Video: History of Sweet Potatoes

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Learn about the history of sweet potatoes with expert cooking tips in this free cooking video on making a sweet potato casserole.

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Video Transcript

Before we start making our sweet potato casserole, let's talk a little bit about these sweet potatoes. Sweet potatoes are indigenous to the Americas. Christopher Columbus found them when he first landed in the west Indies. There are several different types of sweet potatoes. The flesh can vary from white to purple. The most common ones that we see in the United States are more orange colored ones. Either pale orange or deeper orange. Sweet potatoes are mainly grown in North Carolina. They grow about 40% of the sweet potatoes there sold in the United States. A large portion of these are sold whole for people to bake at home. Of course, you have candied sweet potatoes as well in cans. With North Carolina as the largest producer of sweet potatoes in the United States, it's not surprising to learn that the south is the largest consumer overall of sweet potatoes. While white potatoes are more generally consumed in other parts of the country, sweet potatoes are the choice for the south. They can be found in many, many different dishes.