Reading Betsy’s post about the roasted sweet potato salad, I was inspired. I just love sweet potatoes.

It wasn’t always that way. I used to think I despised sweet potatoes. This is directly related to my grandmother’s candied sweet potatoes she made at holidays. Now, I loved my grandmother very much, but my grandmother’s recipe was so sickly sweet that I swear she used distilled essence of Karo syrup in it. It was just too, too much. When I first met my husband, he was sure I was exaggerating about their sweetness. At his first holiday at my parent’s house he took a large helping, took one bite – and instantly understood why it took me until my mid-20s to eat and enjoy sweet potatoes.

Sweet potatoes truly are delicious and oh so versatile

It was one evening at a friend’s house that turned the tide: it was impossible not to have a few bites of the baked sweet potatoes without being rude, so I did, and I tasted the true flavor of sweet potatoes for the first time. They were delicious.

At restaurants, I’m a sucker for sweet potato fries, and an even bigger sucker if there is some raspberry vinegar to go with it. Sweet potato chips are a nice complement to a deli sandwich. My favorite way to enjoy sweet potatoes at home is the simplest way possible: baked. Add a little butter, a little kosher salt and you have a delicious simple lunch. Mashed sweet potatoes are wonderful, and substituting orange juice and a squeeze of lime for the butter and cream is a healthy variation. Potatoes au gratin? Use half sweet potato slices with the regular potato slices for a colorful twist. Latkes on the menu? Make them sweet potato latkes! Either half white potatoes and half sweet potatoes as with the au gratin or all grated sweet potato. And for breakfast, there’s sweet potato pancakes and sweet potato biscuits.

Almost any way you prepare potatoes, you can prepare sweet potatoes.

Orange Juice Mashed Sweet Potatoes

As with many of my recipes, this does not use exact amounts. Tasting and evaluating as you go are the best way to really learn to cook!

A few sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into cubes
Orange juice
Lime
Salt to taste

Boil the sweet potatoes in water until they are tender. Drain and return to the pot (off the stove). Pour in a 1/2 cup or so of orange juice. Mash the sweet potatoes, then using a hand mixer, whip the sweet potatoes until smooth, adding a little more orange juice, if necessary, for moistness. When they are about done, squeeze in some fresh lime juice and salt to taste and stir. Serve warm.