Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Apples
Posted Nov 08, 2018, Updated Sep 30, 2024
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This cinnamon roasted sweet potatoes and apples recipe is a healthy and easy fall side dish. Made with 6 nutritious ingredients including pure maple syrup and ground cinnamon, it’s a perfect side dish to serve on Thanksgiving.
When it comes to a meal (especially Thanksgiving) I am all about the sides. Sure turkey is great, but I’d rather fill up on dinner rolls, cranberry sauce, and delicious sides like these cinnamon roasted sweet potatoes and apples.
This roasted sweet potato and apples recipe is a perfect healthy side dish that is made with only 6 ingredients and is ready in 40 minutes! It’s light and delicious – with all the flavors of fall! Also try savory roasted sweet potatoes or cinnamon roasted sweet potatoes!
Sweet Potatoes and Apples: Ingredients and Substitutions
- Sweet potatoes. Any variety of sweet potato works well – orange, purple or white. Also, yams are a good choice.
- Apples. I have used many different apple varieties to make this roasted apple sweet potato recipe including: Pink Ladies, Gala, Granny Smith, and Honeycrisp. Any variety works great in this recipe, however you need to choose what flavor profile you want – tart? sweet? a mix?
- Salted butter. coconut oil, olive oil, ghee and avocado oil can all be used in place of butter.
- Maple syrup. Honey is a great substitute.
Use room temperature ingredients
Butter is a solid at room temperature, which means that if the melted butter comes into contact with a cold piece of apple, it will solidify almost instantly. This will result in an uneven distribution of ingredients.
How to Make Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Apples
Let’s get started by discussing how to make this sweet potato and apples recipe – don’t forget to watch the video.
Roast Sweet Potatoes Alone
Sweet potatoes take longer to get fully cooked and browned than apples, which is why it is important to begin by roasting the sweet potatoes alone.
To do this, toss the cubed sweet potatoes with melted butter and sea salt. Then, roast the sweet potatoes until they just start to become golden-brown (about 15-20 minutes), stirring once.
As you can see in the photo below, the baked sweet potato cubes are soft and some of them are browned on one side, which is exactly what they should look like before proceeding to the next step.
Add the Remaining Ingredients
While the sweet potato cubes are baking, toss the apples with the remaining coconut oil, maple syrup and cinnamon in a large bowl until everything is well combined.
Once the sweet potatoes begin to brown, remove them from the oven and add the rest of the ingredients to the pan, stirring to combine. Spread the sweet potatoes and apples evenly in the pan in a single layer so they cook quickly and brown nicely.
Bake
Return the pan to the oven and bake until the sweet potatoes and apples are browned and the maple syrup has caramelized, or thickened. At this point, remove the pan from the oven and serve immediately!
Serve
I like to serve this apple sweet potato recipe as-is, they are just so delicious! However, for presentation I recommend putting them in a nice serving dish.
You could sprinkle them with pomegranate seeds and top them with fresh rosemary too, like I did with these maple cinnamon roasted sweet potatoes.
I do recommend serving them fresh from the oven. Letting these Cinnamon Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Apples sit too long at room temperature might cause them to lose some of their crispiness.
Store
Store leftovers in an airtight container for up to 5 days. Reheat in the microwave or to restore crispiness in the oven.
Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Apples FAQs
There are a few key elements in making baked sweet potato cubes crispy:
Roast with only oil and salt first. Like I mentioned earlier, it’s important to roast sweet potatoes with only oil and salt before adding any other ingredients. You don’t want to compromise bake time by introducing a wet ingredient (like in these peanut butter sweet potato fries) before it’s time.
Flip and stir during baking. To ensure that all sides of your roasted sweet potatoes are browned, it’s crucial that you stir/flip them during roasting. Sometimes I even use tongs to individually flip sweet potato cubes to ensure I didn’t miss any!
Cut the sweet potatoes in small, thin pieces. The more surface area of the baked sweet potato cubes that are exposed to the surface of the baking sheet, the higher the ratio of browned, crispy outside to soft inside. Plus, using smaller pieces decreases baking time!
No. I mean, you can, but I do not recommend it! The skin is loaded with nutrients (see below) and adds a great texture and flavor to roasted sweet potatoes! I always recommend roasting sweet potatoes with the skin on!
Same answer as above! Plus, without the skin the apples in this recipe may fall apart and not hold together as well!
Yes. Here are some amazing health benefits of sweet potatoes:
High in nutrients such as Vitamins A, C & B, manganese and potassium – which helps regulate blood pressure!
Sweet potatoes are high in antioxidants and have amazing anti-inflammatory properties
They are high in fiber, which means they do not cause blood sugar spikes, like regular potatoes do!
Help boost fertility. I ate so many sweet potatoes and yams when I was trying to conceive to help my body be as healthy as it could be!
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Cinnamon Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Apples
Ingredients
- 2 medium sweet potatoes (4 cups, cut into ½” cubes)
- 2 medium apples (about 2 cups, cut into ½” cubes)
- 3 Tablespoons salted butter (melted & divided)
- 1 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 2 Tablespoons pure maple syrup
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
- Grease a large baking pan, set aside.
- In a large bowl, stir 2 Tablespoons of melted butter and the sweet potatoes together until the potatoes are evenly coated.
- Add sea salt and stir until evenly distributed.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, stirring halfway through, until sweet potatoes just barely start to brown.
- While the sweet potatoes are baking: stir the remaining 1 Tablespoon of butter into the apples. Add maple syrup and cinnamon and stir to combine.
- After 20 minutes, or the sweet potatoes have begun to brown, remove the sweet potatoes from oven and add the apple mixture and stir to combine.
- Return to the oven and bake for 15 to 20 more minutes, stirring halfway through.
- Once the sweet potatoes and apples are browned and the maple syrup has caramelized on them remove them from the oven and serve immediately!
Video
Notes
- Sweet potatoes. Any variety of sweet potato works well – orange, purple or white. Also, yams are a good choice.
- Apples. I have used many different apple varieties to make this roasted apple sweet potato recipe including: Pink Ladies, Gala, Granny Smith, and Honeycrisp. Any variety works great in this recipe, however you need to choose what flavor profile you want.
- Salted butter. coconut oil, olive oil, ghee and avocado oil can all be used in place of butter.
- Maple syrup. Honey is a great substitute.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Amazing!!! I love sweet potatoes, so I was sold. But my husband and his family do not like them at all. This recipe changed them! A crowd pleaser, for sure! Very easy to make and put together. Healthy and tasty all in one. Thanks!
Has anyone tried making this recipe in the air fryer? I only have one oven and all of my other thanksgiving dishes are at 350… I think these would turn out well in the air fryer but I’m hoping someone else has tried it and has some tried and true advice for me 😉 Thanks in advance!
Made this today to go with pork chops. Loved that it called for maple syrup rather than brown sugar. Roasting the sweet potatoes before adding the apples guaranteed that everything was just the right doneness. My husband loved it, too.
Made this today and it was very good. As an added bonus it made the house smell fantastic! I had it with some chicken but I think it would be fantastic with pork chops.
This is a great fall side dish recipe! I was afraid it would be too sweet, but it absolutely was not! It will be a new fall staple.
Delicious prepared exactly as written except olive vs coconut oil. Mixed this with chicken & apple sausage for a hearty meal.
Really good! I’ll make this again soon!
I love this recipe! Delicious! Made it today, the house smells soooo amazing!! Will definitely make more! Thank you for this great recipe
If I need to make this ahead of time and just warm it day of, how can I do that? (I won’t have time to make it on the day of our Thanksgiving, so I will be putting it into my husband’s hands to warm it before!) Thanks!
I have the same question. Can any of this be done ahead of time? Or will that mean the potatoes won’t be crispy? Thx! The recipe looks so yummy!!
-Jenn
Hey Jenn! How far ahead of time are you wanting to make these? They are the best when they are fresh from the oven!
The fam loved this at Thanksgiving! Will make again!
I think sweet potatoes and apples are some of my very favorite foods, especially roasted or sauteed. 🙂 And I have to 100% agree about the Thanksgiving sides/or the desserts. 🙂