Oven baked spicy sweet potato fries

Sweet potato fries are wonderful. They’re healthy, delicious and on top of that they’re really easy to prepare. The fries in the photograph were ready just as the children returned from school, so as soon as I had taken the picture, we treated ourselves to a lovely afternoon snack. Combined with our very easy cucumber and yogurt sauce, because that is a match made in heaven!

But sweet potato fries also make a really nice side dish. For instance, you might like to try them with our chickpea burgers, for a nutritious and very comforting supper.

As they are prepared below, they are mildly flavoured and versatile, going well with any kind of dish. Depending on your taste and on the dishes you’d like to pair them with, however, you could add any kind of extra flavours: think dried chilli flakes, grated ginger, chopped garlic, Parmesan cheese, fresh green herbs….

The possibilities are endless – so get experimental and enjoy!

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Oven baked spicy sweet potato fries – serves 4

Ingredients

  • 4 large sweet potatoes
  • 2 tbsp. olive oil
  • salt, freshly ground black pepper and paprika to taste

 

Preparation

Preheat the oven to 200oC/400oF/Gas 6.

Peel the sweet potatoes*) and cut them lengthwise into 1 cm-thick wedges. Toss them with the olive oil and spread them in a single layer on a lined baking sheet. Season with the salt, pepper and paprika.

Bake them for 30-40 minutes, until they’re tender and crispy at the edges.

Serve them as a side dish, or as a healthy snack with our very easy cucumber and yogurt sauce.

 

*) You could also scrub the sweet potatoes under running water en cut them into fries without peeling them. This results in fries with extra fibre and extra crunch and that tastes really good! The reason I peel them nonetheless, is the fact I can’t always obtain organic sweet potatoes. With non-organically grown potatoes and sweet potatoes there is a chance of pesticide residues having accumulated in the skin and I don’t like the thought of that. Therefore, if I’m unsure about the provenance of the potatoes, I play safe and make peeled fries.