Baked Purple Sweet Potato Flower Crisps

Baked purple sweet potato crisps are a healthy, delicious and surprisingly easy to make snack. They are also incredibly versatile, while I'm taking a simple savory approach in this instructable, you can season them any way you want! Trade out the olive oil for coconut oil, and the salt and pepper for cinnamon sugar! Or, try a spicy take with a bit of cayenne and garlic salt.

For this recipe we're going to need purple sweet potatoes. (I'm also using a regular sweet potato to add centers to my flower crisps, but not required). Olive oil, a bowl of water and salt and pepper. We will also need small cookie cutters, biscuit cutters and a good kitchen knife. Optional, a potato peeler and a straw.

Step 1) We will start by washing the sweet potatoes. I will then be peeling mine, but you can leave the peel on if preferred. After that, cut them into about a third of an inch slices (quarter of an inch if you prefer them extra crispy). When you're finished, place all the slices in a bowl of cold water for about 30 mins. This will help them get crisp and will leech out some of the extra starch. 

Step 2) Flower time! Get your cookie/biscuit cutters and your cutting board ready. Take one of your sweet potatoe slices and line the cookie cutter up on top. Pressing through the potato can sometimes be a tough process. For my thicker slices I set my 6x4 cutting board on top the cookie cutter and press down using that so it evenly spreads the force without the edges of the cookie cutter sticking into your hand. If you do not have any cookie cutters that will do the job, you can simply cut small triangles out from the rim of your slices to form your own petals.

During this step you can also use a straw to poke a circular hole in the center of your purple slices. If you are using a regular sweet potato as well, then take the straw again and poke a hole in a slice. You are going to save the cut out piece (which can be difficult to retrieve from the straw sometimes, you can poke it through with a toothpick!). Take the little orange cutout and place it in the center of your purple slice. Continue repeating till you've used all of your slices.

Step 3) baking! First set your oven for 425. Once you've shaped all of your flowers it's time to toss them in some olive oil. Take a bowl, put your flowers in and drizzle with olive oil. Gently stir till evenly coated, then line up on a foil lined baking sheet. For my sweet potato crisps I'm only going to season with salt and pepper, but you may use whatever you'd like. Place them in the oven and set a timer for 5 -8 minutes depending on the thickness of your slices. Pull them out, flip, add a little more salt and pepper once flipped and return to oven. Bake another 5-8 minutes. Serve with guacamole or any sauce or side of your choosing!

These crisps are delicious no matter how you eat them, and you can use any cookie cutter you'd like as well, no need to stick with flowers! Experiment with the recipe, the colors and flavors!