The sweetness of the sweet potatoes goes really well with the creaminess of the mayonnaise, the tang of the vinegar and the heat of the sambal. Do note that this roasted sweet potatoes with sambal mayonnaise recipe does not result in crispy sweet potato fries, but is nonetheless delicious. (I wanted a quick & easy recipe and for crispy oven baked fries, you would need to do several more steps such as coat the sweet potatoes in cornflour, so I decided to cover that in a separate post!) It only takes a few seconds to whip up this sauce whilst the sweet potatoes cook in the oven, so this is a great recipe for when you’re feeling lazy!
Roasted sweet potato chunks with a sambal mayonnaise sauce
Ingredients
- 5 Sweet potatoes
- Olive Oil
- 1/2 T Salt
- 2 Tablespoon Kewpie (Japanese) mayo
- 1 Tablespoon Sambal belacan I use sambal belacan tumis (not fresh), which is the kind of sambal you find bottled in the supermarkets.
- 1/2 Tablespoon Vinegar I use rice vinegar but you can substitute it with another type of vinegar
- Spring Onion (Optional) (Slice finely)
Instructions
- Cut the sweet potatoes into thick 1cm strips
- Toss the sweet potatoes in the olive oil and salt, making sure the salt is spread evenly.
- Place them on a baking tin lined with parchment paper, ensuring that there are gaps between the sweet potato chunks so that the sweet potatoes roast and not steam. Roast 30 minutes, turn after 15 minutes (and rotate your pan as your oven may have hot spots) at , 425F/218C You may need more than 1 baking tray to fit the sweet potatoes (and ensure that there is enough space between them.
- Whilst the sweet potatoes are baking, mix the vinegar, sambal and mayo together and top with spring onions, if using. Serve the sauce on the sweet potatoes (or in a platter by the side) once done.
I like to simplify my recipes down to ratios (for example. these 12345 pork ribs) as this makes them easy to remember as well as simple to scale up or down depending on how many people one is cooking for. For this sauce, the ratio is 1:2:4 – 1 part vinegar to 2 parts sambal belacan to 4 parts Kewpie mayonnaise. In other words, if you use 10g of vinegar, you would mix it with 2*10=20g of sambal and 4*10=40g of mayonnaise.
Substitutions
These roasted sweet potatoes with sambal mayonnaise could probably be made with a tangy citrus fruit such as lime or lemon (instead of vinegar), but I chose to use vinegar in the recipe as vinegar is a long-life pantry staple. I don’t know about you guys, but I usually have too many citrus fruits or none when I need some which is annoying, and using vinegar helps to eliminate that issue!
If you don’t have Japanese mayonnaise, regular mayonnaise works (or make your own)- but Kewpie really does taste better than normal mayonnaise so do try it if you’ve never had it before.
What’s your favourite way to cook sweet potatoes?
Tina says
The combination of spice from the samba and the savouriness of the mayo is delish! Thanks for the kewpie tip- so much better than regular mayo.