The Orange Kitchen

Fully Stuffed Sweet Potatoes.

I'm going to share a little fun fact with you - if you eat large amounts of sweet potato, you will eventually turn a light orange colour. This probably sounds like some kind of hilarious joke to most, but I'm being 100% legitimate. 

See, one day I was sitting down and I looked down at my legs and I thought to myself 'wow, I already have orange hair and I swear that I've now got orange legs too. What. The. Heck.' So, as always in strange and seemingly unexplainable circumstances, I turned to Google, and typed in 'skin colour turning orange' and was gifted with a lovely, albeit rather unexpected explanation from Dr. Google. Apparently this predicament is a legitimate condition - "Carotenemia is a medical term for a condition that causes the skin to turn orange-ish due to increased blood carotene levels. In the vast majority of cases seen, it is associated with large consumption of carotene in the diet; as in too many carrots or sweet potatoes."

This explained everything because I absolutely have an addiction to sweet potato and many would probably say that I consequently have uncharacteristically large consumption of carotene. It probably sounds crazy - who would want to be orange - but what actually happens is that you start to look tanned. As in tanned as though you've just been on a lovely beach holiday in the Caribbean. Because of that I have absolutely no plans to stop eating sweet potatoes because now they not only taste delicious, but they apparently also leave me looking like a beautifully bronzed beach bum. No complaints here!!!!

Ingredients;

3 sweet potatoes, washed

½ red onion, finely diced

¼ cup thinly sliced red cabbage

2 shallots (spring onion), sliced

Handful fresh coriander (cilantro)

Small red chilli, finely diced

 ½ avocado

Cracked black pepper

2 tbsp pure-state tahini OR sweet chilli sauce

½ fresh lime

1.  Preheat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius. Place the potatoes on a lined baking tray and bake for approx. 40 minutes, or until a knife can easily slice through the whole potato (depending on the thickness of the potato, you may need longer than 40 mins).

2. When the potatoes are baked, remove from the oven and slice lengthwise. Then, carefully pull either side apart using a fork so they open up. Use the fork to kind of mash the insides a bit and to make a bit of an opening/whole to put all the fun stuffings in!

3. Stuff the potatoes with the cabbage, shallot, red onion and coriander. Take ½ the avocado and slice into thin pieces using a knife. Lay half on each potato, and garnish with the diced chilli and pepper.

4. Drizzle the tahini/sweet chilli sauce (take your pick!) over each potato along with a squeeze of fresh lime and serve immediately.