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Blogs / On the Table / September 2008 / When sweet potatoes rule ...

When sweet potatoes rule ...

Driving in to the office the other morning, I noticed a sign that seemed to signal a trend that had played itself out: Arctic Circle now offers sweet potato fries.

Since the mid 90s, fried shoestrings and thick slices of this orange-hued tuber have been creeping out of the "swee'" potato's Southern-ish homeland and showing up on menus here and there across the West.

I first cottoned onto sweet potato fries at a cool little joint -- the Hob Nob -- in Missoula, Montana back around '95. I even started making them myself.

But I never expected to see sweet potato fries on the menu of a fast food chain, even a small regional one Like Arctic Circle. It seems the trend has reached its full bloom.

I figured at first that sweet potato fries was a done item, but then went back to give AC's version a try.

As I got in line at the ordering counter, a gentleman in front of me was ordering for his family.

I heard his wife, seated nearby, ask a somewhat odd question of an AC employee:

"Are your sweet potato fries made of sweet potatoes, or just potatoes?"

After receiving the obvious answer -- sweet potatoes -- she gasped out at her hubby "Dick! Order some sweet potato fries!"

Now that's getting excited by a starch dipped in oil.

I next ordered some myself. Only one size, $2.49.

They were mid-sized, relatively crisp and not salted too much. (I would prefer mine a bit more brown, as it were.) All in all, they were pretty good as opposed to so many trends that get lamely cycled through fast food operations.

But I must say, that in Arctic Circle, one of the homes of fry sauce, I used ketchup.

With sweet potatoes, opting for the sauce would have been a saccharine travesty. The slight acid bite of ketchup was needed.