My family loves sweet potatoes and yams, so I cook them all the time for different recipes (especially during Thanksgiving and Christmas), but without the proper know-how, peeling boiled cooked yams or sweet potatoes can be a disaster!
Below I've shared my fast and simple way to peel them, but before we begin, the most important thing to know is that you must peel them while they are hot! If you cook them and then put them in the fridge or wait until they are cold to peel them, they can be extremely difficult to peel. I boil mine until they are no longer firm in the center when tested with a knife, remove them from the boiling water, rest them just for a minute or two, and then peel. Here's how I do it.
1. Slice off both ends with knife.
2. Use a sharp knife to make one long shallow cut down the potato from end to end. Only slice through the skin and avoid slicing deep down into the potato.
3. This is how it should look.
4. Use your hands to carefully peel away one side of the skin next to where you sliced. Be careful, its hot! The skin should fall very easily away from the potato.
5. Then do the same thing on the other side, peeling the shell away, working around the potato until the entire skin is removed. That's it!
For peeling uncooked sweet potatoes, remove any woody parts first and then use either a serrated vegetable peeler
vegetable peeler
A peeler (vegetable scraper) is a kitchen tool, a distinct type of kitchen knife, consisting of a metal blade with a slot with a sharp edge attached to a handle, used to remove the outer layer (the "skin" or "peel") of some vegetables such as potatoes, broccoli stalks, and carrots, and fruits such as apples and pears.
or a paring knife to remove the skin. For peeling boiled sweet potatoes, simply fill a bowl with ice water and place the sweet potatoes inside. You can then easily peel the skin away with your fingers.
If you're going to be using a masher and you prefer to not have skins in your mash, you will have to peel the potatoes yourself. But after they're boiled the skins slip off easily. Hold the hot potatoes in a clean kitchen towel-covered hand, then use a paring knife to scrape or pull off the peel.
Potatoes: Peel or pare and chop up to a day in advance. Store in a bowl of cold water in the refrigerator. Sweet potatoes: Peel and chop 3 to 4 days in advance. Store in a sealed bag or container with an airtight lid in the refrigerator.
Add enough cold water to cover potatoes and sprinkle with salt. Bring to boiling, cover, and cook until tender. How long can you boil sweet potatoes: For one pound of sweet potatoes, cover the pan and cook sweet potatoes in the boiling salted water 20 to 25 minutes or until just tender.
Yes, you can eat sweet potato skin, whether it's an orange, white or purple sweet potato. So the next time you make sweet potatoes, try keeping the skin on. Not only will it save you prep time and add a textural component to the dish, but there are also nutritional benefits to leaving the peel on.
Some dishes may require peeling, just like other potatoes. While you are preparing your other ingredients, keep peeled and sliced sweet potatoes in a bowl of water to prevent them from drying out if you are not using them right away.
Use a paring knife to peel the sweet potato if you don't have a vegetable peeler. Hold the sweet potato in your non-dominant hand and the paring knife in your dominant hand. Make a small incision into the sweet potato skin and draw the knife gently under the skin to start removing a peel.
Use tongs to remove the potatoes and drop them in a bowl of ice water. That stops the cooking process and makes the potatoes cool enough to handle. Now here's the fun part: Just pick up each potato and give the skin a gentle tug. It should slide right off.
How to tell if sweet potatoes have gone bad. If your sweet potato is soft in spots, smells rotten, or oozes a mysterious liquid, that potato should be discarded. Another sign that sweet potatoes have taken a turn for the worse is if they start growing stalky purplish sprouts.
Unfortunately, yes! If your sweet potatoes cook too long in the oven they can overbake and become dry. The insides will become mushy. Moving your sweet potato cubes around and checking them periodically can help avoid overcooking.
When boiled, sweet potatoes are low on the glycemic index (GI), which means they won't raise your blood sugar as quickly as high-GI foods. Heart disease. Research shows that sweet potatoes can lower your LDL "bad" cholesterol, which may lower your odds of heart problems.
Place the pot over medium-high heat and bring to a boil. Once boiling, reduce the heat to a bare simmer. Do not cover. (Covering changes the environment in the pot and can make the potatoes turn mushy.)
After you drain the potatoes, your next step depends on if you are serving the potatoes in a hot or cold recipe. If you intend to enjoy them cold in a potato salad, rinse them with cold water before proceeding to stop them from carryover cooking. Otherwise, for hot dishes, proceed with your recipe.
Rinsing potatoes helps remove excess starch, so it is recommended to rinse the potatoes before cooking. To ensure even more starch is out of the way, it's recommended that they even be quickly rinsed after boiling. We recommend using hot water for rinsing after boiling and cold water prior to boiling.
Introduction: My name is Pres. Carey Rath, I am a faithful, funny, vast, joyous, lively, brave, glamorous person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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