Remember the days when the sweet potato was merely a thing of Thanksgiving dinner—and that only with brown sugar and marshmallows to disguise the taste?
But something happened. Nutrition burst into the public conscience, and few vegetables are as well endowed with nutrients as the sweet potato. Back in the day when I was editor of Produce Concepts magazine, the oxygen radical absorbency capacity (ORAC) of the sweet potato came to the forefront and impressed everyone. It turns out sweet potatoes have a higher capacity than most vegetables to fight off cancer-causing free radical cells. And with some imagination, sweet potatoes even taste good—without brown sugar and marshmallows.
It’s likely because restaurants often suffer the blame for obesity in this country that sweet potatoes have been the subject of restaurant R&D. Countless restaurants have slipped them onto the menu, though at this point, mostly as limited time offerings. Perhaps the narrow window of opportunity relates to seasonality. Or perhaps restaurants want to gauge public acceptance before diving in whole heartedly. Sweet potato fries have been the diving-off point.
- Culver’s has gone with sweet potato fries a few times, most recently crinkle-cut this summer with a premium price.
- Chick-fil-A, El Pollo Loco and Smashburger each have focused on sweet potato fries, either as LTOs or permanent additions. Interestingly, El Pollo Loco’s sweet potato fries show up on the menu with more than twice as many calories as most other side dishes at 1,130!
- Burger King added sweet potato fries as an LTO from June to Labor Day.
- LYFE Kitchen (the newest restaurant on the block, founded by former McDonald’s executives) has baked sweet potato fries on the menu served with agave ketchup.
But restaurant chains have also gone beyond fries.
- Sonic, with its popular tater tots, introduced sweet potato tots as an LTO earlier this year.
- Wendy’s added a baked sweet potato side item to the menu as an LTO for $2.49.
- Pollo Tropical offered a sweet potato mash side dish for a limited time last fall.
- To the breakfast menu, Cracker Barrel offered sweet potato pancakes topped with brown sugar cinnamon butter earlier this year.
It is apparent that menu developers are hoping for a healthy halo from sweet potatoes. The jury is still out on whether the menu item will be successful. A love affair is not guaranteed, especially when restaurants become obligated to post calories on their menus and menu boards and consumers see that sweet potato fries will do nothing to help control weight. The cancer-fighting qualities of the vegetable are not widely known, and there’s simply not space to make it widely known
Tell me what you think.
Jody
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