Orange Glazed
Sweet Potatoes

INGREDIENTS:

6 sweet potatoes (about 2 pounds)
2/3 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 tablespoon orange zest
1 cup orange juice
2 tablespoons butter


DIRECTIONS:

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Pare and cut each sweet potatoes in half lengthwise. Arrange in an un-greased 1 1/2 quart casserole.

In a small sauce pan, stir together sugar, cornstarch, salt and orange zest. Slowly stir orange juice into sugar mixture. Add butter. Cook, stirring constantly until mixture thickens and boils. Boil and stir 1 minute.

Pour hot orange juice mixture over sweet potatoes into casserole. Cover; bake 1 hour, basting occasionally.

Serves 4 to 6
 

Curious Sweet Potato Facts

Laundry starch, shoe polish, and a coffee substitute are just some of the more than 118 products that were made from sweet potatoes by George Washington Carver, a famous botanist and educator. Sweet potatoes, a complex carbohydrate food, are often thought of as "poor man's food" because they combine nutrition and economy.

Sweet potatoes and yams are not the same plant. The sweet potato originated in Central and South America and is grown in the United States while the yam was discovered in Africa and is imported from tropical countries. A sweet potato is technically a "storage root." Yams are tubers. Sweet potatoes are sweet and moist. Yams are dry and starchy. Sweet potatoes with orange interiors have a high beta-carotene content. Yams have very little. Sweet potatoes are grown in the United States. Yams are imported to the USA from the Caribbean. The scientific name of sweet potato is Ipomoea batatas and it's a member of the morning glory family. A yam on the other hand belongs to the Yam plant family.

Unsolved mystery: Sweet potatoes were the principal food of the Moari, the native people of New Zealand. How and when did the plant get from the Americas to New Zealand, thousands of miles across the Pacific? It's a gastronomic mystery.

The sweet potato is arguably the healthiest vegetable you can eat. This super spud is packed with vitamins A (beta carotene), B6, and some C, as well as potassium and fiber. The sweet potato ranks number 9 (out of 10 power-packed vegetables) for its concentration of vitamins and minerals. (Broccoli is number 1.) It's as versatile a food as you can find - used in main dishes, soups, desserts and even as a dip.

North Carolina is the "Sweet potato Capital of the World."

Sweet potatoes may be baked, boiled, broiled, mashed, stuffed, steamed, sautéed and cooked in the microwave. They can be substituted for Irish potatoes, apples and squash in almost any recipe. They are great raw - use them as a crudités, shredded on greens or julienne for a colorful addition to salads.

Sweet potatoes make attractive houseplants. Place a sweet potato in a jar of water with its narrow end down. Put the jar in a warm, dark place and keep the jar filled with water. New roots will grow and in about 10 days, the stem will grow. As soon as this happens, put the jar in a sunny window. As the vine grows, it can be left to trail or trained to climb.