Name: Baked Lemon Sweet Potatoes Recipe
Yield: 8 servings
Ingredients: 8 sweet potatoes, peeled and sliced into ¼ inch rounds; 2 cups light brown sugar mixed with ½ teaspoon salt; 2 lemons, washed, dried and sliced as thin as possible (peel and all) no seeds; 2 ½ sticks butter, melted (also soft butter for greasing baking dish)

Why it works: Sweet potato and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 314 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Baked Lemon Sweet Potatoes Recipe

8 servings

Ingredients

8 sweet potatoes, peeled and sliced into ¼ inch rounds
2 cups light brown sugar mixed with ½ teaspoon salt
2 lemons, washed, dried and sliced as thin as possible (peel and all) no seeds
2 ½ sticks butter, melted (also soft butter for greasing baking dish)

Directions

Step-by-step directions aren't available for this recipe. See the full recipe at the source →

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

324Calories

5 gProtein

12 gFat

53 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 6 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Potato	1 medium (173g) baked	161
Butter	1 tbsp (14g)	102
Sugar	1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated	49
Lemon	juice of 1 lemon (48ml)	12
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0
Seed	not in our table	0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By chow. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

Sweet potato + lemontop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together314 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,227 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Sweet potato + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,151 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together53,532 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Swap the sweet potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, lemon, butter):

Arrowrootfits about as well
Shallotfits about as well
Leekfits about as well
Sweet potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, lemon, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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