- Alex Guarnaschelli’s mashed sweet potatoes need only five ingredients, including the spuds.
- Baking the sweet potatoes at 400°F until very tender gives the mash a rich, silky texture.
- You can use a tamis or a regular kitchen strainer to mash the potatoes for a smooth finish.
There is no doubt that sweet potatoes are seriously good for you, as they’re jam-packed with beneficial nutrients and can be used in all kinds of dishes—making them a veggie that works at every meal. But in addition to all those healthy perks, sweet potatoes are also really delicious.
We have tons of ways we love to eat the tasty, orange veggie, from Sweet Potato & Black Bean Chili to Spiced Roasted Sweet Potatoes. But thanks to celebrity chef Alex Guarnaschelli, we’re adding a new sweet potato recipe to our must-try list.
In a recent social media post the Food Network star shared a delicious-sounding way to make mashed sweet potatoes, no cream or milk required. The ingredients Guarnaschelli uses are simple: sweet potatoes, molasses, an orange, cinnamon, salt and butter. The Iron Chef even breaks out a lesser-known kitchen tool, the tamis (pronounced tammy), to execute the recipe.
What’s a tamis? It’s a tool, sometimes called a drum sieve, that looks like springform pan, only it has a flat, metal sieve across the bottom. It’s used to squish things through to make mashes and purees, like the one Guarnaschelli shares in her Insta post. While it’s a cool thing to try out, you could most likely get similar results with a kitchen strainer.
To make her mashed sweet potatoes, Guarnaschelli starts with baked sweet potatoes. “All I did was bake the sweet potatoes at 400°F until they were tender,” she explains, “like an hour and a half.”
“Mashed sweet potatoes,” she says as she starts making the recipe. “You know the rules: piping hot. All you need is a tamis. Just take the skin off and then just push them through the tamis. Once in awhile when you’re mashing them—all the fibers that don’t go through—just scrape and discard, and it’ll get anything that doesn’t go through the tamis.”
After pushing her sweet potatoes through the tamis using a rubber spatula, she’s left with a pile of mashed sweet potatoes, resting on the parchment paper she’d placed beneath the tamis to catch them. “Fold it up, and these are mashed and finished,” she says. “No boiling, no water, right in there.”
All that’s left to do is dress them up a bit.
“Now to that, a tablespoon of molasses, some salt, a teaspoon of cinnamon, [orange] zest—just a few light grates—you can always add more,” Guarnaschelli says. “And while I’m at it, I just add the juice of that orange right in there. The brown butter? We want that to be piping hot and sizzling. Gently mix. No mess on the stove, no cream.”
Guarnaschelli is left with a drool-worthy bowl of sweet, citrusy, buttery mashed sweet potatoes that would be perfect for everything from a holiday meal to a side dish with Sunday dinner. We love how simple her recipe is, and we can’t wait to try it.
“See, even the dog wants some,” Guarnaschelli says as the camera pans to her super-cute pup, longingly staring into the kitchen through the back door. “It’s the texture, they’re just silky.”
We’re with the dog: We’ll be making these mashed sweet potatoes ASAP and cannot wait to taste-test the sweet, buttery concoction. This colorful side dish would be perfect alongside a roasted chicken and a simple green salad. And, since they’re so easy to make, they’d be a great way to use up any leftover spuds after making our Sweet Potato Shepherd’s Pie.
However you decide to enjoy Guarnaschelli’s delicious-looking sweet potato mash, just make sure to clean your plate. If not, you might have your own pup to contend with.
