Baked Sweet Potato Fries

In my latest grocery shipment, I got about five or six sweet potatoes — one of my absolute all-time favorite vegetables. They're simply one of the most naturally, but not overpoweringly, sweet and healthy things you can eat.

One of the things I don't like about them, and all potatoes, though is that it takes forever to cook them. To cut down on the cooking time while also attempting to still make a somewhat healthy side dish, I decided to try baked sweet potato fries.

Since I baked them, they did not end up having the crunch of a deep-fried fry, but it was still a great way to eat a sweet potato in under 30 minutes from prep to table.

What you'll need to make one serving:

1 medium sweet potato
1/4 cup canola oil
1 tsp. kosher salt
1 tsp. cayenne pepper
1 tbsp. brown sugar

Preheat your oven to 450 degrees.

Skin the sweet potato and cut into long, thin strips. I accomplished this by halving the sweet potato lengthwise. Then I halved each half, but with cuts parallel to the first. So I had four equally thick slices of potato. Then I took those flat pieces and cut them uniformly.

It's sad to say, but at this point if you have any small and strangely shaped pieces, they will most definitely burn in the oven. They are worth throwing out or perhaps cooking for half the time with a VERY keen eye on them. I became extremely adept at running over to my very oversensitive smoke detectors during making these potatoes.

Then I coated a cookie sheet with canola oil. Feel free to put parchment paper on the baking sheet so it's easier to clean. I added the strip of sweet potato and sprinkled the salt, cayenne and sugar evenly over the top. Then I mixed the whole batch around with my hands, making the oil and spice mix more even.

The cayenne does, of course, add some kick to the potatoes, but it was really well balanced with the sugar. Unless you're extremely sensitive to heat, I think you'll like this addition to this recipe.

My plan was to cook the potatoes for 15 minutes, turn them over and cook them again for 15 more. Thanks to my lovely smoke detector, I managed 15 minutes on one side and only 10 on the other. But the results were perfectly fine, a little darker where the slices were thinner, but not really burnt. I tend to like my food really crispy and only think toast is burnt when it's black. If you don't like that kind of texture to your food, I'd recommend cutting the ends of the fries so they're blunt.

I put the fries on a paper towel for a little bit before serving so the oil wouldn't get soaked up by the fries.

Though I longed a little for the crispier texture you get from deep-fried restaurant sweet potato fries, they still were delicious. I'm mostly overjoyed to have a new way of cooking sweet potatoes that takes 25-30 minutes.

Sweet potato fries with my portobello burger recipe from last month. 

Brussels Sprouts in Apricot Jam

My dad is a great cook. Between both of my parents, it's a miracle I don't weigh 300 pounds, because between the two of them, I'm pretty sure they can cook or bake anything. My mother does 100 percent of the baking duties, and growing up I'd eat a lot of very hearty, very American meals, usually a meat, a starch and a few vegetables. My father is about half Italian, and inherited that style of cooking, which he's also passed onto my mother. 

In a change of what I consider their typical kitchen roles, my dad set about to make pork roast, sweet potatoes, cranberry and apple stuffing, and some roasted Brussels sprouts serving as our green for dinner. 

While a lot of people don't like the bitterness of Brussels sprouts, I love them. They were even one of my favorite vegetables as a kid, and somehow I forgot about them for about 10 years until one day my roommate was cooking some. I tried one again and thought, "What have I been doing denying myself these delicious greens for so long?"

To balance some of that bitter, my dad decided to experiment and add some apricot fruit spread to the Brussels sprouts. Here is the ingredients list:

butter

Brussels sprouts

apricot jam

Very short, right? First my dad washed and halved the Brussels sprouts. 

He then added I'd estimate about three tablespoons of butter to a pan and turned the heat on. 

Once the butter was melted, he added the Brussels sprouts and cooked them until they were browned a bit on the outside and soft in the middle.

In a separate sauce pan, he put about a cup of apricot jam and heated it so it was warm and more fluid.

Here is where I think both he and I would recommend you diverge from how he actually cooked them. My dad added the heated apricot to the Brussels sprouts. It turns out when you do that, the Brussels sprouts absorb a lot of the jam and get a little soggy.

If we were to do it over, I think we'd plate the Brussels sprouts and drizzle the apricot over it, not using the entire mixture. Also, if one of my sisters was not a vegetarian, I'd like to see what this would taste like with bacon it. Bacon with Brussels sprouts is a very easy way to get anyone to find them more palatable. Perhaps I'd also add some ginger to the apricot jam.

Anyhow, the dish turned out having good flavor but was a touch soggy. This is a recipe for the drawing boards, but the entire meal turned out deliciously. My dad's pork was fantastic, as was the sweet potato. My mother, who has a bigger sweet tooth than I do, really liked the cranberry apple stuffing. I liked it, but in a smaller portion. 

Perhaps one day I'll expound on this recipe and give it another go! I'll see my family again in 10 weeks, so we'll see if I've got it nailed by then. 

Orange Honey Bread

I spent the weekend in Florida with my mom, dad and two sisters, and thought it'd be fun to have a guest blog or two, since basically everybody in my family cooks. 

My sister is very into healthy eating, and especially healthy baking. I can't remember the exact number she's lost, but I think it's around 20 pounds through tracking what she eats and balancing her intake with exercise. The point is, she still eats what she wants, just not as much of it, so you can totally bake your heart out as long as you're smart about it.

Here's what you'll need to make Michelle's orange honey bread:

2 tbsp. Smart Balance Buttery Spread (or substitute butter)

1 cup honey

2 egg whites from large eggs

2 tsp. orange zest

2 cups white flour

1/2 cup whole wheat flour (you can add another 1/2 cup of white flour if you don't have whole wheat)

2 1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. salt

6 fluid oz. fresh squeezed orange juice (you can get both this and the orange zest from about 2 oranges)

1/8 tsp. vanilla extract

1/16 tsp. lemon extract

Preheat the oven to 325 and grease and flour a bread tin. The one we used was 9 inches. 

Cut your oranges in half and juice, making sure if it has seeds they do not get in the fluid. It's okay if the pulp does. 

Then take what's left of the orange and grate the peel to get 2 tsps. of zest. 

Add the butter to a mixing bowl, add honey and blend until smooth. 

In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until foamy but not stiff, about 2 minutes. This will make your bread lighter and fluffier. Add the orange zest to the egg whites and blend. Add the orange juice, vanilla extract and lemon extract to the egg white mix.

In a separate bowl, sift all dry ingredients together: white flour, whole wheat flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. 

Alternating as you go, mix the dry ingredients bowl and the egg mixture into the honey and butter mix until all ingredients are fully blended. 

You may have to scrape the underside of the bowl to make sure all flour is blended in. 

Blended and tasting good!

Then place mixture into the bread tin. This bread bakes at a pretty low temperature, 325, because the honey would otherwise burn, so be careful if your oven tends to run high. Michelle baked the cake for 60 minutes, when a toothpick came out cleanly. 

The result was a very moist, summery cake. And for a person, like myself, who prefers the flavor of white flour, the 1/2 cup whole wheat flour taste was barely there, completely overtaken by the blend of orange and honey. I really liked using this bread as a breakfast bread, toasting it and putting melted butter on top. 

If you cut the bread into 12 slices, it's 204 calories per slice, with only 1.8 grams of fat, 25 grams of sugar, and 8 mg of Vitamin C.