I looooove sweet potatoes.
I don’t eat them nearly enough, so I set a goal for 2018 to create more sweet potato recipes. So here we go with sweet potato recipe No. 1: Maple Sweet Potato & Apple Soup. It has a few simple ingredients but the flavor is dynamite.
It starts with three oversized sweet potatoes roasted in the oven for about an hour, until they’re soft and the outsides are starting to caramelize and the kitchen smells heavenly. Then, in a big Dutch oven, a sweet onion is sautéed with tart Granny Smith apples with a generous pinch of nutmeg and cayenne and pureed until super smooth (like Justin Timberlake). It’s finished with a bit of tangy balsamic vinegar, creamy canned coconut milk and pure maple syrup. All of the flavors are completely balanced and it’s pure soup bliss.
Yes, there is such a thing as soup bliss, and this is it.
The hubs thinks my pureed soups are kinda like baby food, and maybe they look a bit like baby food, but certainly don’t taste like it. There is nothing quite as delicious as a mixture of sweet potatoes, apples, maple, nutmeg, cayenne and coconut milk. 
I think if he gave it a try, he’d understand how insanely good it is.
So if you’re one of those who think pureed soups are baby food, just set that thought aside and try this soup. I think you’ll be licking the bowl.
Maple Sweet Potato & Apple Soup
Serves 8
Ingredients
- 3 large sweet potatoes
- 3 to 4 tablespoons butter
- ½ medium diced onion
- 2 medium diced apples
- 1 to 1¼ teaspoon coarse salt
- 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ½ teaspoon ground black pepper
- ¼ to ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 2 cups unsalted vegetable stock
- 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
- 1 15-ounce can full fat coconut milk
- 3 to 4 tablespoons pure maple syrup
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Poke sweet potatoes with a fork, place in a roasting pan and cook 1 to 1 ½ hours, until tender. Let slightly cool, then peel sweet potatoes and discard peels.
- Heat butter to medium in a Dutch oven. Add onion and sauté 2 to 3 minutes until soft. Add apples and sauté 3 to 4 minutes, until soft. Stir in salt, nutmeg, black pepper and cayenne. Stir in cooked sweet potatoes and vegetable stock and bring to a simmer. Cook 10 to 15 minutes with lid on.
- Remove from the heat and use an immersion blender to puree soup until very smooth. Stir in balsamic vinegar, coconut milk and maple syrup. Taste and adjust seasoning, if necessary.
