By Ilaria Catizone

One of the great summer veggies that can be stored into winter is sweet potatoes. I’ll be honest, I have never eaten them much, and I always feel a little unsure about what to do with them.

But when I was at the Co-op recently they looked large plump and delicious and I decided to give them a go… and oh my, I was not sorry!

Since I had no idea where to start, I decided to look up some recipes. The one that caught my eye featured ginger and coconut milk which most fussy eaters in my family like, so it seemed like a good one to try.

The full recipe is here https://thefirstmess.com/2020/02/19/sweet-potato-coconut-milk-stew/ but I am not really good at following recipes so I used red lentils and red onion instead of their brown counterparts as that’s what I had at hand. I also used olive oil instead of coconut oil as we prefer the taste of it.

Here are the original recipes’ ingredients:

1 tablespoon coconut oil
1 medium yellow onion, small dice
½ – 1 teaspoon dried chili flakes
½ teaspoon ground coriander
½ teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon ground turmeric
2-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and minced
3 garlic cloves, peeled and minced
sea salt and ground black pepper, to taste
1 ½ lbs (690 grams or 2 medium) sweet potatoes, peeled and diced into 1-inch pieces
½ cup brown lentils, picked over
4 cups vegetable stock
13.5 oz (400 ml) can full fat coconut milk
1 small bunch of kale, stems removed & leaves chopped (about 4 cups chopped & lightly packed kale)

GARNISH:
chopped cilantro
extra chili flakes
lime wedges
nigella seeds (optional)

The method is pretty easy, I just sautéed the onions then added all the other ingredients and let it simmer.

The recipe recommends balancing the sweetness of the coconut and sweet potatoes with lots of chilli and I think that could work well, but I skipped the chili to make it more kid-friendly. The soup was certainly very sweet but in a very pleasant way and even my fussy 4 yr old loved it.

Another thing that could help balance the sweetness are the herbs and the greens. I didn’t add them, as it was too cold and dark to venture into the garden! But I think I’ll make the effort next time – or maybe I’ll just buy kale from the Co-op, which is also where my coconut milk came from!

A dash of lemon was delicious and I also think this recipe would work great in the slow cooker if you are organised enough to start cooking in the morning.

I am so happy about how well this veggie packed dish was received at my place I look forward to making a bigger batch next time so I can freeze half for another day.