Sweet Potato Madness! (Part I)

My wife, the lovely CW, bought a big bag of sweet potatoes late last week.  After a weekend of parties and lazy meals, the challenge before me come Monday was clear: use those sweet potatoes before they, a) went bad or b) we forgot about them!

I am a late convert to sweet potatoes.  Growing up, the only exposure to them that I had was at Thanksgiving, when they were invariably prepared with marshmallows, adding sweetness to sweetness.  As mentioned by CW in her first entry to this blog, I am a savory guy at mealtime, and never enjoyed such a sweet side dish.  Luckily, over the past several years I have eaten sweet potatoes in different "non-sweet" preparations (starting of course with the ever-friendly French Fry) and grown to like them a lot.

I knew that I wanted to use our sweet potatoes over the course of 2 dinners (we had at least 3-4 pounds), and that one of them would be a soup.  On Monday I had a full day of work and knew that I didn't want to deal with a long-cooking soup - so I searched around and came up with a recipe for a Chicken and Sweet Potato Bake.  The recipe calls for using chicken breasts on the bone, but I bought some boneless breasts because the store I was in only had Jumbo packs of bone-in breasts, and I was only cooking for two.  That said, I decided that I would alter the recipe a bit so as not to overcook the chicken too badly.

Cooking Down Sweet Potato and Apples

First thing I did was to prep the potatoes, onion, and apples (I used 2 green apples).  I sauteed these in a Dutch oven on the stovetop.  The potatoes went in first (longest cook time), followed by the onions and the diced apple.  The spices were added to this mixture, along with a pinch of salt and some pepper.   Once the potatoes started to soften, I poured in a quarter cup of brandy and about a half cup of low-sodium chicken stock to barely cover the veggies and add some moisture in preparation for the chicken breasts, which had been seasoned with some spice rub that was left over from some flank steaks over the summer.  The rub ingredients are to the right of the chicken picture.

Spice Rub

• 1 tablespoon kosher salt
• 2 tablespoons ground cumin
• 2 teaspoons ground black pepper
• 1 tablespoon ground coriander
• 1 tablespoon chili powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

The rubbed chicken breasts were added to the pot, and then transferred, covered, to the oven at 350 degrees.  



Since I was using boneless chicken I dropped my cooking time from the 45 minutes in the recipe to 25 - 30 minutes, so as not to dry out the bird too much.  While the dish roasted, I prepared a side dish of some sauteed red chard with garlic and olive oil.  Chard is a bitter leafy green that I find delicious with some oil, garlic and salt.  I thought the bitter salty chard would balance the sweetness of the potatoes and apples nicely.  Chard has thick stems, which are perfectly edible (and yummy), but need to be cut off and cooked longer than the more delicate leaves.  The greens were simply sauteed in olive oil over medium heat with some garlic and salt,

After 25 minutes I took my pot out of the oven and checked the chicken - it was cooked through (white throughout, no pink spots, clear juices).  I plated the meal in shallow wide bowls since there is a lot of juice from the broth and apples.  The chard was served alongside.

Unfortunately, the chicken, while not very dry, was cooked a couple of minutes too long, and could have been more moist.  Also, by roasting the chicken in the pot with all that broth, much of the rub washed off the bird and into the surrounding liquid.  Overall however, the flavors of the dish were excellent, with the cinnamon and nutmeg melding nicely with the sweetness from the apples and sweet potatoes.  The chard, with its bitter saltiness, proved an excellent counterpoint to the rest of the dish. 

Should I make this again I would try and get bone-in chicken, and maybe pan-sear the bird first to lock in the juices a bit better.  If using boneless breasts, I would certainly do a quick sear on the stovetop, and then finish in the oven at a lower temperature, taking frequent temperatures so as not to overcook the meat at all.  Live, cook, and learn!

The meal was enjoyed with a bottle of Anne Amie pinot noir, purchased on our recent trip to Oregon.  The wine was delicious with this dish - the light bodied fruity red cutting through the dish's sweetness and leaving the palate satisfied and refreshed.  My only regret is that it was our only bottle :(

So there you have it - part one of Sweet Potato Madness.  No promises as to when Part II: THE SOUP, will arrive, but I hope to have it written by the weekend.