Baked Sweet Potato Chips

Oh, the simple things that excite me. I can’t tell you how excited I am about today’s blog entry. I know we just used sweet potatoes last week in the veggie burgers, but I have been trying to make the perfect baked sweet potato chip for some time now, unsuccessfully I might add. Sure the fryer would work but then they would be soaked in oil and I really wanted these baked.

Some might say I am picky. I might agree, but I have a very specific expectation for my sweet potato chips. That is, to be crispy, and not burnt. I don’t like crispy on the outside, soft on the inside (or middle). I mean c.r.i.s.p.y!

I have tried a slew of ideas - completely dry, with a drizzle of oil, seasonings before, seasonings after, placed directly on the baking sheet, placed on foil, on parchment paper, presoaked, various temperatures, various baking times, combinations of these ideas ....the list goes on. Last Sunday, I think I finally mastered a technique that works for me and my kitchen equipment. I can only hope it will work for you too! 

Before we start, does anyone know the difference between a sweet potato and yam? Technically speaking, I learned a yam has one embryonic seed leaf and a sweet potato two. Honestly, don’t really care! What you might care about is a yam is usually starchier and drier. If you are in a traditional grocery store, you are most likely finding a sweet potato.

Okay, here goes - the best Baked Sweet Potato Chips!

Baked Sweet Potato Chips

Ingredients:
Sweet Potato
Egg
Salt

First, wash and peel the sweet potato. Also, go ahead and trim the ends off. Don’t forget to preheat your oven to 385 degrees.

Better Bonus Tip: When I am at the store, I try to find a sweet potato that looks to be about the same width / diameter from top to bottom.

Next, we need to slice them up. You could use a mandolin or a steady hand and a knife. The key here is they need to be the same thickness and diameter. I ended up making my slices ¼ cm thick. If you are using a mandolin, just please be careful!!

First secret tip: soak the sweet potato slices in some water. This will do a couple of things, aesthetically it crinkles up the edges like a chip. More importantly, it removes the starch so the potato doesn’t caramelize (ie. brown / burn). Some browning is probably inevitable, but I have found this helps. Soak the potatoes for a minimum of 30 minutes. You will notice when you remove the slices of potato, the water is nice and cloudy. Go ahead and dispose of the water, rinse the potato slices and pat dry. 

  

While your potatoes are soaking, go ahead and line some baking sheets with parchment paper.

Second secret tip: add the presoaked slices, a few at a time, to a bowl with egg whites. I used 2 eggs for the one large potato. After dipping in the egg white, let the excess drip off and line them on the baking sheet. Make sure to not overlap. 

Better Bonus Tip: If you have different diameter slices, that is fine, I just recommend sorting them this way on different baking sheets. This allows you to remove the smaller ones first, before the larger ones are done.

Now for the baking. Add the baking sheet(s) to the bottom rack of the oven. Cook for 10 minutes and remove from the oven. Third secret tip: flip each slice over and replace the baking sheets back in the oven. Now comes the variable part. Start your timer for another 6 minutes. Every oven will vary, but most will need a total of 6-10 minutes on the second side. At the 6 minute mark, just watch and continue to cook in two minute intervals - checking frequently. When the edges are starting to turn brown, remove them from the oven. Sprinkle with salt as soon as you remove them, while they are still hot. 

Fourth secret tip: let them rest for 10 minutes.

Better Bonus Tip: Feel free to play around with your seasoning: add sugar for a sweeter chip, chipotle or chili powder for more of a smoky chip.

That’s it! I hope you enjoy them as much as we do!

~Ashley

Veggie 'Burgers'

I’m back from New Orleans and boy was it fun! So much culture, great music and great food! I shared on my Blog Facebook Page some of the different food that we got to try. We had everything from duck, pork belly, oysters, shrimp, crawfish, gumbo, jambalaya, red beans and rice, boudin sausage, alligator sausage, rabbit, po'boy, etouffee, muffuletta. To say the least, I think I need to not eat for a week - I am still full! It was all delicious and I got so much inspiration, but none of it was healthy. So, today we are back on the eating light train. 

I have mentioned time and again, that I am trying to eat less meat. Today, we are making veggie burgers, one of my husband’s favorites! The star ingredients are black beans, sweet potatoes and quinoa. I also added a little roasted red pepper for added depth. Roasted red peppers are really easy to make, but today I used a bottle version because I like using some of the pickling liquid in the sauce I serve them with. We eat ours as is (no bread) with some sliced avocado - Mexican meets California - delicious! 

By the way, I am not great at naming my recipes - clearly! They are either extremely vague, extremely wordy and most of the time just repeating the ingredients. I would love to hear from you! Feel free to start leaving in the comments, some fun names based on what you see in the pictures and ingredients. All suggestions welcome!

Veggie ‘Burgers’
Makes 4 patties

Ingredients:
Black beans, ½ can drained and rinsed (or if using fresh bulk beans - use 1 cup cooked)
Sweet potato, heaping ¼ c shredded
Quinoa, ⅛  c uncooked
Roasted red pepper, ¼ c chopped
Regular breadcrumbs ¼ c
Egg, 1
Garlic powder, ½  tsp
Coriander, ½ tsp
Dry mustard, ½ tsp
Cumin, ½  tsp
Pinch of salt

Sauce:
Greek yogurt, ¼ c
Chives, 1 T
Dijon mustard, ½  T
Roasted red pepper pickled juice, ½  T
Coriander, ¼  tsp
Garlic powder, ¼  tsp
Onion powder, ¼  tsp

Rinse quinoa to remove the naturally occurring plant chemicals. 

Add 1 cup water and quinoa to a stovetop pot. Bring to a bowl, then cover and simmer for 15 minutes. A typical liquid to quinoa ratio is 2:1, but I added a little more due to the small volume. Drain and let cool.

Better Bonus Tip: To learn more about quinoa, read here.

Mash the beans. 

Add the rest of the burger ingredients to a bowl and mix.

Score the mixture and form into patties.

Saute in a pan with oil for 3-4 minutes per side, until brown and crispy. Let rest on a paper towel for a couple of minutes when done.  

While patties are cooking and cooling, mix all of the sauce ingredients together. 

To serve, spread a layer of the sauce ingredients on top of the burger. Optional additions: sliced avocado or spouts. Also, feel free to eat this as an actual burger with bread, but I prefer it just by itself.

Better Bonus Tip: Double the recipe and freeze extras or make mini bites for a party!
 
~Ashley
 

What Started It All: Food, Inc.

I wanted to get you a post this week, but you will notice it is a day early. Last Thursday evening, I was checking my person email and found three emails from Southwest Airlines in my inbox. Two of them confirming usage of our frequent flyer miles for purchases and a third one confirming my flight for January 10th. I didn’t have a trip scheduled? I looked a little further down and noticed it was to New Orleans. My husband has been wanting to take me there for a long time, so I knew something was up. I walked downstairs, put my phone up to him and didn’t say anything. He just started smiling and said “I changed the email address, how did you get that?”  I think he changed the email for the actual itineraries (which I did not get), but our Rapid Reward accounts are linked to my email. Surprise was out! He loves surprising me and was so mad I found out. Anyway, we are off to the airport for a long weekend trip for an early birthday present, because he will be out of town on my actual birthday this year.

Before I go, I wanted to leave you with my first blog entry hopefully inspiring your New Year’s resolution to make better food choices. Watching the documentary Food, Inc., was what started my full fledged food journey. I have watched it multiple times and now own it. You saw a few pictures in my food vs science post a few months back from this documentary. Below is the trailer and a summary of some of the key points I took away from it.

Corn

The Government promotes corn production. It is cheap to grow and can be used in many ways (ie. processed food). So much food and ingredients originate from corn. Examples of ingredients include, Cellulose, Xanthan gum, Ascorbic acid, Margarin, Fructose, Maltodextrin, Ascorbic acid, High Fructose Corn Syrup, and Saccharin. It is also used as feed for animals.  The average farmer used to be able to feed 6-8 people, but now can feed 126 people with the use of corn.  Additionally, farmers used to be able to plant some of their corn and soybean seeds over again the following year, making it cost effective. In the 1980s, Monsanto Corporation (chemical company that also produced Agent Orange) developed the weed killer Round Up. They also started genetically engineered seeds that can resist the pesticide and patented it, so farmers have to buy more seed each year. If the farmers try to save seed, they will be investigated and fined. Now a chemical company controls the majority of the food industry!

Industrial Food

Corn = the introduction of industrial food. There are 47, 000 products in the average grocery store. The average meal travels 1,500 miles from farm to supermarket. No seasons are found in the supermarket. Ripening is done with ethanol gas. Foods are engineered so they won’t go stale, with 90% of them containing a corn ingredient or soy. Salt, fat, and sugar, not found in nature, are the three most common tastes in today’s food supply.  

Meat Industry

In the 1970s the top five beef suppliers controled 25%, now the top four control control 80%. This is beginning to happen with pork. Meat is produced by a system, not as it used to be. The average person eats 200 lbs of meat per year. How do you keep up with that? Meat needs to be produced quickly: introduction of corn and factory farms (sometimes referred to as CAFO: Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation). Animals are now raised and slaughtered in half the time, but twice as big. Chickens are raised to have large breasts and no bones, which is what America wants, but clearly not in a natural state. Chickens can be raised in 49 days instead of 3 months, which means more money, more often. Animals also are often caged and don’t see sunlight.  There are often in horrible living conditions, including dust and feces. *In fact, in most documentaries I have watched, cameras are not even allowed into these environments.* Sadly, because of tight quarters and rapid growth, bones and internal organs can’t keep up and most animals can’t walk. Additionally, illness occurs. Cows in particular are prone to a certain strand of E.Coli, 0157. If one cow gets this, it is likely to pass on to the other animals and sometimes the consumers. Antibiotics are put into feed to help prevent this, which can pass through. Workers and those that consume the meat are now becoming resistant to antibiotics. Additionally, ammonia is used to treat the beef at slaughter time for sanitation purposes.  Finally, farmers are in trouble and can’t keep up. To build one poultry house, it costs $280-300 K and they end up in debt because they only earn about 18,000 a year.

For more on beef, check out my two previous posts here and here.

Health Concerns

One hamburger comes from 50 - 100 (at one point the documentary said thousands of types of beef) cattle. If you are consuming factory meat, it will be almost impossible to figure out where your meat comes from, which means if there is a foodborne illness, it will be hard to track its source and figure out if your meat came from the same source.  Additionally, the FDA has slowed inspections. In 1972 there were 50,000 and by the 2000s not even 10,000.

A second concern, with the increase in refined carbohydrates and high fructose corn syrup, there are high spikes in insulin. One in three Americans born after 2000 will contract early onset diabetes, among minorities there will be a one in two mortality rate. One in five health care dollars is now spend on someone with diabetes and there are five thousand deaths from foodborne illness per year. One case of reported salmonella poisoning means another 40 were probably not reported.

In last 30 years, there was an increase tenfold in the amount of pesticides used. Pesticides also run off into rivers and end up in oceans and the biosphere. 18% of greenhouse emissions come from livestock.

If you have been following my blog, you have probably heard me talk about a lot of these topics in the past, some entire blogs devoted to it, other tidbits integrated. Keep in mind, this documentary and my notes from it, are reflective of the year 2008. Some topics have probably gotten worse, while others better and yet new ones have arisen. I STRONGLY encourage you to watch it for yourself! Also, check out Take Part, if you are interested in continuing to follow what is going on in our food supply. This documentary changed my life and started me on the journey I am now taking. I hope you will join me!

I am also currently reading one of Michael Pollan’s books, the Omnivore's Dilemma.  He is one of the featured reporters in Food, Inc. and I now own a few of his books. While I am on the flight, I hope to continue to get more reading done.

I will be back with a recipe next week. Be sure to like my Facebook page, as I hope to get inspired eating lots of great food this weekend and will be sharing there. If you don’t have facebook, email me at cookingforabettertomorrow@gmail.com to sign up for the Facebook updates via email. I don’t see healthy food choices in my near future (exactly why I cannot vow to eat organically 100% - I do what I can, while still enjoying life), but sure am super excited to experience the New Orleans culture. I will get back on track once I am hope. Have a good rest of the week!

~Ashley