- Sweet potatoes are full of vitamins, fiber and minerals, making them both healthy and satisfying to eat.
- Chefs agree that roasting sweet potatoes brings out the best flavor, texture and natural sweetness.
- With many varieties and uses, from mashes to fries, sweet potatoes are a versatile and budget-friendly staple.
Few foods are as warm and comforting as a dish made with soft, pillowy sweet potatoes—especially during the fall and winter months, when the root vegetable is in season. Sweet potatoes are packed with nutrients like potassium and vitamins A and C, and they contain lots of fiber, too, making them great for gut health and satiety. What’s more? Chefs, including Travel Channel and Food Network star Andrew Zimmern, love cooking with sweet potatoes and say they’re simple enough for anyone to cook at home.
“Sweet potatoes are incredibly healthy,” Zimmern told EatingWell. “They are generally inexpensive and extremely versatile. I think home cooks who ignore the sweet potato are missing out on one of nature’s great vegetables.”
But what’s the best way to cook sweet potatoes at home? We asked five chefs and they all agreed: Roast those tubers. Read on to learn more about sweet potatoes, why chefs love them and the best ways to prepare the root veggie.
Chefs’ Preferred Way to Cook Sweet Potatoes
Rocco Carulli, executive chef and co-owner of R House in Miami, Florida, said roasting is his preferred method for cooking sweet potatoes. “Roasting intensifies flavor without watering the potato down,” he explained. “Boiling or steaming can mute the sweetness and make the texture one-note, but roasting brings out complexity and gives you a texture contrast that’s hard to beat.”
“When you roast a sweet potato,” Carulli added, “the natural sugars caramelize, giving you that deep, earthy sweetness and crisp edges you just don’t get from other methods.”
In fact, Zimmern, whose new book The Blue Food Cookbook: Delicious Seafood Recipes for a Sustainable Future, comes out in late October, said he likes to “over-roast” sweet potatoes for added flavor.
“Typically if a medium-sized sweet potato takes 70 to 80 minutes at 350 F to become tender, I cook them for 90 to 120 minutes, until the caramelized liquid coming out of them starts to scorch and burn,” he said. “This lets me know the moisture has evaporated inside the sweet potato, and most importantly that that scorched caramel flavor has transferred from the liquid into the flesh of the potato.”
“Whether you slice them, dice them or cut them into fries or wedges, the caramelization that dry oven heat provides when roasting sweet potatoes results in deeper and richer flavors than any other cooking method,” added chef, food blogger and culinary instructor Natalie Marble. “It also has the benefit of not leaching out any water-soluble vitamins.”
Marble’s go-to method for roasting sweet potatoes at home is simple: “I always roast my sweet potatoes on a sheet pan with just enough olive oil or avocado oil to coat the potatoes, kosher salt and black pepper as a seasoning base in a 400-degree oven,” she said. “Depending on what you’re using the roasted sweet potatoes for, you can add additional savory spices such as cumin, garlic or smoked paprika, or you can lean into the sweetness with cinnamon or maple syrup.”
Marble said you can also roast the sweet potatoes with only salt and pepper as seasoning, then, “add another layer of flavor after they are roasted, such as a little citrus-and-herb-flavored butter, a drizzle of chili crisp or a salsa verde.”
Erin Fletter, a chef, cookbook author and founder of kid-focused culinary program Sticky Fingers Cooking, said to remember “a whole roasted sweet potato can be eaten just like a plain baked potato with a little butter and salt or can be whipped into a yummy, smooth mash.” Fletter also said to save tonight’s roasted sweet potato leftovers, as they’re a great addition to tomorrow’s wrap or salad.
Types of Sweet Potatoes
“Sweet potatoes come in so many distinct varieties,” said Zimmern, adding that there are a few sweet potato varieties the average home cook is most likely to find in their local grocery aisle. “They all have their own personality in the kitchen. There are the orange-fleshed types—what most Americans picture when they hear the words ‘sweet potato’—that are universally moist, sweet and rich in beta carotene,” Zimmern explained. “They’re perfect for pies, mashes or roasted wedges, where their natural sugars can caramelize into a deep, almost dessert-like flavor. That’s why I like to over-roast them as I mentioned before.”
“White sweet potatoes are a dryer starch, less sweet, and closer in texture to a regular potato,” he added. “They are great in most savory preparations like gratins or any dish where you want structure rather than sweet softness. Purple sweet potatoes, like the Okinawan variety or the Stokes purple variety, bring a lot of drama with their color, but they also bring a lot of subtlety because of their earthy, almost wine-like flavor and firm texture. They shine making things like gnocchi, chips or a show-stopping, colorful mash.”
Does Zimmern have one variety of sweet potato he thinks is best for cooking? Not really. “There are over 400 known varieties of sweet potatoes, spanning shades of cream, gold, red and ones that are even skinned in a color you would swear is black. And because they have adapted to different soils and altitudes, one type of sweet potato grown in two different parts of the world will have two different tastes, textures and structures. I think the lesson here is no single variety is best, but you should experiment and try your favorite recipes with as many different varieties as you have in your local market.”
Popular Ways to Prepare Sweet Potatoes
There are plenty of other delicious ways to cook sweet potatoes besides roasting. Recipe developer and food blogger Marissa Stevens said they’re great for roasting or steaming, then blending up and adding to soups—especially butternut squash soup. “They’re that secret ingredient that makes the texture velvety,” she explained.
“Sweet potatoes are also excellent for quick breads—I roast them whole and scrape out the flesh,” she added, “and also for hash browns. A lot of people don’t think to make hash browns with sweet potatoes, but they’re actually easier and faster than with russets.”
Carulli said it’s also easy to grill sweet potatoes, slicing the root vegetable into planks, brushing each with oil and grilling until soft and charred. And Carulli likes to serve mashed sweet potatoes as a side with roasted garlic and some butter folded in.
“Sweet potato fries or chips are also a guilty pleasure,” Carulli added. “They’re crispy, salty and a nice twist on the classic. But at home, if you only try one method, roast them. It’s the simplest way to let the sweet potato shine.”
The Bottom Line
While there are plenty of different varieties (and colors) of sweet potato out there, if you’re new to cooking with the tuber, the standard orange-fleshed ones you’ll find at the grocery store are a great place to start. Chefs agree, the best way to cook sweet potatoes is to roast them, either peeled and sliced or diced, then drizzled with olive oil and seasoning, or roasted whole like a baked potato and served with butter and other toppings.
