About the Recipe
Roasted sweet potato gives these brownies a soft, dense center, while XOL Pure Love brings the depth of unsweetened Ecuadorian cacao. Panela adds a mellow caramel note, with a little vanilla to round out the chocolate.
Sweet potato, often called camote, belongs to an Indigenous American food story that reaches back thousands of years. Its cultivation in Central and South America, including ancient Peru, predates the Inca Empire. This contemporary recipe celebrates that heritage by bringing sweet potato and cacao together in a brownie made to share.
Weigh 200 g of smooth, roasted, peeled orange-fleshed sweet potato. Pure Love is unsweetened cacao mass, containing both cacao solids and natural cacao butter. The quantities below account for its lack of added sugar.
Allow about 4 hours from roasting to slicing, including 2 hours for the brownies to cool. With already roasted and cooled sweet potato, allow about 2 hours 45 minutes.
Ingredients
1 large orange-fleshed sweet potato (about 350–450 g raw); use 200 g of the roasted, peeled flesh
70 g XOL Pure Love cacao coins (unsweetened cacao mass), weighed and finely chopped
100 g unsalted butter, plus a little for the pan
130 g finely grated panela
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
100 g all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon fine salt
1/4 teaspoon ground Ceylon cinnamon, optional
A small pinch of flaky salt for the top, optional
Preparation
1. Roast the sweet potato. Heat the oven to 400°F (200°C). Scrub and prick the sweet potato, then roast on a lined tray for 45–60 minutes until completely tender. Scoop out the flesh, mash smoothly and weigh 200 g. Cool for about 10 minutes. Reserve any extra.
2. Prepare the pan. Set the oven to 355°F (180°C) conventional, or 320°F (160°C) fan. Line an 18 cm (7-inch) square metal pan with parchment and lightly butter the exposed sides.
3. Melt. Gently melt the butter with the chopped cacao over a water bath. Remove from the heat and let the mixture become lukewarm.
4. Combine. Stir the measured sweet potato and panela together. Mix in the melted cacao and butter, then the eggs and vanilla until smooth.
5. Fold. Mix the flour, baking powder, fine salt and optional Ceylon cinnamon separately. Fold into the wet mixture just until incorporated. Spread evenly in the pan; add optional flaky salt.
6. Bake. Check at 20 minutes; expect about 20–25 minutes. The perimeter and surface should be set, with a soft center. A skewer should carry damp crumbs, without liquid batter. Use these cues to judge readiness.
7. Cool. Leave in the pan until completely cool, about 2 hours. Lift out and divide into 16 squares. Chill briefly if needed for tidy cuts.
Pan option. An 8-inch (20 cm) square metal pan makes thinner brownies. Begin checking at 18 minutes and use the same doneness cues.
Keep and serve. Refrigerate fully cooled brownies in an airtight container for up to 4 days, or freeze individual squares for up to 2 months. Let chilled squares stand briefly at room temperature before serving. Contains wheat, eggs and milk.
Recipe reference: BBC Radio Berkshire — Sweet Potato Brownies. Adapted with unsweetened XOL Pure Love, panela adjusted for the cacao substitution and a plain brownie finish.
Ingredient history: CGIAR Genebanks — Sweetpotato; Roullier and colleagues, PLOS ONE (2013). This is a contemporary recipe celebrating the ingredients' American heritage.