Sweet Potato Wontons

1 cup sweet potato mixture makes about 25 wontons

Don=t relegate sweet potatoes to only Thanksgiving and Christmas menus! They should be enjoyed all year round and in ways that don=t bear any resemblance to how we typically see them used during the holiday season.

Using store-bought wonton skins eliminates nearly all of the prep work  Stuffing the wonton skins is the most time consuming part of this recipe, but enlisting help from family and friends can make this chore a delightful part of your Sunday Supper experience.

We experimented with the Kotobuki and Jewel sweet potato varieties to compare which one yielded better flavor. (For more information about different sweet potato varieties, visit http://www.saturdaymarket.com/nakashima.htm.) The Kotobuki yielded a drier stuffing compared to the Jewel, but both tasted great! A small amount of lemon juice added to the sweet potato stuffing is the secret ingredient that brings out the sweet potato=s hidden soul. Try using lemon juice in other sweet potato recipes!

Baking the Sweet Potatoes:

• Preheat oven to 350° F.
  
• Place 2 medium-sized sweet potatoes on a baking tray lined with aluminum foil (to catch the sweet syrup that flows from the potato during baking). Bake for about 40 minutes, until the sweet potato is cooked, but not mushy.
  
• Remove them from the oven and let cool. Peel and mash lightly. One potato should yield about 1 1/2 cups (about 35-40 wontons).

Sweet Potato Stuffing:

To each cup of sweet potato mash add:

1 tsp. lemon juice
½ tsp. chopped fresh sage
A few TBS of any seasonings such as:

      Chopped green onions
      Chopped arugula
      Chopped kale, sautéed in oil olive and garlic
      Any other tasty greens (cooked as necessary)
      Chopped smoked chicken
      Chopped ham or Prosciutto
      Cooked, chopped bacon

(One package of wonton skins typically contains 50 skins, which will require 2 cups of this mixture.)

Assembly:

Cooking and Serving:

• The wontons can be deep fried (about 3-4 minutes) until golden brown or they can boiled (4 minutes).

• For fried wontons, a Sweet Thai Chili (see http://www.sundaysupper.com/thaisalmon for more information on this sauce) makes a perfect dipping sauce. (Fried wontons also make great cocktail party hors d=oeuvres.)

• For boiled wontons, a browned butter, which is seasoned with thin slivers of fresh sage leaves, makes this a savory dish.

• For a simple Sunday Supper, serve a bowl of wontons accompanied by a green salad.

• For a more elaborate preparation, serve the boiled wontons on a bed of legumes (such as black-eyed peas) that have been poached in a lemony chicken broth.   (A recipe in The Food of the Campanile by Mark Peel and Nancy Silverton can provide inspiration for your own variations on that theme.)