have brown-ish, rougher skin and lighter flesh. Theyre also starchier and dryer when cooked.
Sweet potatoes have more tapered ends, reddish-orange skin and vibrant orange flesh though they can come in a variety of colors from white to orange to purple. Sweet potatoes are also sweeter when theyre cooked.
The take-away: if what youve bought looks like these photos, odds are its a variety of sweet potato even though it may have been called a yam in the store.
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Baked Sweet Potato Method: Freeze First
Rating: 9/10
Possibly the most curious ways of baking a sweet potato Ive encountered, this method outlined on Serious Eats calls for freezing a sweet potato solid, then baking it at a low temperature before hitting it with a high heat finish. Supposedly this process helps bring out the sweetness in sweet potatoes better than any other, thanks to science. Heres the logic: Freezing a sweet potato removes excess water from inside the potato and gives it more time to convert its starches to sugars because of the low temperature at which it starts baking.
After leaving a sweet potato in the freezer overnight, I wrapped it in foil without poking it with a fork, then placed it on a foil-lined baking sheet. I baked it at 300°F for 2 hours, then carefully removed the foil. I finished the sweet potato by increasing the oven temperature to 450°F and roasting it until the skin was browned and charring in spots, which took 40 minutes.
As surprising to me as the whole process was, it really worked. Inside, the potato was even softer than the one that was cooked low and slow, and the skin was crispy and even had a few burned spots puffing up and separating from the flesh.
To Prep Sweet Potatoes In Advance
- Bake the sweet potatoes: cut in half, drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt, then roast on a sheet pan for 30 minutes.
- Once baked to perfection, allow the sweet potatoes to cool on the sheet pan. You dont want to place the sweet potatoes directly into a storage container while hot as this will cause condensation to build in the container.
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Easy Baked Sweet Potato
A perfectly Baked Sweet Potato is easier than you think! Learn how to bake sweet potatoes quickly and easily with my foolproof method! Sweet and fluffy on the inside with a delightfully crispy skin, these baked sweet potatoes make the perfect side dish for every occasion. Go sweet OR savory your choice! Looking for more tasty side dishes? Make sure to try my famous Cranberry Sauce and Twice Baked Potato Casserole!
Ideas To Serve Them Up
Theres so many ways to serve up sweet potatoes. I think theyre a great accompaniment to a variety of mains, including:
- Beef: You could fill them with barbacoa or plate them next to a serving of beef brisket. And dont forget prime rib during the holidays.
- Chicken: Simple baked chicken breast, roasted balsamic chicken and honey mustard chicken are a few of my faves for weeknight dinners. You could also stuff them with shredded chicken!
- Pork:Pork chops with apples are delicious during fall, and you cant beat a pile of juicy and tender carnitas on top.
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How To Bake Sweet Potatoes In Foil
There is only one distinct difference between this baked sweet potato recipe with and without foil the skin.
The skin tends to not crisp up when its wrapped in foil. The rest of the process remains the same though. Just wrap the sweet potatoes in foil before placing in the oven. You will still want to use a baking sheet because the juices tend to find their way out of the foil.
A baked sweet potato microwave style?