Twice Baked Sweet Potatoes with Coconut Milk and Spinach

from A Year in a Vegetarian Kitchen

by Jack Bishop

Ingredients

4 sweet potatoes (10-11 ounces each),scrubbed

2 tablespoons canola oil, plus more for rubbing on the potatoes

2 tablespoons minced gingerroot

2 teaspoons Thai red curry paste

1 1/4 pounds flat-leaf spinach, stems removed unlessvery thin, leaves washed, shaken dry to remove excess water, and chopped (about 8cups)

salt (I used Atlantic sea salt)

1/3 cup unsweetened coconut milk

2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro leaves

Move an oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 400 degrees.

Lightly rub each potato with a little oil.

Place potatoes on a foil-lined baking sheet and bake until the skin is crisp and a skewer slides easily through the flesh, about 1 hour and 10 minutes.

Remove the baking sheet from the oven and set the sweet potatoes aside on a rack tocool for 10 minutes.

Increase oven temperature to 450 degrees.

While the potatoes are cooling, heat the 2 tablespoons oil in a largesaucepan over medium heat until shimmering.

Add the ginger and curry paste and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute.

Add the damp spinach, cover, and cook, stirring once or twice, until completely wilted, about 5 minutes.

Add salt and set spinach mixture aside.

Using a folded kitchen towel to hold the hot potatoes, cut each on in halflengthwise. (If possible, cut so that the flat sides of the sweetpotatoes will rest on the baking sheet.)

With a spoon, scoop the fleshfrom each half into a medium bowl, leaving 1/4 inch of flesh and skin ineach shell.

Arrange the empty sweet potato shells on the baking sheet.

Mash the sweet potatoes in the bowl with the coconut milk until smooth.

Stir in the spinach mixture and cilantro.

Adjust the seasonings, addingsalt to taste.Mound the sweet potato filling into each shell.

Bake until the top of thefilling is firm and slightly crisp, about 15 minutes.

Remove the baking sheet from the oven and cool the sweet potatoes on the baking sheet for 5 minutes. Serve. (Straight from the oven, the potatoes are unbearably hot to eat.)

My review: I purchased this cookbook over a year ago after reading excellent recipe reviews on a long (and very much still alive thread) on the Cooking Light Bulletin Board. After purchasing the book, I had my eye on this recipe. I kept wanting to make it, yet I never seemed to have all the ingredients at home at once, or I could never find the time to pay attention to the details (this recipe is not complicated in any way, it just has several steps and a long cooking time). Finally, spurred on by a huge bag of fresh baby spinach sitting in the fridge, I wrote down the ingredients I didn't have, and made a stop at the store on the way home. I halved the recipe, since I only needed to feed myself, and I wasn't quite sure how the leftovers were hold up, or if I would even want to eat the leftovers. The final product was warm, Thai spicy, filling, and all- around yummy. I loved the little crunch the skins had from oiling them before baking (something that usually only happens to white baking potatoes). I may have added a little too much coconut milk, since I was eyeballing half of the 1/3 cup called for in the full recipe, making the filling a little mushier than I would have liked. I can't wait to have Thai night and feature these for others to enjoy as well. A nice change from the standard stir-fry or baked sweet potato with butter (and for some [not me], cinnamon and sugar).