Recipe: Purple Potato Risotto

If you need a lovely dish to take to an ECU Pirates dinner or a Northwestern Wildcats party, have I got the recipe for you: Roasted purple sweet potato risotto.

Actually, the recipe called for regular NC sweet potatoes -- I found it in a deck of recipe cards courtesy of the NC Sweet Potato Commission.What, you didn't know North Carolina has a Sweet Potato Commission? It is the state vegetable, after all.

But anyway, I had all these purple sweet potatoes left from our Produce Box, so I just substituted them in. And WOW, is it purple. Also, quite tasty (despite the fact that my photo here makes it look like a dumped-out can of cat food) -- my husband even had seconds.

And, did I mention it's very, very purple?

Here's the recipe, with my usual amendments. Will probably try it again with orange sweet potatoes to see if it changes the taste or just the color.

Roasted Sweet Potato Risotto

Ingredients:

• 2 medium sweet potatoes [I used 3 because they seemed slightly smaller than medium.]
• 1/4 cup olive oil, divided
• 4 cups hot vegetable stock, divided [I used chicken stock because it was in my pantry.]
• 1/2 cup finely chopped onion [I mis-read this ingredient and used 1/2 an onion. I think it was fine.]
• 1 tbsp minced garlic [I used elephant garlic from my Produce Box -- worked fine.]
• 1 1/2 cups arborio rice (12-oz package)
• 3/4 cup white wine
• 1 tbsp fresh rosemary [I used dried. Fresh probably would have been better.]
• 1 1/2 tsp thyme leaves [Dried again.]
• 3 tbsp butter
• 2 tbsp grated Parmesan cheese [I used shredded because it was in the fridge. Also added a little more as a topping when I served it.]
• 1 tsp salt
• 3/4 tsp black pepper

Directions:

1. Preheat over to 350. Peel sweet potatoes and cut in half.
2. Cut half of the sweet potatoes into 1/4-inch dices and set aside.
3. Cut the remaining sweet potatoes into 1-inch chunks and toss with 1 tbsp olive oil. Roast until soft, about 30 minutes. Puree in a food processor with 1/4 cup vegetable stock; reserve.
4. In a large saucepan, heat remaining 3 tbsp oil and sauté onion and 1/4-inch diced sweet potatoes over medium-high heat. Cook about 3 minutes until softened but not browned.
5. Add garlic and arborio rice and cook 2-3 minutes, stirring frequently. Stir in wine and cook, stirring until completely absorbed. In the same manner, add hot stock, 1/2 cup at a time, stirring until each addition is completely absorbed and stock is use up.
6. Add sweet potato puree, rosemary, thyme, butter and Parmesan. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Let me know what you think if you try it out. Or, if you have a favorite sweet potato recipe, add it here in the comments.