Twice-Baked Sweet Potatoes with Spinach and Coconut Milk

[aargnzarf]

The flavors of sweet potato and coconut milk together are a must try! If you are in a hurry I think a simple sweet potato adorned with coconut cream would be a great alternative to the american staple of baked potatoes with butter and sourcream. You can serve this up as a mashed dish instead of in the potato skins as well.

An important excerpt on Sweet Potatoes vs. Yams:
The terms sweet potato and yam confuse many cooks. A yam is a huge tropical tuber with white fles and thick, hairy brown skin. It looks like a log. Unless you shop at ethnic markets, you've probably never seen a real yam.
Although the labels in many supermarkets say yam, generally the word is a misnomer for sweet potatoes. Some farmer somewhere must have liked the word yam and mistakenly applied it to sweet potatoes. The name has stuck around ever since.
Sweet potatoes vary-some have yellow or white flesh, others orange. I've even seen one with purple flesh. In general, orange varieties are sweeter and moister than the yellow or white varieties, which are startchier and nutty-tasting. Yellow or white varieties are popular in the Caribbean and are sold in many latin markets in the United States. I use orange varieties, which are universally available.

I tried the recipe out with the orange variety, though the store had multiple colors. I'd be curious to hear how this recipe fares with the yellow or white sweet potatoes.

from A Year in a Vegetarian Kitchen, by Jack Bishop
serves 4 as a main course

4 sweet potatoes (10-11 ounces each), scrubbed
2 tablespoons canola oil, plus more for rubbing on the potatoes
2 tablespoons minced gingerroot
2 tablespoons Thai red curry paste
1 1/4 pounds flat-leaf spinach, stems removed unless very thin, leaves washed, shaken dry to remove excess water, and chopped (about 8 cups)
salt
1/3 cup unsweetened coconut milk
3 tablespoons fresh chopped cilantro leaves

1. Move an oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 400 degrees. Lightly rub each potato with a little oil. Place potatoes on a foil lined baking sheet and bake until the skin is crisp and a skewer slides easily through the flesh, about 1 hour and 10 minutes. Remove baking sheet from oven and set the sweet potatoes aside on a rack to cool for 10 minutes. Increase the oven temperature to 450 degrees.

2. While the sweet potatoes are cooling, heat the 2 tablespoons of oil in a large saucepan over medium heat until simmering. Add the ginger and the curry paste and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the damp spinach, cover, and cook, stirring once or twice, until completely wilted, about 5 minutes. Add salt to taste and set the spinach mixture aside.

3. Using a folded kitchen towel to hold the hot sweet potatoes, cut each one in half lenghtwise. (If possible, cut so that the flat side of the sweet potatoes will rest on the baking sheet.) With a spoon, scoop the flesh from each half into a medium bowl, leaving a 1/4 inch of the flesh and skin in each shell. Arrange the empty sweet potato shells on the baking sheet.

4. Mash the sweet potatoes in the bowl with the coconut milk until smooth. Stir in the spinach mixture and cilantro. Adjust the seasonings, adding salt to taste.

5. Mound the sweet potato filling into each shell. Bake until the top of the filling is firm and slightly crisp, about 15 minutes. Remove the baking sheet from the oven and cool the sweet potatoes on the baking sheet for 5 minutes. Serve. (Straight from the oven, the potatoes are unbearably hot to eat.)