No marshmallows required: Natural sweetness shines in Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Shallots

Roasting sweet potatoes and shallots with rosemary, garlic and cayenne pepper creates a naturally sweet/savory side dish that packs a satisfying kick. Recipe below.

sweet-potato-shallots

SWEET POTATOES DESERVE BETTER. As a kid, I thought sweet potato casserole was a waste of perfectly good miniature marshmallows. Now I think that saddling sweet potatoes with pie ingredients—brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg—and calling them a side dish masks their delicious natural sweetness. Again, a waste.

And sweet potatoes have far too much to offer to relegate them to a cloying, gooey annual tradition. The Center for Science in the Public Interest puts them at the top of their Best 10 Foods list, calling sweet potatoes a “nutritional All-Star—one of the best vegetables you can eat. They’re loaded with carotenoids, vitamin C, potassium, and fiber.” Sweet potatoes may help fight cancer and heart disease as well as diseases related to inflammation, such as asthma, osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. And although they’re called sweet, they’re actually very low in sugar and in fact have been proven to help regulate blood sugar level in diabetics.

We’re big fans of sweet potatoes done right, so I’ve been thinking of things to do with this healthy, delicious root vegetable. I wanted something that would take advantage of its natural sweetness, but still have an overall savory quality. Roasted shallots add a nice bite while delivering a little sweetness of their own. Garlic and rosemary further temper the sweetness of the dish. And cayenne pepper gives it dimension with a nice spicy finish.

Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Shallots

Ingredients

  • 1 to 1-1/2 pounds sweet potatoes (1 large or 2 medium)
  • 3 to 4 shallots, peeled, ends trimmed and halved lengthwise
  • 2 cloves garlic, chopped
  • olive oil
  • salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
  • 1 tablespoon fresh rosemary (see Kitchen Notes)
  • 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper (see Kitchen Notes)

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 375ºF. Peel the sweet potatoes and cut into bite-sized chunks. Place in a 9×13-inch glass baking dish. Add shallots and garlic to baking dish and drizzle with 2 to 3 tablespoons of olive oil. Toss gently with a wooden spoon to avoid breaking up shallots. Season generously with salt and pepper, then sprinkle with cayenne pepper. Toss gently again to spread seasonings more or less evenly.
  • Place baking dish on middle rack in oven and roast 40 to 55 minutes, stirring gently a couple of times during the roasting, until sweet potatoes are tender and slightly browned.
  • The sweet potatoes may absorb a bit of the olive oil and appear to be drying out—just drizzle with some more oil before tossing them. The shallots may brown even more than the sweet potatoes, and the chopped garlic will almost certainly blacken. That’s okay—all will be delicious. If your sweet potatoes were refrigerated before roasting, as mine were, you will probably need the full 55 minutes. Transfer to a serving bowl and serve immediately.

Kitchen Notes

Rosemary—keep it fresh. I’m a frequent user of dried herbs, especially in winter. But this dish demands fresh rosemary. Even though the needles dry during roasting, they’re not as stiff and tough as dried rosemary. And while I often chop fresh rosemary when I cook with it, I left them whole here. Paired with the chunks of sweet potatoes and halved shallots, they work better visually that way, I think. The act of plucking them from the sprigs sufficiently bruises them to better impart their flavor.
Cayenne pepper—how spicy do you like it? We don’t go crazy with spicy foods, but we like them to have a little kick. I used 1/2 teaspoon when I made this dish, which gave it some authority, as I like to say. Depending on your own tolerance levels for heat, use less or more. But unless you’re totally heat averse, don’t skip the cayenne pepper. It adds another dimension to an already interesting dish.

23 thoughts on “No marshmallows required: Natural sweetness shines in Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Shallots

  1. I think sweet potatoes are the business. So versatile. We roast them, like you and also put them into Thai curries, savoury tarts and vegeburgers. They are fashionable on this side of the water these days but were relatively unknown until a few years ago. We’re making a spinach and roasted sweet potato tart in our shop these days.

  2. I. Love. Sweet potatoes. Truth be told, my favorite way to eat them is roasted in the oven (NOT microwaved ~ the skin doesn’t get crisp) and topped with butter. I devour them, skin and all. I also like them as oven-roasted “French fries.” But this recipe sounds divine ~ your combination of herbs and shallots truly sounds amazing, Terry. My mother made the annual Thanksgiving sweet potatoes and marshmallows, but she also fixed baked sweet potatoes during the rest of the year. The problem was that she always served them with butter and tons of brown sugar. She did the same with acorn squash, and it was only as an adult that I discovered they don’t actually taste the same. Thanks for another inspired dish.

  3. What a great food blog and nice site. I am new to the food blogging and hope to communicate with you in the future. I will let you know when i try one of your recipes.

  4. Dani—Your favorite way to enjoy sweet potatoes sounds perfect! I also remember having some amazing sweet potato straws at the bar of the House of Blues. They were finer than matchsticks and seasoned with cayenne pepper.

    Thanks, Nicole! They are gorgeous, aren’t they, he said somewhat immodestly.

    Delishhh—Welcome to the land of food blogging. Hope you have fun with it!

  5. I love the idea of the cayenne! I often find sweet potatoes, even without marshmallows, to be far too sweet. Spice is an excellent mitigation I would imagine…

  6. I never could abide that horrid casserole. Fortunately, the only way my mother made sweet potatoes was to bake them whole. I love your dish – I wouldn’t peel them, though ;-))

  7. Never had anything as exotic as marshmallows on top of the sweet potatoes growing up. Mom simply opened a can of sweet potatoes and made a sickening sweet very thin syrup of brown sugar & water and heated them up. Brings to mind your profile where frozen veggies in a bag were taboo, but bring out the can opener and continue to cook them to death. (Can you tell I’m from the Midwest too?) Will try your recipe for sweet potatoes!

  8. Laura—I think the garlic and shallots help tame the sweetness here. So does the cayenne, interestingly; the heat gives your mouth something else to think about besides the sweetness.

    Katie—For baked sweet potatoes, the peel is a definite good call. I wonder if in this dish, though, the peel might separate a little too much from the potato chunks.

    Lora—Ah, the kitchen sins of our Midwestern mothers. I hope you enjoy these!

  9. I have never had it but sweet potatoes with marshmallows doesn’t sound like something I’d like. This recipe you have here is much more my thing. Gorgeous and delicious. BTW I didn’t know that a recipe could be copyrighted. On the US copyright site it states that ” Mere listings of ingredients as in recipes, formulas, compounds, or prescriptions are not subject to copyright protection.”

  10. WizzyTheStick—It’s not so much the ingredients list per se that are copyrightable, but the overall description of the process, along with the ingredients, is.

  11. I always felt like cooking sweet potatoes with marshmallows and brown sugar was a waste, too. I always feel bad after eating that stuff, especially since sweet potatoes are so good on their own! I’m bookmarking this recipe – it’s refreshing to see the potatoes used in a savory dish!

  12. Happened on your blog when I had a yen for (not)sweet potatoes. I too think making them sweet(er) is a great mistake. I only learned to really enjoy them when I discovered savory preparations. Tonight, leading into fall, I roasted them as you described, sauted chard in garlic infused olive oil and served with my husband’s grilled turkey breast encrusted with a paste of garlic, dijon, and herbs. Marvelous!

  13. Thanks, Sunie! Usually when I find a comment on an older post, it’s spam. I was delighted to see this was an actual comment. And your timing is eerily impeccable. Last night, for this week’s post, I cooked sweet potatoes and served them with garlicky sautéed Swiss chard. I mashed the sweet potatoes this time and actually did sweeten them, but only a little, with a tablespoon of maple syrup. I also salted them generously. The combination of the salt and maple syrup really brought out the natural sweetness of the sweet potatoes. Look for the post on Wednesday!

    Your meal with the grilled turkey breast sounds amazing, BTW.

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  15. Hey Terry! Just wanted to let you know that my aunt made these for Thanksgiving and they were delicious and a big hit at our huge family gathering!

  16. Made these for dinner tonight along with ribs. They were so delicious. I keep sneaking into the fridge to pick at the leftovers. Thanks!

  17. Just checking in to say that this has become a Thanksgiving staple in our house–love a non-sweet sweet potato dish!

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