Whole-Roast­ed Sweet Pota­to with Sun­flower Gre­mo­la­ta and Lemo­ny Sour Cream

Serves 4

After I had the best whole-roast­ed sweet pota­to of my life in Tel Aviv (thank you, Port Said!), I knew I had to write a recipe for this loaded-up bad boy. The secret is to roast the sweet pota­to at very high heat, so it releas­es all its deli­cious sug­ars that caramelize on the skin. Then to bright­en things up, I add sour cream (because what goes bet­ter with a roast­ed pota­to?) and a sun­flower seed and basil gre­mo­la­ta, which adds some much-need­ed crunch and takes things over the edge into max tastiness.

Roast­ed Sweet Potatoes

4 sweet pota­toes, scrubbed clean

4 table­spoons extra-vir­gin olive oil

2 tea­spoons kosher salt

Sun­flower Gremolata

¼ cup sun­flower seeds

¼ cup fine­ly sliced fresh basil leaves

¼ cup extra-vir­gin olive oil

Grat­ed zest of 1 lemon

½ tea­spoon kosher salt, plus more to taste

1 gar­lic clove, grated

Lemo­ny Sour Cream

½ cup sour cream

Juice of 1 lemon

¼ tea­spoon kosher salt

Serv­ing

Flaky sea salt

Fresh basil leaves, the small­est leaves you can pick

1. Roast the sweet pota­toes: Pre­heat the oven to 450°F.

2. Place the sweet pota­toes in a bak­ing dish. Rub each pota­to with 1 table­spoon of the olive oil and ½ tea­spoon of the salt. Roast until the skin is crispy and begin­ning to caramelize, about 1 hour 15 min­utes. You want the sug­ars to start seep­ing out and caramelizing.

3. Make the sun­flower gre­mo­la­ta: Toast the sun­flower seeds in a dry pan over low heat until fra­grant, about 5 min­utes, then rough­ly chop them.

4. In a medi­um bowl, toss togeth­er the sun­flower seeds, basil, olive oil, lemon zest, salt, and gar­lic. Adjust the sea­son­ing with more salt, if desired.

5. Make the lemo­ny sour cream: In a small bowl, mix togeth­er the sour cream, lemon juice, and salt.

6. To serve: Split each sweet pota­to down the mid­dle and fill each half with 2 table­spoons sour cream and 2 table­spoons of the gre­mo­la­ta. Fin­ish with a sprin­kle of the sea salt and gar­nish with the small­est basil leaves you can find.

NOTE Go with the small­est sweet pota­toes you can find — they’re sweet­er and eas­i­er to cook evenly.

Reprint­ed from Eat­ing Out Loud. Copy­right © 2020 by Eden Grin­sh­pan with Rachel Holtz­man. Pho­tographs copy­right © 2020 by Aubrie Pick. Pub­lished by Clark­son Pot­ter, an imprint of Ran­dom House.