Real Recipes From Real Home Cooks ®

mrs. ballew's sweet potatoes

Recipe by
Robin Stringer
Waco, TX

When my family and I first moved to our small town, we attended a Thanksgiving meal at the school. I fell in love with the caramelized sweet potatoes and immediately started asking who made them. I was told that in years past a little lady in our town always made the sweet potatoes for this event. Although she was no longer able to participate, they still used her recipe. I sought this lady out and she invited me into her home where I sat at her tiny kitchen table in her old farm house and wrote down her recipe. I received so much more than a recipe - I received a friend.

yield 10 +
prep time 1 Hr
cook time 2 Hr
method Bake

Ingredients For mrs. ballew's sweet potatoes

  • 6-8 md
    sweet potatoes (east texas if you can get them)
  • 1 tsp
    salt
  • can
    crisco for greasing pan
  • 1/4 - 1/2 c
    water
  • 1 1/2 c
    brown sugar
  • 1 1/2 c
    granulated sugar
  • ground cinnamon
  • ground ginger
  • 1 stick
    butter

How To Make mrs. ballew's sweet potatoes

  • 1
    Rinse sweet potatoes, and then boil them whole.
  • 2
    Sprinkle salt in pot while boiling. Refrigerate overnight.
  • 3
    Next day, grease baking pan.
  • 4
    Slice sweet potatoes about 1/2" in thickness. Lay in pan, single layer (over-lapping slightly).
  • 5
    Pour about 1/4 - 1/2 cup water over potatoes. Sprinkle with approximately 1 1/2 cups brown sugar and then approximately 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar.
  • 6
    Sprinkle with cinnamon to taste and then also a light coating of ginger (as if sprinkling salt).
  • 7
    Cut 1 stick of butter into small pieces. Place the pieces on the potatoes, making sure that the butter is evenly spaced across all potatoes. Make sure that all potatoes will come into contact with the melting butter.
  • 8
    Cook in 350 degree oven for about 2 hours. during the last 30 minutes, look at the water content. If there is standing water, turn the temperature up to 400 degrees to evaporate excess water.

Categories & Tags for Mrs. Ballew's Sweet Potatoes:

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