ArcaMax

Ingredients:

For the potatoes

3 lb of sweet potatoes (Usually about six. Depends on their size.)
Up to 1/2 cup of sugar (optional) I did NOT add this sugar. It’s really not necessary. Sweet potatoes are sweet enough!
6 Tbl of butter
1 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract (I use organic.) If your crowd loves sweet, make this 2 tsp.
1/2 tsp of grated sea salt, or to taste. This gives the potatoes that little zing.

Topping

1/4 cup of melted butter
1 cup of chopped pecans (You can toss in some pecan halves too)
1/2 cup of Swerve Brown. You can order this online. It’s amazing. Some stores have it now. Another brand is ZSweet. If you can’t get this and don’t have time to order it… use 1/4 cup of regular brown sugar.
1/2 cup of regular white flour
1/4 tsp of grated sea salt

Instructions:

Pro Tip: Starting the day before… or early in the morning the day you’ll serve it.

Set your oven to 400 degrees. Poke several holes in your sweet potatoes and put them on a cookie sheet. Warning: If you skip the cookie sheet, I promise you’ll have potato ooze all over the bottom of your oven and it will stick and burn. Bake the potatoes for about an hour until they are fork-tender and very soft. Take them out and let them cool long enough to be able to handle them. Slice them on one side, tip to tail, and scoop out all the goodness in the middle and put that in a large bowl.

Add the butter, vanilla, and salt. Beat with your mixer until the potatoes are smooth and the other elements are all mixed in.

Now you’re going to transfer this to your baking dish. Use a dish that can handle a few minutes under the broiler. It can be Pyrex, some other brand, or you can do what I did and put it in a cast-iron pan. Set that aside and make your topping.

I melt the butter first and leave it in the bottom of the bowl. Add the pecans, sugar sub (or sugar), flour, and salt. Mix this all up with your fork until it’s gooey. Spread this over your sweet potatoes. It can be done with a spoon in blobs and spread slightly. I leave a rim around the middle for showing off the orange potatoes.

Bake at 400 degrees until the topping is browned and the filling is hot and bubbly. This might take about 30 minutes. If it’s not quite browned on top, you can fire up your broiler and it will only take a couple of minutes more. I like my pecans to have a bit of char in places.

Serve hot.

Enjoy!
Cheers,
Zola