Not a marshmallow in sight. For the longest time, the only sweet potatoes I saw were either covered in bubbling marshmallow goo, or baked in a pie. A pie that kinda tasted like pumpkin, but not really. It was stickier and not as creamy. I prefered pumpkin. As you can see, my sweet potato reference was limited. Then there’s yams. The word feels funny coming out of your mouth. While I know they’re different, I’m not exactly sure of the distinction so I looked it up for you. We are talking about sweet potatoes here. Bright orange, moist and so very good. I’m seeing sweet potatoes show up on all kinds of menus, from the fanciest places to fast food joints. Surely you’ve had sweet potato fries? Seriously, are they fantastic or what?
Now I have a sweet potato biscuit recipe for you. No fooling, you’ve got to try these biscuits. They are just made for butter and honey. Ham? Absolutely. Bacon? Did it. With some apply jelly. Wowsers. I would serve these along side a fried chicken dinner. You could gussy these up with pork belly or duck confit and serve them as appetizers. (I just talked myself into that, so if you’re coming to dinner at my house in the near future, get ready.) The best part? Easy. So easy. Roast the sweet potatoes ahead of time, even days ahead of time, and you’ll have these biscuits put together in 5 minutes. Hot, fragrant biscuits out of your oven in no time. Pale orange (pretty!) sweet potato biscuits. Do try them, I’m fairly certain you’re going to fall for them like I did.
1 cup mashed baked sweet potatoes (about 2 medium)
2/3 cup whole milk
1/2 stick of butter, melted
1-1/4 cups all purpose flour
3-1/2 teaspoons of baking powder
1 tablespoon of sugar
1 tablespoon of honey
3/4 teaspoon of salt
Preheat the oven to 450. Grease a baking sheet and set aside.
In a medium bowl, mix the sweet potato, milk and butter. Sift together the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Add to the potato mixture.
Gently, gently mix the ingredients together, forming a soft dough.
Drop the dough by the table-spoonfuls onto the prepared baking sheet.
Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, or until a deep golden orange tinged with brown. Serve warm or let cool on a wire rack.
Notes: I found that these needed a bit more salt for my taste. Taste a bit of the dough and increase the salt by 1/4 teaspoon at a time if needed.
You can just “drop” these like I did, but you can also be more careful and shape them with a spoon to make them a bit neater looking.
These are going to brown quite a bit on the bottom before the center is done. You could try a silicone mat or silpat mat, this might mitigate this a bit. I will be trying the mat next time I make these.
Adapted (barely) from Martha Hall Foose’s Screen Doors and Sweet Tea. Fabulous book, get yourself a copy.
A Plate Full 
Mom used to make these for me. I love them. I love all things sweet potatoes and tried growing them last year because I have a Chinese client’s grandmother who wanted the greens for heart and memory healthcare. Apparently they pretreat store yams and sweet potatoes with an anti-growth chemical that impairs sprouting, so I ended up with muddy, moldy stubs. I might try and look at Paulino Gardens this year and I’ll send you some if it works out. I think potatoes dug right out of the ground are the absolute best regardless of what you do with them!
Quadupled my veggie garden this year! I may even end up selling at the Farmers’ Market! Knowing me, I’ll probably end up giving most of it away, but it’s so fun to muck in the dirt!
I love sweet potatoes and this recipe even seems easy enough for me to try baking something. Now if only I can plan ahead enough to roast the potatoes…!
As soon as I saw Martha Hall Foose’s name on this, I knew it would be good. They are delicious and so simple. I like that these are pretty foolproof since you don’t have to cut in cold butter and worry about over-kneeding.