Roasted sweet potatoes

So being that it is technically spring, though it is still pretty chilly around here, it is grilling season! The Man and I have been grilling a lot (well, more him then me, it's like if you add fire to anything then guys think it is awesome) these last couple weeks.


There has been extra incentive to do grilling as it is pretty low-maintenance cooking, and low-maintenance is ideal when it is finals week and one of you is graduating this year. Make that "graduated", as I spent most of the day today going to my husband's graduation ceremony and reception things. Yeah. Next year I get to go to all of those things again.

But that has nothing to do with roasted sweet potatoes, which are really good!

So this is less of a recipe and more of a method that the Man came up with. Apparently when he was spending time in Egypt you could buy roasted yams from food carts, and recently he decided to try and make his own.

It turned out really good and it's not difficult. Only when we made them a couple days ago, we used sweet potatoes, but those are yummy as well. It also works with normal potatoes, but because of the lower sugar content in a russet-type potato, the flesh doesn't caramelize or get very smoky, and they aren't much more exciting than baked potatoes.

Also keep in mind that I'm fairly sure that the "yams" you buy in the U.S. are an orange-fleshed variety of sweet potato, but don't quote me on that.

Anyway.
Here is the basic method:


When you are done grilling meat and veggies, the coals should still be hot but will have cooled down quite a bit. Just put the sweet potatoes/yams directly on the coals. I usually try to pile some hot coals on top of the potatoes, but there weren't quite enough coals this time.

He likes to push the coals with a piece of wood. I usually use tongs. Either works.


Put the lid back on the grill, and then turn the potatoes over after ten or fifteen minutes. They'll be charred and a bit ashy, and that's fine, as I usually don't eat the skin anyway.


They're done when they look like this and are slightly squishy when you poke them. That time varies a lot depending on the size of the tuber (tuberous roots, technically) or how hot the coals are, but I cooked these for probably 45 minutes. It would probably be hard to burn them because the coals cool off pretty quickly.


That's it! You can mash them with some butter (which is really dang good) or eat plain. We usually eat yams without the butter.


Note that the yellow is not from a crappy camera (well, mostly isn't) but that sweet potatoes have a nice golden color on the inside.

And you have an easy side to a barbecued meal!