Thursday, June 2, 2011

Sweet potato donuts

Sweet potato is an easy plant to grow if you have its favourite type of soil and weather. It can be very invasive. It is best to grow one shoot or slip in one metre square between each plant. Some Asian groceries sell sweet potato shoots for cooking. On this sweet potato vein shoots have nodes where the roots will grow on soil or water. I found sweet potato shoots last October in Gepps Cross Sunday Market. I was not sure what variety sweet potato shoot it was, but it was a fun experiment.

Sweet potato shoots

The roots sprouted very quickly in 2~3 days in warm water end of Spring. Just leave it near a sunny window.DSC09611

Plant the shoots with the roots tuck nicely into the warm soil. It grows very quickly in mild weather. As usual my plants like to have a break in middle of summer for weeks if planted on our most sunny and hottest place in the garden doing nothing. Then it picks up growth again end of summer. I should mention sweet potatoes is heat-tolerant, although it does nothing if the soil is too hot.

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Last summer, I experimented growing sweet potatoes in 3 different location in our garden to see which is the best growing method for our garden.

Sweet potatoes growing in polystyrene container~ Received only morning sun, no checked growth, very fast growth and good harvest in just about 4 months.

Sweet potatoes growing in heavy clay soil~ I wish that sweet potato can help break the soil like potato. Unfortunately, I did not get my wish. Partial shade, no check growth and many leaves. However, a very small tuber were obtained from each plant after 22 weeks from planting.

Finally, we harvested our sweet potatoes that were growing in our most sunny part of the garden in summer last Saturday. It is starting to rain a lot last week so I was afraid if I leave it longer it will be rotten. Moreover, I was getting anxious about my garlic which I have not complete planting yet because of this space. I don’t think if I let them grow longer it will give me more since the soil will be colder now. Since it was growing in the hottest part of the garden during the summer, it has stop growing during middle of summer and pick up growth after the weather has become mild again. Growing on a good loose soil.

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What a relief to dig in and find some sweet potato tubers.

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I think for our garden, planting sweet potatoes in container is the best method to get quick harvest and make the garden much more productive. Next spring, we are on a quest of vegetables that can grow well at our hottest part of the veggie patch again.

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With this harvest, we made sweet potato donut or famously known as kuih keria in Malaysia. English have their tea with cakes, Malaysian have kuih keria for tea Winking smile. It is very easy to make and you don’t need much ingredients for it.

Ingredients: Sweet potatoes, plain flour, cooking oil, water and sugar.

Boil or steam sweet potatoes until soft. Take them out from the boiling water and mashed. Add in plain flour bit by bit and mix it well. You don’t need flour anymore if it is not that sticky and you can roll it make a doughnut shape. Be careful though that too much flour will give you a hard donut. Fry the donut in hot cooking oil.

For the sugar coating, I usually snip some pandan leaves and extract some juice from it which I will use for the coating later. In a clean pot, add in sugar (for example 2/3 cups of water) and the pandan extracted juice (4~5table spoon). The pandan juice is just to dissolve the sugar. Usually, only plain water is used but I like pandan flavour and aroma. Stir on moderate heat and just before it starts to crystalize (which usually is a quick process), quickly add in the fried donuts to coat.

Join in Wendy’s Garden To Table Challenge.

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Every cook has their special tips or advice or different ingredient. I am basic cook. If you are a first timer and not sure about the measurement, check out this great blog:

CikManggis~ Jom masak, jom makan-makan…

Shaz~ Test With Skewar

Sonia~ Nasi Lemak Lover

23 comments:

Cat-from-Sydney said...

MKG dear,
My Mama would make Cek Mek Molek using sweet potato, same method of mashing and mixing with flour but roll them flat the size of your palm, put sugar in the middle, roll up and fry. yummm...... The kueh is from the East Coast. purrr....meow!

Katie M said...

Ohmigosh, YUM! And, for once, we have both planted sweet potato! I haven't harvested mine yet, I'll get on to it soon

Hazel said...

It is too cold to grow sweet potato here...except maybe for the shoots in the summer. I love that long snakey one.

veggiegobbler said...

Oh yeah they looks good! I could make these donuts and kid myself that they're healthy.

cikmanggis said...

Ini kah keria yang tergendala sebab kehabisan minyak masak tu hehe.

Terima kasih sb bagi idea bagaimana nak dapatkan benih keledek.Dulu-dulu Cm terpaksa biarkan ubi keledek tumbuh daun untuk dijadikan benih:)mengambil masa yang agak lama.

Sue Garrett said...

We've never tried growing sweet potatoes so have never eaten them either

littlekarstar said...

I love sweet potato especially in bo bor cha cha! Yummmmmmmm. Clay soil here too unfortunately.

Daphne Gould said...

I love sweet potatoes, but they are not the easiest to grow here. Our season is just too short and cold. Your donuts look delicious.

Charmcitybalconygarden said...

yummy donuts! Your kids must love these:)

Chloe m said...

I so love how you showed it from start to finish. Most people would not appreciate the donuts, but considering all your efforts, I would savor every bite. Yum!

Mark Willis said...

I like sweet potatoes, and we sometimes buy them in the shops, but I have never grown them. I don't think it would be warm enough here for them to do well.

Sunray Gardens said...

I would love to grow them if I had room, and your doughnuts look wonderful.
Cher

Mr. H. said...

I could use one of those donuts with my coffee right about now...they look delicious. Did I mention that we will be trying to grow sweet potatoes this year under a row cover...wish me luck.:)

Kelli said...

Sweet potato and donuts look impressive. I read an article recenlty that said sweet potato is difficult to grow in UK/Ireland. Some day i'll give it a go.

One said...

That is a plant I would like to grow. I miss eating kuih keria. Where can I find them? Oh yes! I can make them.

Wendy said...

oh gosh does that look delicious! Donuts are my weakness and the pandan flavored glaze sounds just amazing. your sweet potatoes look great!

Sue Catmint said...

I love the way you grow the shoots in water, I will try this with my grandson and the donuts are very tempting as well.

shaz said...

Yummy! I love kuih keria. Great harvest. When the weather warms up I'm going to try and grow some sweet potato too, going to try them in bags like potatoes.

Kat said...

These look so delicious, and very naughty! yum :)

Bom said...

Those look and sound delicious. I should ask my wife to this a try, especially the pandan coating. Something new for my pandan leaves. We usually have sweet potatoes for snacks but these are sliced thinly (like chips) and coated with brown sugar then fried. Or we just boil, peel, smear with butter and sprinkle with sugar.

kitchen flavours said...

Your sweet potato tubers are fantastic! How come the ones we grow are so pitifully thin and lanky?
Your kuih keria looks so yummy. My mom used to make them too, I prefer this over the regular doughnuts anytime! Adding the pandan juice is a great idea! Must be really wangi!

i amsterdam said...

I LOVE kuih keria !!! Been making them since i learned how, 2 months ago :D In fact, made some 3 days ago !!!

Mama Pongkey said...

Super LIKE! Now I can really believe that stem cuttings can really grow into tubers.. I kinda regret letting my sweet potato stems die off a few years ago.. but I did manage to harvest some of the leaves to make a kind of Syrian pastry and a stir fry dish :-)