The day Kristin, her parents, and I moved all our junk into our apartment in North Carolina, we ended up sweaty, tired, and hungry. Around that time, Kristin and I remembered that it was in fact our wedding anniversary. We needed some kind of tasty, relaxing dinner, for sure.
We ended up at The Pit in Raleigh, which solidly delivered. People talk a lot about their pulled pork (they do whole-hog bbq down there), but Kristin and I both go for the ribs – best I’ve had anywhere. Now, since this was North Carolina, the #1 producer of sweet potatoes in the U.S., providing a full 38.5% of all U.S. production, it will not surprise you to learn that sweet potato fries were on the menu.
I’d like to take a moment to apologize to the benevolent Creator for the atrocities perpetrated upon such a beautiful tuber. We fallen humans have defiled the vegetable with all manner of unnecessary and haughty trappings, such as obscene amounts of butter, sugar, cinamon, and (blasphemy!) marshmallows.
Anyways, they were delicious. And I tried to make them at home, and never found a great recipe that really told you all you needed to know… Some of them produced mushy results, some missed important notes, some took a long while, and others were just too darn fussy. It’s an oversight I wish to correct with this post. You’re welcome, internet.
Sweet Potato Fries
Get ready: big pot of salted water, 2 sweet potatoes, olive oil, coarse (kosher) salt, freshly-ground pepper, a sheet pan, covered with a sheet of aluminum foil (for easy cleanup), colander and large bowl.
Initial prep: Set the pot on the heat, bring to boil. Preheat oven to 450 F. Coat foiled pan with a little bit of olive oil – spread around with your fingers or a brush. This helps keep the potatoes from sticking.
More prep: Take sweet potatoes, wash them well (potatoes grow in dirt, after all), trim the ends, and slice a narrow slice off the side, so that they lay flat and won’t move around while cutting. With a chef’s knife (i.e. large, sharp, and non-serrated), carefully cut the potatoes into fries just over 1/4 inch thick. Be careful – raw sweet potatoes are tough and fibrous. Doing this with a dull knife or without caution is a good way to lose a finger. Don’t let it scare you, just learn you some knife skills. They’re kindof a big deal.
Is your water boiling? Good. Boil potatoes for 5 minutes. Do not overcook. Drain in colander – be careful with the steam. Let them sit in the colander for a minute – you want them fairly dry. Put them in the bowl, add “some” olive oil – I dunno, 2 tablespoons? Add “some” salt and pepper. Go a bit easy on the pepper. Cumin is also good here if you like. Toss a bit (be careful not to mash – some fry-damage is inevitable though). Transfer to the sheet pan, spreading them out, and roast for 10 minutes. Use a spatula to flip them over a bit (it’s impossible to do perfectly, just toss a bit again). Roast for another 10-15 minutes. The final roasting time will be determined by how large your julienne is, how waterlogged the fries were going in, and how crowded the pan was. Watch them and pull them out when they start to look crispy and not black. Sweet potato fries will get black fairly quickly once they start, so watching them is important.
The final product is a marvelous thing. They aren’t deep fried, so they’re not going to have the texture of a fast-food fry, but they should be a little crispy on the outside, with a little color, and soft and tasty on the inside.
It may seem a bit involved, and it did take me a while to knock it out the first time I did it. But I’ve done it several times since and can now get it done lickety-split while working other foods too. Cleanup is a breeze – trash the foil, and you’ve got a pot, a colander, a knife and a cutting board, none of which are particularly nasty.
There are plenty of refinements possible – for instance, it’s nice to have the sheet pan a bit hot (but not smoking the oil) before adding the fries so the bottoms start crisping up as soon as they hit the foil. But none of that is essential. This recipe works for me, helps me get more vegetables on the plate, and eat real food without fussing too much about it, which is exactly what I want.
Happy cooking, and watch your fingers.
