sweet potato souffle;
Sweet potato soufflé is a holiday classic of my mother in law and I always always look forward to having it when she makes it come the holidays! Soft and sweet and fluffy mashed sweet potatoes piled high with a nutty brown sugar topping…me oh my! Is it healthy? No. Is it delicious? Hell yeah!
When it comes to the sweet potatoes, you have two options. Microwave or oven. The microwave is fast and easy, and to be honest, my lack of planning usually means this is the method of choice. When you’re planning a big meal for family, it’s helpful to shorten steps and make things easy wherever you can. When you’ve got 6 dishes to make and ones a ham or turkey, there’s no shame in microwaving your baked sweet potatoes.
Use salted butter for the topping or add in a pinch or two of salt with unsalted butter to reinforce the salty-sweet.
secret to success
But for optimum flavor and caramelization in the sweet potato flesh, baking the potatoes in the oven simply has to be the superior choice. Especially if you’re running your oven for other dishes or meal preparations, sometimes it’s not too hard to throw your sweet potatoes in with other dishes or even a couple of days before you need to assemble your sweet potato soufflé.
For optimum flavor and caramelization in the sweet potato, baking them in the oven has to be the superior choice.
secret to success
For this soufflé, you’ll want to whip the potatoes. There’s a time and a preference for lumps in potatoes–sweet potato soufflé is not that time! A soufflé is soft and fluffy with lots of air and melts in your mouth. So get out your hand mixer or stand mixer and whip those sweet potatoes up real good!
When it comes to nuts, my go-to always is pecans. They have the perfect nuttiness and toast up so nice with the right amount of snap. Mixed with brown sugar, it has the perfect umami and sweetness combination. But other nuts will do the trick as well. If I had to choose an alternative, I’d go with walnuts. They’re soft and still get that nice snap when toasted and add their own nutty factor.
Pecans are always my go to. But if I have to choose an alternative, I’d go for walnuts.
secret to success
Just don’t skimp on the brown sugar. Like I said, sweet potato soufflé isn’t going to win any health food prizes! You want that perfect ratio of sugary nutty topping in every bite. So a wide, large surface-area pan is perfect for getting the perfect ratio. If you only have a deeper dish, an alternative is mixing some of the topping into the actual soufflé itself. If you go this route, I’d actually mix in chunky pockets of the topping so you get sweet surprises throughout the soufflé.
secrets to success;
Want all the best tips and tricks to make this recipe a success? Check out the blog post above to find out more!
more recipes;
Looking for other holiday dishes? Check out some of my favorites guaranteed to feed a crowd, and keep them coming back for more:
- You can never go wrong with a holiday pumpkin pie; and even better when it’s a caramelized honey pumpkin pie with chai whipped cream.
- Love sweet potatoes? Check out some of my favorite sweet potato recipes like twice-baked breakfast sweet potatoes or butter sage sweet potato gnocchi.
- While you’ve got your pecans out of the pantry, why not whip up this pecan pie muffin recipe? So chewy and sweet and delicious.
- Or if you want your house smelling like cinnamon spice and everything nice for a while, make your own slow cooker candided cinnamon nuts.
Ingredients
sweet potato soufflé;
- 3 cups sweet potatoes peeled and chopped into 1" cubes
- ½ tsp salt
- 4 Tbsp butter melted
- ¼ cup brown sugar (up to ½ cup if preferred sweetness)
- 2 eggs lightly beaten
- ½ cup milk whole milk preferred
pecan topping;
- 5 Tbsp butter melted
- ¾ cup brown sugar
- ½ cup all-purpose flour
- 1 cup pecans chopped (or nut(s) of choice)
Instructions
sweet potato soufflé;
- Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Meanwhile, peel and chop sweet potatoes into 1" cubes.
- Once water is at a rolling boil, add the cubed sweet potatoes and cover with a lid. Allow to cook 5-7 minutes or until all pieces are fork tender.
- Strain and dump into the bowl of a stand mixer (or alternatively a bowl for use with hand mixer). Add ½ tsp salt, 4 Tbsp melted butter, 1 tsp vanilla, ¼ cup brown sugar, 2 lightly beaten eggs, and ½ cup whole milk.
- Using the whipping attachment or a hand mixer, blend the sweet potatoes for 2-3 minutes or until light and fluffy.
- Pour into a greased baking dish. Cover and bake for 35 minutes at 350°F.
pecan topping;
- While the soufflé is baking, prepare the pecan topping. Roughly chop 1 cup of pecans and add to a medium bowl.
- Add to the bowl ¾ cup brown sugar and ½ cup flour and stir to mix evenly.
- Add 5 Tbsp melted butter to the mixture and stir until evenly combined.
- After the original 35 minutes of baking passes, remove the dish from the oven. Sprinkle topping evenly over top of the souffle, and return to the oven for 20 minutes
