Sweet potato spinach balls
By the time you are reading this there is only one day left of our whole30 adventure. We will have completed 30 days, well almost! And looking back, it kind of went pretty quickly too. We eat these delicious sweet potato balls somewhere on day 24 if I remember correctly, but I am guessing you couldn’t care less.. 😉 The recipe I found on one of my favorite paleo sites. Eat, drink, Paleo
Coming up with delicious recipes is not that difficult to be honest and it is going better every day too. Once you’re used to this way of cooking it is making quite a lot of sense. I do have to say that I am really, really happy that I love to cook and that I know a thing or two about flavor combinations. It would be totally different doing this program if I did not like to cook!
A friend of mine, to name an example, hates cooking and she would stick to a few safe options when making food for dinner. If she were to follow a program like this she would probably end up eating a boiled egg for breakfast, a iceberg lettuce salad for lunch and steak and salad for dinner. Now that would get really boring, really quickly. Ofcourse not everyone can love cooking (although I still don’t understand how you cannot love it! ) And if you’re used to eating a lot of ready made stuff, this will be a hard change. Cooking from scratch does require more time. And you do actually have to COOK.
And so yes, I am extremely happy that I do love to cook and that also makes it a fun challenge to find new recipes or to try out weird and wonderful combinations of food. Give me some ingredients and usually I can produce something edible. But I also love looking at other blogs, books, tv-shows and magazines for inspiration. Nothing wrong with that. And I particularly like looking at a ‘normal’ recipe and try and make that paleo-approved.
This recipe is not mine, but it is from Irena Marci. She is from the blog Eat, drink Paleo and has a book with the same title. A great book too and I have cooked quite a few recipes from her already. Unfortunately the book is not for sale in print here in Europe, but you can order it from her site or buy the ebook, like I did. Works fine too.
Sweet potato balls
Ingredients
- 2 medium sweet potatoes peeled and cut into cubes
- 1 1/2 cup wilted spinach see instructions below
- 1 large brown onion diced
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 2 garlic cloves diced
- 4 sprigs of thyme leaves only
- Zest of 1 lemon
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- 1 1/2 tsp sea salt
- 2/3 tsp ground black pepper
- 1 tbsp arrowroot flour
- Oil for frying
Instructions
- Wilt your spinach by placing a big two handfuls into a bowl and pouring boiling water on top. Leave to stand for about a minute, then drain, leave to cool and sqeeuze out any moisture you can. Chop your spinach.
- Put the sweet potato cubes into a pan with cold water and bring to the boil. Cook for about ten minutes or when done.
- Heat two tbsp of oil in a frying pan and saute the onions on medium high for about ten minutes until translucent and golden. Add your chopped spinach, the garlic, lemon zest and thyme leaves to it and cook for a further 3-4 minues. Drizzle with lemon juice.
- Drain the sweet potato and put into a bowl. Use a potato masher or a fork to mash them. It's doesn't have to be super smooth. A few lumps are ok. Add the spinach mix, salt, pepper and the arrowroot flour and mix everything well together.
- Heat a thin layer of oil in a frying pan until piping hot. Then turn down the flame, wet your hands and make golf ball sized balls. Fry them for about 2 minutes on each sides, making sure they get golden all over.
- Serve with lemon wedges and thyme
Notes
Disclaimer
The nutritional values above are calculated per portion. The details are based on standard nutritional tables and do not constitute a professional nutritional advice.
Thanks for this recipe! – I had some roasted sweet potatoes left over, so I fried the onion and garlic together, added the spinach and some chopped chili-pepper and the potatoes and mashed it all together!
Sounds good too!