January Super Food Challenge - Sweet Potatoes

Photo by Carl E Lewis

Welcome to the first month of the Organized Mommy Super Food Challenge. I hope you are ready to follow along with me as we gradually incorporate new healthy foods into our regular diet!

This month's super food is Sweet Potatoes.

One sweet potato has all the beta-carotene you need in a day—a nutrient that research indicates may be cancer-protective. Your heart will be happy, too, thanks to the vitamin C and potassium content. Be sure to eat the peel—it contains fiber along with additional disease-fighting phytonutrients. - Woman's Day - 10 Perfect Foods

I'm going to work sweet potatoes into my diet in two ways.

First, Trader Joe's sells some awesome Sweet Potato Frites. I'm going to use them as my veggie side dish once per week. Now, I know that some of you may think it's humorous to start my year eating healthy by vowing to eat french fries! But, hey, this is supposed to be realistic! If I commit to buying and baking whole sweet potatoes, I know this just won't happen on a regular basis. Besides, these frites are baked, not fried. And no matter what form they take, they are still sweet potatoes and still contain all those healthy vitamins.

Second, Trader Joe's sells cubed sweet potatoes in a microwave steam bag. I am going to try to work these into one of my regular recipes once per week. Perhaps inside of my lentil soup, or steamed on top of my big spinach salad. Come to think of it, I might substitute them for the zucchini in my chicken apple sausage stir fry!

I think that sweet potatoes will work in any recipe that calls for regular potatoes. Sweet potatoes are a much better choice! So, feel free to get creative.

How will you make Sweet Potatoes part of your regular diet?

1) Use the Mr Linky below to link to your post about how you will incorporate sweet potatoes, or any good recipes you have that use them. In the name field, put your name and then your post title in parens. (Like this, "Josie (Sweet Potato Frites)"). Feel free to also just leave a comment!
2) On the last Friday of the month, I will round up with some of the best ideas and let you know how my family did.



P.S. I apologize for my reliance on Trader Joe's here. It's where we shop for food. We just don't have time to go to multiple stores for our groceries.