My favourite pastry chef: SWEET POTATO BREAD

HISTORY

Sweet potato is cultivated for its edible tuberous root plant. It’s a storage root with a high concentration of sugars, carotene and provitamin A.

Native to the tropics of Central and South America, has been domesticated and cultivated for over 5.000 years in the department of Ayacucho (Peru), it have been found representations of sweet potato in numerous pre-Columbian ceramics and rests of the tuberous roots in some tombs. Sweet potato arrived in Europe in the sixteenth century and has spread widely throughout the world.

The CIP (International Potato Center, in Peru) began to research on sweet potato in 1986, in order to promote its use for industrial purposes and as fresh produce and maintain a total of 3.096 clones of sweet potatoes from 18 countries Latin American and the Caribbean, of which Peru has 2.016 varieties. In Peru, the sweet potato is very popular and in many typical dishes replaces the potato, greatly flavoring the variety of Peruvian cuisine.

RECIPE

Ingredients:

150 gr. Whole wheat flour

300 gr. Flour

1 teaspoon of salt

20 gr. Yeast

1 tablespoon of sugar

4 tablespoon of olive oil

2/3 cup of sweet potato purée

1 teaspoon of oregano

200 ml. lukewarm water

Utensils:

1 bowl

Clingfilm

Baking tray

A cloth

METHOD

Step 1: Put the flour and whole wheat flour into a big bowl. Sprinkle the salt outside the flours and make a hole in the middle. Dissolve the yeast with a little lukewarm water and the sugar and let stand few minutes.

Step 2: Add the yeast in the middle and mix with some flour. Add the oil, the sweet potato purée, oregano and the water, and knead the dough until the dough is smooth and elastic.

Step 3: Cover the dough with a cloth and let stand for 1,5 hours.

Step 4: Dust the working table and remove the dough from the bowl, and put on the table. Punch it down to remove the gas and forming rolls 50 gr.

Strep 5: Brush the baking tray with oil and put the rolls, cover with a cloth and let stand for 30 minutes.

Step 6: Preheat the oven to 200ºC

Step 7: Brush the rolls with some beaten egg, and make a cut on the top of each roll.

Step 8: Bake the rolls for 20-25 minutes or until brown .

Step 9: Let cool on a rack, and enjoy them.