Sticking with the unconventional and untraditional Thanksgiving side dish theme, I have come up with this stunning, incredibly delicious, different, and satisfying sweet potato dish. I literally created it on a dime, when recently wondering what to do with three vivid purple sweet potatoes sitting on and staring at me from the kitchen counter. I could have sworn I heard little voices screaming “eat me!” 

I thought of a baked potato piled high with sour cream, cheese, and bacon bits, a meal commonly eaten in my early twenties. No this had to fit my current dining standards, dairy-free and pork-free, but decadent, healthy, and filling. This is what I came up with.

I halved the purple sweet potatoes, scored them, brushed them with olive oil, a sprinkle of salt, and a dash of black pepper and popped them in the oven. While they baked, I tossed some pumpkin seeds with oil, salt, Japanese curry powder, and coconut sugar and baked those too. During this time, I grabbed a bowl, put a large mound of plain coconut yogurt in it, alongside lime juice and lime zest, turmeric powder, salt, and a touch of sumac and mixed it up fine.

After the sweet potatoes came out of the oven I allowed them to cool a few minutes then generously dolloped them with the turmeric coconut yogurt mixture, added the sweet and spiced toasted pepitas (which by the way are to die for, make a great snack or soup and salad topping), pomegranate seeds, chopped up cilantro, scallions, black sesame seeds and some beautiful edible flowers.

I sat down, ate half of a sweet potato decked out with the color and beauty, and enjoyed the heck out of it. I thought to myself, I want to eat this on Thanksgiving and I am sure other people would do. So here I deliver the recipe to you.

But before I do, a few words about the nutritional value of some of the star ingredients in this dish. Purple sweet potatoes are high in the anti-oxidant beta-carotene and fiber and are a slow-releasing starch which means they are great for blood sugar regulation.

Pumpkin seeds are a good source of magnesium, since and unsaturated fats.

Pomegranate seeds are good in fiber, vitamin C, and folate.

Turmeric the anti-inflammation star is due to its curcumin.

By the way, the toasted spiced pepitas are so good, I have you make a bit extra, so you can snack on them later.

Serves 6/ Prep time 30 minutes/ Cook time 30 minutes/ Total time

Gather

3 purple sweet potatoes (if hard to find you can use regular sweet potatoes).

2 tablespoons olive oil

Salt

Pepper

1 cup/ 250 grams plain coconut yogurt

2 teaspoons lime juice

Zest of 1 lime

3-4 teaspoons turmeric powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon sumac (optional)

1 tablespoon olive oil

1/2 cup/ 25 grams fresh chopped cilantro

3 scallions roughly chopped

1/2 cup/ 87 grams pomegranate seeds

3 teaspoons black sesame seeds

1 1/2 cups / 367.5 grams pumpkin seeds

1 teaspoon Japanese curry powder or curry of choice

3 tablespoons coconut sugar

1 and 1/2 tablespoons olive oil

Salt

Make

Preheat the oven to 350.

First, prepare the pumpkin seeds. Place the pumpkin seeds, curry powder, coconut sugar, olive oil, and salt into a bowl and mix well until the pumpkin seeds are well coated. Place the seeds onto a large baking tray, and bake for 10-15 minutes. Check at 10 minutes. If the seeds don’t seem browned enough, bake another 5 minutes. Remove from the oven and transfer to a bowl to cool. Bring the oven to 415 F. Cut the sweet potatoes in half, lengthwise, and lay on a small baking sheet. Brush the potatoes with olive oil and sprinkle each with salt and pepper. Place in the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes until the sweet potatoes are fork-tender. Remove from the oven. While potatoes are baking, make your yogurt topping. Combine the coconut yogurt, lime juice, lime zest, turmeric powder, salt, sumac, and olive in a small bowl and mix until well blended. Transfer the potatoes to your serving dish. Spoon a dollop of the turmeric yogurt in the center of your sweet potato, then top with the pumpkin seeds, pomegranate seeds, chopped cilantro, and black sesame seeds. Sprinkle with colorful edible flower petals.

Recipe developed by Anna Getty-Oster of Amalgam Kitchen