Roasted Sweet Potatoes
I don’t believe I’ve ever met a sweet potato I didn’t like.
They are delicious no matter how they are cooked. My top three favorite ways to cook and eat sweet potatoes is to roast them whole, make sweet potato fries and roast them cubed with garlic and onions. Today we are going to focus on cubing them and roasting with fresh garlic and onions. I almost always use fresh garlic, not minced garlic in a jar, tube or a powder. Most importantly, with fresh garlic I know I’m only getting garlic without any preservatives or additives. You can most certainly use any more convenient form of garlic if you prefer. I’ve noticed fresh garlic is milder, will not overpower your dish or overpower your breath. I absolutely hate it when I’ve eaten a garlic heavy dish and brushing my teeth can’t get rid of the garlic taste in my mouth. Have you ever woke up the next day and still have the lingering taste of garlic in your mouth? Ewww – that's nasty and I don’t like that! So, I find that mincing, slicing or chopping garlic to be much more preferable. I usually mince it in my food processor so it’s not that labor intensive at all. I also use my garlic press if I’m just mincing one or two cloves of garlic. Alright, let’s make some roasted cubed sweet potatoes!
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. I use the convect function on my oven so my times are based on using that feature. It may take a little longer if you are just using the regular oven.
Wash the sweet potatoes. I never peel them. I trim the ends and any bad spots, but there are extra nutrients in that skin so why bother? It’s not even noticeable in the end. If peeling on potatoes bothers you though, peel them with a carrot peeler and it will go fairly quickly!
Cut the sweet potatoes in half and depending on the size of the sweet potato, I usually cut them in fourths. The goal is to have your sweet potato cubes similarly sized for even cooking, but we are not going for perfection here, so just cut them up however you want to eat them. The size of the cubed potatoes will determine the cook time so if you want them to cook faster, cut them smaller.
Mince your garlic. Dice up a medium onion. This is also a good time to put your food processor to work! Put in your peeled garlic cloves and pulse a few times and then add your onions and pulse a few more times to get a rough chop (not a puree). We want to eat healthy, but not spend all day in the kitchen, right? If you don’t have a food processor, just chop the onions and garlic. There are times I just chop everything by hand because I don’t want to get another appliance dirty and I find joy in the rhythm of chopping.
Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. If you’ve never used parchment paper, I’m about to change your life. My husband bought it by mistake when I needed wax paper while making Christmas goodies one year. We used it for that and it worked just as well. We also started lining our baking sheets and pyrex dishes with it because it saves so much time on clean up. Your food won’t stick to it. It was a little daunting at first because I was worried it would catch on fire. The parchment paper has gotten super charred before, but never caused a fire. So, try it and stop scrubbing dishes. I’m all for ease in the kitchen. You can also use less fat because the parchment keeps your food from sticking to the pan. How’s that for a happy little mistake?
Pour your cubed sweet potatoes, onions and garlic onto the parchment paper.
Pour 1-2 tablespoons of olive or avocado oil in the middle and grind some fresh pepper and salt on top.
Get your hands in there and stir it around so the sweet potatoes are coated and the onions and garlic are distributed fairly evenly.
Then put your pan on the top rack in the oven and let them cook for 10-20 minutes, get them out and stir them around and cook them for an additional 10-20 minutes. We like to have ours a little crispy on the outside and have charred edges on the potatoes, so I cook mine a little longer. If you just want them soft, your cooking time may be shorter.
Roasted Cubed Sweet Potatoes
3-4 Sweet Potatoes
1 medium onion
1-2 cloves garlic
½ tablespoon of olive or avocado oil
fresh ground pepper
fresh ground pink Himalayan salt
Directions:
Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
Wash sweet potatoes and cube them.
Peel and rough chop onion. Peel and chop garlic cloves. Or add onion and garlic to your food processor and pulse until roughly chopped.
Add sweet potatoes to a baking sheet with a piece of parchment paper over it. Add onion and garlic to the sweet potatoes, pour the oil over the vegetables, grind salt and pepper over the vegetables. Then mix it all together with your hands and spread it out evenly over the pan.
Cook for 10-20 minutes, stir the potato mixture and cook an additional 10-20 minutes. Your cooking time will depend on your preference of having just soft potatoes or potatoes with crispy edges. We like charred edges with a little crisp so I cook mine a little longer.
