Camote cue

Sweet potato slices fried through first, then sugar thrown into the oil to glaze them.

Vegan.

Ingredients

• 1 kg sweet potatoes, in 1 cm slices
• 150 g dark muscovado sugar
• oil, for deep frying
• bamboo skewers

Method

1. SLICES, NOT WHOLE, which is what separates this from the bananacue on this site. A banana on a skewer cooks through in four minutes; a whole sweet potato would still be raw at the centre after fifteen, by which time the outside is leather. So it is cut into 1 cm coins and each one cooks through on its own.
2. Soak the slices in cold water 15 minutes and then dry them well. That takes off the surface starch, which would otherwise catch and burn in the sugar.
3. Oil to 160C, which is lower than the bananacue wants. Sweet potato needs time in the middle.
4. Fry 8 to 10 minutes, turning, until a skewer goes through without resistance and the slices are pale gold. Lift them out onto a rack.
5. THEY MUST BE COOKED THROUGH BEFORE THE SUGAR GOES IN. Once sugar is in the pan everything happens in ninety seconds, and a slice that is still hard in the middle stays hard.
6. Heat the oil up to about 180C, then throw the sugar in all at once. It will foam and then melt into the oil.
7. Slices straight back in and turned constantly for 60 to 90 seconds, until each one is coated in dark glossy caramel.
8. Lift them out with tongs onto a rack, well apart, and leave them 2 minutes. The coating sets hard and brittle.
9. Thread three or four onto each skewer. They are at their best within ten minutes; after an hour the caramel has drawn water out of the potato and gone sticky.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

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