Sweet potatoes are one of my favorite comfort foods and because of their high vitamin, mineral, and fiber content they also happen to be a very nutritious alternative to standard potatoes and grains. Although I don’t eat sweet potatoes everyday, I do eat some form of this root vegetable several times a week, making it one of my primary sources of starch. The fry variation is great way to introduce sweet potatoes to skeptical family members or friends.
Serve the fries as a side dish to burgers or included in a wrap. They’re also great as an appetizer, especially when served with avocado mousse (pictured). Because they’re a finger food, kids will eat piles of these fries and they’ll love it if you serve multiple colored varieties. The photo of this recipe shows purple and garnet sweet potato fries, but you can use any variety of sweet potato you desire. Most standard grocery stores have garnet and jewel sweet potatoes (sometimes labeled as yams). Much to my excitement, the natural foods store in my small town started carrying the purple variety, so I assume they’re also available in larger cities. Nutritionally, all sweet potatoes contain a long list of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and fiber, but the orange varieties are one of the best food sources of vitamin A and the purple varieties have high levels of a powerful class of anti-cancer anti-oxidant called anthocyanins (the purple pigment contains the anthocyanins, so all purple hued plants have some anthocyanin content).
- 2 large sweet potatoes
- 2 Tbl avocado oil
- ½ tsp sea salt
- ¼ tsp ground black pepper
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- Peel the sweet potatoes, cut each potato in half cross-wise and then cut each half again length-wise, so you have each potato in 4 pieces. Slice each quarter lengthwise into ½" pieces. Take the long ½" thin pieces and slice them so they are close in shape to long rectangles.
- Toss the ½" cubed rectangles in the avocado oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
- Spread out the fries onto a baking tray or two. Make sure there is a little space between the fries. Place the fries into the oven cook for 25-30 minutes, using a spatula and flipping the fries after 15 minutes.
*Not all calories are equal.