Recipe video above. A magnificant savoury sweet potato casserole made with creamy mashed sweet potato with swirls of browned butter, topped with a crunchy parmesan panko breadcrumb topping sprinkled with sage and crumbled bacon. Unapologetically indulgent!
1.75kg / 3.5lbsweet potato(3 large or 6 smaller ones)
1/2 cup (115g)sour cream
1/2 cup (50g)parmesan, freshly grated
2garlic cloves, finely minced
3/4tspsalt
1/4tspblack pepper
Browned butter & crispy sage:
250g / 8ozbutter, salted, cut into 2cm/1" cubes
15sage leaves(Note 1)
Topping:
3/4 cuppanko breadcrumbs(Note 2)
1/2 cup (50g)parmesan, finely grated
1/4tspeach salt and pepper
150g / 5ozbacon, streaky, cooked until golden then finely chopped
Instructions
Bake & mash:
Preheat oven to 180°C/350°F.
Place potatoes on a foil lined tray. Bake for 1 hour 15 minutes (small) to 1 hour 40 minutes (large) until knife can be easily inserted into the centre.
Cool potatoes until they can be handled (but still piping hot inside!) or use tea towel to handle.
Browned Butter & crispy sage:
Meanwhile, place butter in a large silver saucepan over medium heat.
Once melted and starts to foam, add sage leaves. Cook 1 minute or until golden brown, then fish through the foam to find the leaves and drain on paper towels (will crisp when cool).
Continue to leave butter on stove until foam dies down and you see black bits on the bottom of the pan (it will smell nutty).
Strain through paper towel lined sieve - should have 180ml or so.
Topping:
Crumble sage leaves in your hand (chop if not fully crisp) and place in bowl.
Add 1/4 cup Browned Butter, panko, parmesan, garlic, salt and pepper, mix.
Mash:
Cut slits down the middle of the potatoes then scoop flesh out into a bowl.
Add 1/4 cup Browned Butter (below), sour cream, parmesan, salt and pepper. Mash or use electric beater to mash until smooth (if using food processor, be careful not to overdo as it will make potato gluey).
Assemble & bake:
Place half the potato in a baking dish (2 litre / 2 quarts). Make swirls across surface with spoon (as catchment for butter!), then drizzle over 1/4 cup Browned Butter. Cover the butter pools with remaining potato - the less you disturb the butter, the better!
Sprinkle over Topping. Bake 25 minutes until top is golden brown and edges are bubbling.
Sprinkle with crumbled bacon, then bake a further 5 minutes. If you've got any leftover butter, drizzle it on then serve!
Notes
1. Sage - sage and browned butter is a classic flavour combo. If you don't have fresh, feel free to add about 1/2 tsp mixed dried herbs into the topping. Or just skip the herbs - there's certainly plenty of flavour in this dish as it is!2. Panko breadcrumbs - larger pieces than normal breadcrumbs which creates a really nice extra crunchy topping. Pretty common nowadays, found in the Asian section of supermarkets here in Australia. Can sub with normal breadcrumbs.3. Baking dish size - 20x28cm / 8 x 11", 2 litres / 2 quarts, or thereabouts.Make ahead - assemble all except bacon. Fridge 2 to 3 days, then bake, sprinkle with bacon, bake again! Can also bake to make it golden then while still warm on the inside, just pop it back in for a few minutes at end to reheat the topping :)4. Nutrition per serving. Thought the calculator would explode from all the butter in this! But actually, this is higher cals than reality because you lose a lot of butter in the sage cooking/draining and straining process. 250g/8oz butter yields 180g/6oz browned butter (minor liquid evaporation is very minor)