Nigerian Sweet potatoes are like no other. I discovered that after an interesting experiment.
When I moved to Spain, I searched for sweet potatoes and was excited to find a few at the local store. They had the purple-brownish tone of the African sweet potatoes, but when I got home and cut through one of them, I was suprised that it was yellowish-orange inside, a big contrast to the white color I was used to, back home in Nigeria.
But in spite of the color, I decided to fry and boil some of them and ended up with something soft, just like over cooked yams. Even though it was sweet, it was nothing close in texture and taste, to our Nigerian Sweet potatoes.
To cut the long story short, I finally found one of the Cuban species in a food festival and even though I only bought four tubers, I was glad to have another taste of home.
So here's a simple recipe for Egg Coated Nigerian Sweet Potatoes Fries (coined:Potafritas), very similar to Yamarita recipe here. Enjoy!
- 3 medium sized Nigerian or Cuban sweet potatoes
- 2 eggs
- 3 tablespoonful plain Flour
- 1 bouillon/stock cube/seasoning cube (crushed)(optional)
- Vegetable oil for frying the potatoes
- Ground pepper to taste
- Salt to taste
Here's how to prepare the Pepper sauce . You can choose to add canned sardines to your sauce.
Cooking Directions
1.Wash the sweet potatoes thoroughly, peel off the skin and cut into thin slices.
2. Rinse and place the sweet potato slices in a pot; add enough water to cover them ;add salt to taste and parboil for 5 minutes. Pour out into a sieve and set them aside, to cool a bit.Tip: The sweet potatoes should be firm and not tender. Remember that you'll be frying it later.
This method is known as ''blanching'', you can test the firmness with a fork;the fork should NOT be able to pass through theslices.
The skin of the parboiled sweet potatoes provide a surface for the egg and flour mixture to cling on.
3. Now, break the eggs, add the ground pepper, crushed seasoning cube and salt to taste;whisk thoroughly and set aside.
Pour the flour into the egg mixture, mix well to form a paste and set aside.
4. Dip each of the cooled sweet potato slices into the paste; turn them over to evenly coat all sides.
5. Heat up the vegetable oil until moderately hot and fry the
coated sweet potatoes on medium heat, until both sides are golden brown.
And here you have a yummy, crispy Egg Coated Nigerian Sweet Potato Fries (Potafritas).
Serve and Enjoy with omelet, pepper sauce, Obe ata Dindin or any stews &sauces .
Click here to watching video