Thai Spiced Sweet Potatoes (2024)

FAQs

What is sweet potato in Thai? ›

Sweet potato: Man thet (มันเทศ). Man thet (literally meaning "foreign tuber") is popularly also known as man daeng (Thai: มันแดง; "red tuber"); boiled pieces are eaten as a snack or used as an ingredient for desserts.

The cold water bath helps rinse the starch off the sweet potatoes so they're a bit more crispy. That said, if you do not have the time, you can still get crispy baked sweet potato fries by using high heat and a little drizzle of olive oil.

Nevertheless, Korean Sweet Potatoes are smaller, purple on the outside, and yellow on the inside when cooked. It has a lower water content which makes it perfect as a roasted or baked snack because it retains a dry but fluffy interior when cooked. It is also sweeter than American sweet potatoes.

The two most common white-fleshed sweet potatoes are Boniato, also called batata, or Cuban sweet potato, and the Japanese sweet potato, also called the satsuma-imo. The big difference between the two is the skin color: Japanese sweet potatoes have a pinkish brown skin and the outer skin of a boniato is light tan.

In Korean, they are called “bam goguma” and “mul goguma.” These two types are the same Japanese sweet potato, but their appearance and texture are slightly different depending on their growing conditions.

Just like the other sweet potatoes, Korean sweet potatoes are rich in dietary fiber, which helps promote digestion and keeps you and your child full for longer. They are a great source of potassium, vitamin A, and vitamin C.

Extra-virgin olive oil – It adds a little richness and helps the potatoes soften and brown in the oven. And salt and pepper – They contrast wonderfully with the potatoes' natural sweetness, making the roasted sweet potatoes deliciously sweet and savory.

The takeaway. If you want to eat sweet potatoes and maintain blood sugar balance, Sapola suggests boiling rather than roasting them. This method will take the glycemic index impact down a few points and maybe even challenge your cooking creativity.

When sweet potatoes are boiled, the temperature doesn't get above 100°C, so this flavour development doesn't happen. The breakdown of starch into simple sugars during baking also helps by creating more substrates for these reactions, leading to a more fragrant and flavoursome result.

For the gardener who doesn't care about looks, but is searching for taste, "Jewel" is considered the "Queen of Sweet Potatoes" and is the leading spud planted in North Carolina for commercial growers.

Which sweet potato is the healthiest? ›

Purple sweet potatoes are a good source of beta-carotene but are an even richer source of anthocyanin pigments, which act as antioxidants that can help reduce inflammation and boost your immune system. Purple sweet potatoes have about three times more anthocyanins than the average blueberry.

Which sweet potato is the sweetest? Sweetest is subjective but relatively speaking, Garnets and Hannahs are mildly sweet. Purple and Jewels are moderately sweet and the Japanese variety tend to be the sweetest.

Although both veggies are very close in fiber, protein, vitamin C, and magnesium, sweet potatoes are the healthier option because they are lower in overall calories, lower in carbohydrates, and higher in beta carotene (vitamin A).

If you are lucky enough to find a purple sweet potato, it will probably either be a Stokes Purple® or an Okinawan sweet potato. There is a chance it may also be an Ube (pronounced OO-beh) but that is actually a yam, not a sweet potato.

Murasaki. These Japanese sweet potatoes have a reddish-purple skin and white flesh. This is one of the “firm” varieties that is drier than the orange-fleshed varieties. When cooked, their texture is much closer to that of a regular potato than soft sweet potatoes.

In the United States and Canada, sweet potatoes are often (confusingly) referred to as “yams.” But sweet potatoes are not even closely related to yams. As such, the USDA requires any label with “yam” to also include “sweet potato.” So why are sweet potatoes sometimes confusingly called yams?

In Thailand and other Southeast-Asian countries, in addition to regular sweet potato and regular yam, purple yams are also popular.

Yam (ยำ, Thai pronunciation: [jām]) literally means "mix," but in Thai cuisine, it usually refers to a type of salad-like dishes in the culinary repertoire of Thailand.

Are Yams and Sweet Potatoes the Same? No, yams and sweet potatoes are not the same. Yams have rough, dark brown skin that is often compared to tree bark, and their flesh is dry and starchy like a regular potato. Sweet potatoes have smooth reddish skin, softer flesh (when cooked), and a sweet flavor.