My daughter and I ate this entire side dish that I intended to serve with dinner as our lunch. Why, you may be asking yourself, if this dish was supposed to be served with dinner, did it even exist at the noontime hour? It all has to do with daylight savings time--the bane of any food photographer. You see, as we get closer and closer to the winter solstice, the amount of daylight gets shorter and shorter and my window of opportunity for natural light with which to take all the photos you see here on this site, grows less and less. Folks, I am operating in crisis mode now and dinners that I want to record for sharing with you are often getting cooked at breakfast time, just so I can get a good shot of them!! I can't wait till we go back to normal hours or I figure out how to take good photos with artificial light! In any case, whether you eat these easy-to-make sweet potatoes coated in a delightful brown sugar lime glaze, for lunch, dinner or even breakfast, you're gonna love them!

I gotta say, nine times out of ten, it's the side dishes, far more than the main courses, that stay with me and this one is no exception. Tell me it can be thrown together in under 30 minutes and I'm hooked for life. And that's what this sweet potato side is--a real keeper!

Each bite is a tender little cube of sweet potato lightly coated in a slightly sweet, slightly tangy sauce. There's even a little bite to these too, as you add a dash of cayenne pepper at the end, just before serving. Really livens up an ordinary dinner!

Make these tonight or this afternoon or this morning or whenever--just make them, I promise you won't regret it! And now I see it's 9:15 a.m. which means I really have to get dinner going, or else!! Have a great day!!

Brown Sugar Glazed Sweet Potatoes with Lime

Makes 5-6 servings

Prep Time: 10 minutes; Cook Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil

• 2 pounds (about 4) sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into bite-sized cubes

• 1 cup water

• 1/2 cup brown sugar, packed

• 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice

• Coarse salt and black pepper to taste

• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter

• Small pinch cayenne pepper

The Recipe

1.  Place the oil into a large skillet and heat over medium-high heat. Add the sweet potatoes and cook for about 4-5 minutes, only stirring once so that the potatoes start to brown a bit. Stir in the water, brown sugar, lime juice and salt and pepper to taste and turn the heat up high. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat so that the liquid is simmering and cover. Cook for 10 minutes until the sweet potatoes are crisp-tender. Then uncover and cook over medium-high heat for another 7-9 minutes, until the sweet potatoes are soft and the liquid is reduced and syrupy.

2.  Remove from the heat and add the butter. Stir gently. Add the pinch of cayenne pepper and a bit more salt to taste. Stir and serve immediately.

Note:  Recipe adapted from Martha Stewart.