Last Updated on 20th April 2022 by
If you’re into curry, you’ve probably had all kinds of curry before: Tikka Masala, Vindaloo, Saag from India, red, green, and yellow curry from Thailand, Jamaican curry, African Vegetable curry– and many more.
These are made with different kinds of vegetables, produce, and spices to create their own unique flavors. One of our family’s favorite curry recipes also uses a sweet, delicious main ingredient that hits the spot among children and adults– sweet potatoes.
Who said sweet potatoes could only be snacked on? When offered in a dish, especially a creamy curry, sweet potatoes give you both sweet, spicy, and flavorful in one pan.
Grab your seatbelts because I will be sharing how to prepare sweet potato curry and how to thicken and reheat them. I will also be sharing other sweet potato curry iterations, like how to make butternut squash potato curry and vegan and chicken sweet potato curry.
What Makes Sweet Potato Curry Different?
Curry, in general, is a dish seasoned with various herbs and spices mainly connected with Asian cuisine, especially in India and Southeast Asian countries. There are many variations of curry depending on natural, regional, or cultural traditional traditions, but what doesn’t change is that curry is a dish made out of various spices, usually thick in consistency.
Curry is often eaten with rice or bread– mainly rice in Asian countries.
Sweet potato curry is another spin on the traditional curry recipe. We can narrow down sweet potato curry as sweet potatoes (and other ingredients) drowning in creamy coconut milk and Thai spices and flavors.
Why Thai curry? Because for this recipe, we will be using red curry paste originating from Thailand packed with chili red peppers and turmeric, among others.
With all that out of the way, let’s dive down on how to cook sweet potato curry.
How to Prepare Sweet Potato Curry
To prepare sweet potato curry, we would need the following ingredients:
- One tablespoon of vegetable oil
- Fish sauce
- Two cloves of garlic, minced
- Ginger
- One cup of vegetable or chicken broth
- One can of regular coconut milk
- One can of chickpeas
- Three cubed sweet potatoes (or two, if sweet potatoes are large sized)
- Baby spinach
- Chopped peanuts
- Cilantro
- Salt and pepper to taste
- Three tablespoons of Thai red curry paste (you can also mix in yellow curry paste)
Thai red curry paste is spicier than the yellow and green ones, and the yellow curry paste has this pinch of sweetness that the red curry paste doesn’t have. I’ve found that, for my taste, mixing red curry paste and yellow curry paste for my sweet potato curry is the best combination, but of course, you can always adjust these to your liking.
Now, to start cooking our sweet potato curry. Note that for this recipe, we wouldn’t be using any kind of meat, so this is also a guide on how to cook vegan sweet potato curry at the same time.
Heat a large, deep skillet over medium heat and add oil. After heating the oil, add ginger and garlic and saute until browned and aromatic. Add the curry paste and then simmer for 1 to 2 minutes.
Add sweet potatoes, chickpeas, coconut milk, and broth. Combine and simmer until the sweet potatoes are tender, approximately 15 minutes—season with salt and pepper to taste.
Add in the spinach until just wilted, then remove from heat. You can add the chopped peanuts and cilantro just before serving.
How to Make Indian Sweet Potato Curry
As discussed above, there are many variations of curry, especially in taste, depending on the nation and region making these curries. Sweet potato curry, for example, can get an Indian spin by changing the type of curry used in the dish.
While Thai-style curry uses red, green, or yellow curry paste, you can substitute it with Madras curry powder to make Indian sweet potato curry. You can also add in a can of chopped tomatoes.
How to Make Butternut Squash and Sweet Potato Curry
You can also add butternut squash into the mix for a more hearty vegan sweet potato curry! Learning how to make butternut squash and sweet potato curry sounds complicated, but it’s not!
Using our recipe above, add one diced butternut squash and one peeled and diced sweet potato, and cook until tender.
How to Make Chicken and Sweet Potato Curry
If you’re looking for a meat addition to your traditional vegan curry, then using chicken meat is the best way to go.
What I do is that I sautee chicken meat (I use boneless chicken breast cut into small pieces) until they’re browned and cooked, remove the chicken from the pan, and on the same pan, I continue cooking my curry.
After sauteeing onion on the same pan, I add back the cooked chicken, adding the spices, curry mixture, chicken broth, and coconut milk or tomatoes, until cooked. Just the same recipe, but added and cooked the chicken just before the curry.
How to Thicken Sweet Potato Curry
When cooking sweet potato curry, I still use coconut milk to help thicken the curry. When allowed to simmer down, coconut milk is one of the major ingredients that help thicken curry sauces.
However, for sweet potato curry, in particular, sweet potatoes themselves are one of the factors that help thicken the sauce. When I want a thicker soup, I add more sweet potatoes than usual and mash some of them so that I am left with slices of sweet potato AND a sauce full of curry and mashed sweet potato mixture.
How to Store and Reheat Sweet Potato Curry
You can keep leftover or premade sweet potato curry like any other dish in the fridge. Use an airtight container to ensure the curry is protected and sealed, and you can keep this for up to 7 days, so you can absolutely have sweet potato curry as part of your weekly meal prep.
To reheat sweet potato curry, you can reheat it in a pot or pop it inside a microwave.
I'm Pauline, a retired patisserie chef, mother of four and now a full time food blogger! When i'm not cooking i love long walks, reading thriller novels and spending time with my grandkids. Head to my about me page to learn more about the woman behind the food! You can find my Facebook here