Sweet Potato Biscuits

Here's an autumnal recipe for all you people out there gushing about fall foliage (it is beautiful) and sweater weather (I'd rather run around nekkid in the tropics). I was flipping through some recipe books in search for bread recipes (I've vowed to make more bread this season), and landed on these sweet potato biscuits. I like love sweet potatoes, and I like biscuits, so...I made them.With two cups of mashed sweet potatoes in the dough, these biscuits aren't exactly high-risers, but they certainly aren't dense pucks either. And with sugar, cinnamon and allspice in the recipe (I skipped the allspice, since I had none), I'd say these biscuits are a hybrid between biscuits and scones (I even sprinkled sugar on top when I baked them, to make them more scone-like). But the subtle sweetness would not stop me from eating these sweet potato biscuits alongside a savory meal. And, yes, you can taste the sweet potatoes, but, be forewarned, if you smother these biscuits with fruit jam, you'll mask the subtle sweet potato flavor. May I suggest cane syrup or honey slathered on a warm sweet potato biscuit for the autumn hiding behind sweaters...er, hunkering down.Sweet Potato Biscuits
adapted from A Gracious Plenty
makes about 13 large (3-inch) biscuits

3 cups all purpose flour, plus additional for rolling surface
3/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon salt
3 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons allspice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3/4 cup shortening
2 cups mashed sweet potatoes
1/3 cup milk

• In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, salt, baking powder, allspice, and cinnamon. Cut in the shortening (I like to use my hands) until it resembles coarse meal. Add the mashed sweet potatoes to the flour mixture (again, hands work really well). Add the milk, and mix until incorporated.
• Turn dough out on floured surface, and roll to 3/4-inch thickness. Cut dough with biscuit cutter (I used a 3-inch cutter), and place on a greased baking sheet.
• Bake in a pre-heated 450 degree oven for 12-15 minutes, or until done.
  

I Told You Once. Now, I'll Tell You Twice.

I’m gonna take the quick way out of blogging here, because I’m just not in the mood. Winter is dragging me down, making me want to crawl in a hole, and not move or think.

Remember the post on the ornamental sweet potato experiment where I concluded with a recipe for sweet potato mash that the sweet potato vines you pick up at the garden center to grow in your containers and gardens are just as tasty as the sweet potatoes you pick up in the grocery store?

Well, the photo above is further proof that they’re edible and delicious. This sweet potato pie was prepared last Thanksgiving, not by me, but by someone I convinced to use the tubers in their garden, and was just as good as the usual orange pie. No one died, and everyone went back for seconds. Booyah!

Bourbon-Walnut Sweet Potato Mash

Here’s one last recipe from Bon Appètit’s Thanksgiving issue, plus a fun little experiment. I chose the one sweet potato dish from the other five regular potato dishes in Bon Appètit’s Thanksgiving potato section because sweet potato soufflé is always on our holiday table, unlike mashed potatoes. Mashed potatoes are – brace yourself – never on our table. Rice is the vehicle for all gravies and sauces on Thanksgiving and the other 364 days of the year.

Oh, you want to know about the experiment, and could care less about my lack of mashed potato consumption? OK.

Instead of sweet potatoes from the market that are breed for sweet flesh, I used the sweet potatoes from the garden center that are bred for ornamental foliage. The two plants – grocery store sweet potatoes and garden center sweet potatoes – are the same plant, Ipomoea batatas, just different cultivars.

My quest was to see if the ornamental sweet potatoes bred to look pretty in gardens are sweet enough to warrant eating. I normally toss these tubers every year when I do garden clean-up, but this year curiosity got the better of me.

I dug the tubers from three different ornamental sweet potato cultivars (Sweet Caroline Sweetheart Red, Marguerite, and Ace of Spades), threw them in my car, and forgot about them for a few weeks. So, unfortunately, when it came time to identify which tuber was which, I had no clue. A good scientist I do not make!

Confusing picture. Four potatoes, but three cultivars - last two are the same cultivar.

I boiled and roasted some of each variety, and then it was time for the individual taste tests. They were all sweet, none drastically more so than the next. And was I glad, because if one was better than the other, I was going to kick myself for letting the tubers roll around the back of my car for weeks, and not remembering which was which.

So, on to the bourbon-walnut sweet potato recipe in Bon Appètit. Trying to be a good scientist, I made a control batch from sweet potatoes from the market. Yum. A sweet, but more rustic dish than the baked sweet potato soufflé typically topped with marshmallows. I adore the marshmallows, by the way.

The mash made from the ornamental sweet potatoes, thanks to their collective white, yellow, and purple flesh, looks about as appetizing as dirty bath water. But guess what? In a blind taste test, they taste just as good as the store bought sweet potatoes bred for eating. The only thing that gives the ornamental sweet potatoes away, besides their color, is a slightly lumpier texture. But lumps can be cured with longer cooking or pureeing.

Stick with the more visually appetizing orange-fleshed sweet potatoes for the holiday table, but don’t toss those tubers from your flower beds – eat them!

Bourbon-Walnut Sweet Potato Mash
Adapted from Bon Appètit
8-10 servings

4 pounds sweet potatoes
½ cup whipping cream
6 tablespoons butter
¼ cup maple syrup
2 tablespoons bourbon
1 ½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground allspice
¾ teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 cup toasted walnuts, chopped

• Preheat oven to 350°
• Roast whole potatoes on a baking sheet for 1 - 1 ½ hours, or until tender. Cool until you can handle, then scoop flesh into a large bowl. Mash potatoes coarsely.
• Heat cream and butter in a saucepan over low heat until butter melts. Slowly combine cream mixture into potatoes. Then add syrup, bourbon, and spices. Add salt and pepper to taste.
• Sprinkle with nuts and serve.

New Potato Pizza

I ate a lot of pizza last month, thanks to the handy-dandy pizza dough at Trader Joes. They offer plain, whole wheat, and herbed dough. Stick with the plain. The whole-wheat dough is too heavy and the herbed dough competes with toppings.

Pizza #1 – Caramelized Sweet Onions and Brie. The dough was brushed with olive oil and topped with Brie and two large, sliced, caramelized onions. (I would eat this again!)

Pizza #2 – Spinach and Feta. The dough was topped with tomato sauce, sautéed onions and spinach, sun dried tomatoes, and feta. (Kind of ordinary. Take it or leave it.)

Pizza #3 – New Potato, Port-Salut, and Rosemary. The dough was brushed with olive oil and topped with thinly sliced new potatoes, Port-Salut, and rosemary. (The winner! This one is dinner party worthy. I was very sad when the leftovers were gone.)

New Potato Pizza

pizza dough
5-8 new potatoes, thinly sliced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 garlic head, roasted and mashed
3 sprigs fresh rosemary
6 ounces Port-Salut cheese, diced or sliced
salt and pepper to taste

• Slice potatoes and boil for 5 minutes or until just done.
• Mix olive oil, garlic, and rosemary in a large bowl.
  
• Add potatoes to bowl with olive oil mixture. Toss to coat.
• Top pizza dough with cheese, potato mixture, and season to taste.