Recipe: Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Cinnamon & Crushed Chili

Just in case you were wondering, roasted sweet potatoes with cinnamon and crushed chili (red pepper flakes in America) is a wonderful idea. Fraser and I had it with the chicken curry we made for dinner. After learning how to cook basic roasted potatoes, thanks to Gordon Ramsay, I decided to see if it'd work with sweet potatoes and if that combination of tastes would be good. In short: SUCCESS! They were so good, we ate all of it before it occurred to me that a picture would be helpful with this post.

It goes like this:

1. 1. Peel and cut up sweet potatoes (however many you want to eat) and boil with a little salt for about 10 minutes.
2. Put just enough oil in a rectangular baking dish to coat the bottom, and place it in a hot (200 C/ 400 F) oven for a few minutes to get the oil hot.
3. Drain the sweet potatoes, then toss them with some cinnamon (enough to give each chunk of potato a nice sprinkling) and a dash or 2 of chili flakes (depending on how spicy you like things). Season with a little salt & pepper, then toss with a drizzle of oil to help it all stick.
4. Put the potatoes into the heated pan and carefully toss with the hot oil. Roast until crispy, or until you can't take the smell of deliciousness any longer and must eat them even if they're still a bit soft (30-45 minutes, depending on how crispy you like them). Turn them once or twice while roasting.
5. Remove from the pan with a slotted spoon and spread them on a paper towel to remove any oil that stuck to them.
6. Devour.

P.S. If it won't alienate anyone, I think I'm going to ditch the Tumblr account and just post my recipes and cooking adventures right here, in the mix with everything else I babble about. Tumblr is too buggy, and it's not like I'm over-posting and flooding the Internet with this thing, right?

Cook, Eat, Love

I've never been all that interested in cooking. Baking, yes, but not more frequently than once a week at most, and generally only sweet things. Other than that, I've always seen cooking as a chore - a thing that needs to be done. That's not to say I always minded doing it, but I also never looked forward to it either. I might have looked forward to the meal that would be the result of it, but the act of actually putting it together just wasn't something I would get excited about. That is, until recently.

Fraser working on a Guardian recipe

I've been in Scotland a little over a month now, getting used to sharing my everyday life with someone again, after a really long hiatus. One of my favorite parts of this is, to my surprise, the time we spend in the kitchen. Without consciously setting out to, Fraser and I have become these people who like to cook. Neither of us is particularly gifted when it comes to culinary creativity, but we can follow a recipe with the best of 'em, and we know what we like.

We've taken to cutting recipes out of the newspapers, bookmarking ones that people post to Twitter or Facebook, and even flipping through a Jamie Oliver cookbook (Say what you will about him, but the guy comes up with some good stuff.).

We don't eat out much, partly because, well, everybody knows we don't have any money. The silver lining to that lack of funds is still pretty shiny, though. If we had a bunch of money, we might have taken to eating out a lot and missed out on some really good experiences. Just about every day, when we start getting hungry, we wander into the kitchen. As we rummage through the cabinets, preheat the oven, boil water, chop vegetables, or whatever is required, we're not only doing a chore that needs to be done if we want to eat anything remotely healthy and within budget, but getting some quality time to follow whatever the day has brought. This is when anything remarkable about the day will be brought up, when plans will be made, concerns addressed, and silliness ensues. Also, if dinner gets messed up, it's hard to place blame if both of us are equally involved in creating it. That's a rarity though, as we've pretty much gotten the hang of it at this point.

There was some burned rice and improperly-stored and consequently rotten veggies in the beginning, but we're getting steadily better. We don't do pasta a lot, but when we do, we've figured out what to add to it to make it less boring. We've also officially mastered the Scott Pilgrim shepherd's pie. If it was a rough day - the kind where he was hassled at work or I've had a project blow up in my face, this goes a long way toward making it better and restoring balance. If it was a good day, then it continues to be a good day, turning into a good night.

I just can't help but wonder how many people who live together would be happier if they also cooked together. It really is a good way to make a chore enjoyable while spending time together without needing to go out and spend money or be camped in front of the TV. If you also do this, let me know. If you don't already but decide to try it out, let me know how it goes. If not, come have dinner with us sometime. It probably won't be too fancy, but it'll be made with love.