Homemade Brownies Recipe: Sweet Potato Brownies

Sweet Potato Brownies Recipe

When my husband and I started our family, we made a commitment to creating healthier options from the kitchen: homemade foods made with wholesome ingredients and lots of nutrition. However, we also didn’t want to deprive our children of delicious sweets and lots of flavors. That’s when I began to learn the art of adapting food. The key to adapting is not to have an “all or nothing” attitude. In other words, you don’t have to substitute an entire ingredient in order to make the food healthier. Break it down into portions. For example, if your favorite muffin recipe calls for 1 cup of butter and your family is trying to decrease their fat intake, you can substitute half of the one cup with one ‘on-the-go’ toddler fruit pouch, which is approx. 1/2 cup. There are so many ideas out there – whole wheat flour for half the white, fat-free greek yogurt mixed in with the cream…and so on.

Most often, our family adapts recipes to make them have less sugar. Again, I’m not going to substitute the entire amount of sugar, just a portion. What will fill the empty spot, you say? But of course, sweet vegetables! There are a number of inexpensive vegetables available at the grocery store with natural high sugar content….beets, corn, squash, carrots, pumpkin and sweet potatoes. Soften them, and add them into your recipe. It’s that easy.

Today I’m going to show you how to add sweet potatoes to homemade sweet potato brownies. The original recipe called for 1 ¼ cups sugar. I adapted the recipe to include 1 cup cooked sweet potatoes + ½ cup sugar + 2 T. pure maple syrup. There is plenty of sweetness to carry through the brownie, but now your dessert has potassium and vitamin A. When you adopt an ingredient within a recipe to make it healthier and it doesn’t affect the flavor, that’s success!

Come on into my kitchen!

Here are the ingredients. Most of them you probably have on hand – the only weirdo is coconut oil, but you can use any other oil in its place. We like to use coconut oil in recipes that only call for a small amount of oil as you can’t taste the coconut flavor, but get the health benefits like medium chain triglycerides 🙂

Start off by peeling and chopping 1 cup of raw sweet potatoes. The potatoes should be heaping since there will be unused air space in the cup.

Now, you will want to cook them until soft. You can boil them, microwave them in a bowl of water or (my preferred method), you can bake them in a hot oven. Grease your pan with olive oil, spread out the potatoes and bake them in a 425-degree oven for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, combine your dry ingredients in a bowl… 1 cup flour, ½ cup cocoa powder, 1 tsp. baking powder and dash salt

If you are like me, you want to know exactly how much a dash is. I used to think it was a sprinkle, but actually, a dash = 1/8 tsp. In this picture, I’m showing a ¼ teaspoon measuring spoon and a dash measuring spoon, exactly half the size of the ¼ teaspoon. I could have easily said 1/8 tsp. salt, but “dash” sounds so culinary! 🙂

Use a whisk to blend the dry ingredients together and prevent those pesky lumps!

In your mixer bowl, add the ½ cup sugar, egg, 1 tsp. vanilla, 4 T of oil {coconut, vegetable or canola}and 2 T. pure maple syrup. If you don’t have maple syrup, honey works fine, but that hint of maple goes great with the sweet potato!

Beat on high for 30 seconds with your whisk attachment until frothy. If you don’t have a stand-up or hand mixer, you can do this by hand and get a great workout!

Now ready for the secret ingredient. When your potatoes are done, you should be able to easily stick a fork through it – nice and soft.

Add the hot, cooked potatoes right into the mixing bowl.  Beat on high for 1 minute until the batter turns a lovely orange and there are just little bits of sweet potato evidence. Don’t worry; they will disappear when we add the dry!

Now, with the mixer on slow, add your dry ingredients.

Beat on high until the batter resembles boxed brownie mix – thick and creamy. You are free to add chocolate chips or nuts if your family enjoys that!

Spread the batter into a greased 8×8 square pan and put into a preheated 350-degree oven.

Check the sweet potato brownies at 15 minutes with a toothpick or cake tester in the middle of the pan. If the toothpick comes out with bits of  moist brownie on it,  go ahead and take them out.  They will cook the rest of way in the pan. You don’t want to overcook them! If the toothpick comes out with wet batter, you will need another minute or two.

Allow them to cool and cut into 12 brownies. You don’t have to, but these brownies will last longer if you store them in the refrigerator.

There you have it! I guarantee you that nobody will notice the cup of sweet potatoes in there. These are absolutely delicious with a rich and very moist cake like texture. If you prefer your brownies on the more fudgy side, simply decrease the flour to ¾ cup. Either way, what a success!

Oh, and one unique thing about these sweet potato brownies is that they are the perfect dessert to make ahead. The flavors really meld after a day and they are even better!

Enjoy!

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Meredith is a pastor’s wife and stay-at-home mom living in NW Ohio. She loves to adapt recipes to her family’s eclectic tastes and is learning to provide nourishment for any bellies who walk through the door at a moment’s notice. If not in the kitchen, you’ll find Meredith in front of her sewing machine or spend quality time with her home and church families. Life goes by so fast!