Food & Recipes
Decadent Sweet Potato Mashed- Nyama Na Irio
Decadent Sweet Potato Mashed, wondering why this is decadent well for one it’s definitively not your average sweet potato mashed that’s for sure. This little number is from East Africa made popular by Kenyans. It’s usually served with steak strips – Nyama Na Irio, a quintessential Kenya cuisine. I discovered Irio while in college, my girlfriend swear by it, at first I was apprehensive, my first thought was – what the heck happened to the regular sweet potato mash. One day she coerced me into trying it out and hmm let just say it’s an acquired taste.
At first try, I wasn’t gung ho about it until I had kids and I wanted to introduce more veggies into their meals, Irio seems like a perfect way to do just that. It’s a combination of sweet potatoes mashed with green peas and corn, that’s it – simple but it packs a punch.
Decadent Sweet Potato Mashed
- 3 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cut lengthwise into quarters
- 1 large onions, sliced
- 1 cup frozen green peas
- 1 can of sweet corn - drained
- Olive oil to coat
- 1 cup buttermilk
- 3 tablespoons unsalted butter
- salt & black pepper to taste
- Preheat oven to 375˚ F.
- Put the sweet potatoes and onion in a bowl
- Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt
- Arrange the sweet potato and onion on a baking sheet
- Place in the oven until the potatoes and onions are tender and golden, about 35 to 50 minutes
- While the potatoes are in the oven, heat up the sweet corn and frozen peas
- In a saucepan, melt the butter and heat up the butter milk
- Transfer the sweet potato and onion from the oven into a bowl, add the warm buttermilk mixture*, peas & corn and mash until desire texture
- Taste and season with more salt & pepper, if desired
You can serve it with whatever you see fit, but if you want to go the traditional Kenyan way serve it with seasoned steak strips as shown in the picture above.
*Depending on how you like your mashed potatoes, you can reduce the milk/butter mixture for a less creamier outcome
1 Comment