These delicious Maple Glazed Sweet Potatoes are a perfect addition to your Thanksgiving Turkey with just the right amount of rich spicy sweetness.
I always try to outdo my self each year with the perfect side dishes for my Thanksgiving turkey. To be honest, I haven’t always found a perfect sweet potato recipe.
In my early days of cooking, I would use canned sweet potatoes. But that sicky sweet water that the potatoes were packed in was really a turn off. Plus the potatoes were often fiberous – almost stringy.
So I switched to fresh sweet potatoes, which made all the difference. But the recipe usually called for the sweet potatoes to be boiled to first tenderize them. This, I thought made the sweet potatoes too watery.
Then it called for lots brown sugar and butter, which resulted in not only a watery dish, but it was also overly sweet and overly rich dish. And it was made even worse when you topped the potatoes with marshmallows.
So this year, I decided to try a healthier approach to a candied sweet potato recipe and this was really eye-opening. The brown sugar is still there, as well as the butter but in much smaller amounts. And to make it a bit more natural I added maple syrup to give it just the right amount of sweetness and some cinnamon for spice.
But to tenderize the sweet potatoes I decided steaming them was a smarter idea. That way you’d actually taste the potato instead of the water.
The result was, without question, the best candied sweet potatoes I’ve ever had. The texture, because of the steaming was exactly right and the flavor was sweet, but not too sweet with just the right amount of spice.
So let’s make them.
Ingredients for Maple Glazed Sweet Potatoes
- Sweet potatoes
- Butter
- Maple syrup
- Cinnamon
- Brown sugar
How to Make Maple Glazed Sweet Potatoes
As I mentioned earlier, steaming the potatoes first before baking is the best way is ensure a far more flavorful dish. And the easiest way to do that is in a steamer.
I always rely on my trusty bamboo steamer over my electric wok. But if you don’t have a bamboo steamer you can use a metal insert steamer in a pot with water.
I really like the bamboo steamer better because you have two layers you can steam at the same time, so you can make these Maple Glazed Sweet Potatoes for a crowd.
After peeling the sweet potatoes, I like to cut them into 1/2” slices for a better serving presentation.
Add the slices to your steamer and steam them for 10-12 minutes until they are just tender.
Then in a baking dish that you’ve sprayed with oil, layer the sweet potato slices in rows each sweet potato just over lapping the next.
To make the syrup, melt the butter in a microwave for about 30-45 seconds. Then whisk in the maple syrup, cinnamon and the brown sugar.
Pour the syrup mixture evenly over the sweet potatoes and bake, uncovered, for about 30-35 minutes and serve warm.
What’s the Difference Between Sweet Potatoes And Yams?
Have you ever walked through the produce department and saw both yams and sweet potatoes and thought they were basically the same thing?
According to the LiveStrong Foundation they really are different from each other.
First of all sweet potatoes are root vegetables and yams are tubers (vegetables that form at the base of roots).
Yams are darker than sweet potatoes and generally have a rougher skin and their flesh is lighter colored much more starchy and drier than sweet potatoes. So you’ll often see more cream or butter added to yams in recipes.
Sweet potatoes, on the other hand, have a lighter skin and a deep orange flesh. And of course they’re naturally sweeter than yams.
Nutritionally, both are extremely healthy for you. A 100 g serving of yams packs an impressive 800 mg of potassium. Plus the same serving gives you about 30% of your daily dose of Vitamin C.
Sweet potatoes also are nutritionally great. A 100 g serving will give you about 3 times your daily requirement of Vitamin A with about 330 mg of potassium.
And, here’s the bonus, if you’re looking to save some calories sweet potatoes are the way to go because they have 20% less calories than yams.
Maple Glazed Sweet Potatoes
These delicious Maple Glazed Sweet Potatoes are a perfect addition to your Thanksgiving Turkey with just the right amount of rich spicy sweetness.
Servings: 4 servings
Calories: 355kcal
Equipment
- Steamer
Ingredients
- 2 Large Sweet Potatoes Peeled and cut into 1/2" slices
- 1/4 Cup Butter
- 1/4 Cup Maple Syrup
- 1/2 Tsp Cinnamon
- 1/4 Cup Brown Sugar
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F
- Steam the sweet potato slices in a steamer.
- As the sweet potatoes are steaming, add butter to a microwave safe bowl. Add maple syrup, cinnamon and brown sugar. Microwave on high for 20-25 seconds. Mix thoroughly and set aside.
- Add the sweet potato slices to a large square baking dish overlapping the potatoes in rows. Then pour the syrup mixture evenly over the sweet potatoes.
- Bake uncovered for 30-35 minutes.
Nutrition
Calories: 355kcal | Carbohydrates: 61g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 12g | Saturated Fat: 7g | Cholesterol: 31mg | Sodium: 200mg | Potassium: 636mg | Fiber: 5g | Sugar: 33g | Vitamin A: 24472IU | Vitamin C: 4mg | Calcium: 88mg | Iron: 1mg
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