Baked sweet potato (yam) fries

Baked sweet potato fries

1 large sweet potato or yam (about 1 lb.)
1 Tb. starch (corn starch, tapioca starch/flour, brown rice starch/flour, or a mixture)
2 Tb. canola oil
Spices to taste (such as seasoned salt or chili powder or cinnamon)

Peel the sweet potato or yam and cut it into 1/4" by 1/4" fries. Put the fries in a bowl and cover them with cold water. Let them sit for about 1 hour or up to overnight. Drain and pat dry.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Line one or two sheet pans with aluminum foil and spray the foil with a non-stick cooking spray.

Put the fries in a large plastic bag or bowl with a cover. Sprinkle them with the starch and then shut the bag or put the cover on the bowl. Shake the container until the fries are lightly coated with the starch. Put the oil (and any spices, if using) on the fries and again shake the container.

Carefully lay the fries in a single layer, without letting them touch each other, on the pan(s). Bake for 15 minutes, carefully turn the fries over, and then bake for another 10-15 minutes. Watch to make sure they don't burn on the ends. If you have more than two pans of fries in the oven, it will take longer to cook them. At that point, it is probably easier to cook them in separate batches.

The fries will be crispier if you let them cool a bit on the baking sheets. Sprinkle with salt to taste.

Eliza's notes: These tasted very good, but were a bit tricky to cook since I was tripling the recipe and had three pans in my oven. Then I forgot to set the timer one of the times, and they started to get a bit toasty. I'll probably just try one sweet potato or yam next time and have better results. The starch is supposed to help the fries be crispy, which is sort of tricky with yams/sweet potatoes because of their high water content compared to regular potatoes.