Sweet Potatoes Are a Secretly Great Cocktail Ingredient

Over fall and winter, I find myself eating a lot of sweet potatoes. But I’ve never thought about using them as part of a cocktail program.

Thankfully, several bartenders around the world have seen the potential for this underutilized and versatile starchy vegetable. “The sweet potato adds a richness to the drink, a nice purple color and a confection element,” says Jesse Vida, a founding partner of Cat Bite Club in Singapore, which is debuting the Ube Noir (Luzhao LaJiao Baijiu, Ron Zacapa Rum, black sesame, ube-coconut cream, Amontillado Sherry, Aperol, rose water) to its winter menu. 

Ah, but it’s not so simple. It’s important to note that there are thousands of types of sweet potatoes. And sweet potatoes and yams look similar but are different root vegetables. There are purple sweet potatoes and then similar-looking ubes (as Vida mentioned in the drink above) that are purple, but those are technically yams…which are often mistakenly labeled as sweet potatoes in the U.S. For my article, you’ll find bartenders discussing both sweet potatoes and yams, and we’ll try to clarify the variety of the vegetable when needed, with “sweet potato” working as shorthand. 

Also, prep isn’t always easy! With one exception, it takes real time and effort to incorporate the sweet potato into your home bartending arsenal. But it’s worth it; you end up adding earthy, sweet and nostalgic notes to your cocktails, and occasionally a cool purple hue.

How to choose (and source) your sweet potatoes

It tends to be what’s available regionally. “We chose the regular sweet potato, also known as the Beauregard variety, for its high sugar content and familiar flavor to our guests,” says Colin Williams, the director of beverage and service at The Kingsway and Saffron (New Orleans). 

Aaron Wolfson, a bartender at Rex at the Royal in Philadelphia, prefers Covington sweet potatoes, which offer an “authentically yammy flavor” and are part of the bar’s Home Remedy cocktail, made with Scotch, ginger, sweet potato, smoked honey and lemon. 

But look overseas, and you’ll find a treasure trove of sweet potato and yam varieties. “We use an organic Japanese orange sweet potato,” says Jonathan Adler, the beverage director at NYC’s Shinji’s. “We found that this yielded the most juice and flavor for the drink.”

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“The Bemi Imo has a vibrant hue and brings color and personality to a cocktail,” adds Dominic Dijkstra, director of mixology, Waldorf Astoria Osaka, which offered up an Okinawan Coquito over the holidays, featuring rum, sherry, ben imo, coconut milk, milk, cream, condensed milk, kokuto and vanilla. “It has a naturally sweet, slightly earthy and creamy quality that softens and enriches the drink without overpowering it. When added to dairy in its puréed form, it adds body and a silkiness, while its gentle sweetness helps balance the luxurious texture.” (That said, these can be difficult to source outside of Okinawa.)

How to prep the sweet potatoes

Some of the preparation for sweet potatoes may admittedly be out of league for the typical home bartender. Adler, for example, peels and juices the sweet potatoes and then reduces the juice by 20% (to remove the starchiness on the palate); he then blends this with fenugreek-infused Appleton rum and maple syrup and has the mixture emulsified together with a combination of guar gum, kappa carrageenan and xanthan gum. That’s probably an afternoon you don’t have.

It can be easier. “We keep the preparation very simple,” says Timofei Osipenko, the Bar Manager at Bar Iris in San Francisco, which serves Japanese-inspired cocktails. For their drink, the Okinawa, “We roast the yams whole at 450°F for about an hour, let them cool, peel them and purée them with oat milk,” he says. “That gives us a smooth, vibrant base without overworking the starch.” And at the Cat Bite Club, Jesse Vida creates an ube jam (with ube sweet potatoes) that’s shaken into the drinks.  

There is, however, a sweet potato cheat code. “In all honesty, we use the El Guapo Sweet Potato Syrup,” says Evan Hawkins, owner of the NYC bar Romeo’s, which recently added a Sweet Potato Casserole Milk Punch to its menu, featuring vodka, Amontillado Sherry, rye, Smith & Cross, Angostura bitters and El Guapo. “It takes so much of the heavy lifting out of our hands while still giving us that rich, nostalgic flavor we were aiming for. We wanted the cocktail to echo that classic sweet-potato-casserole vibe without getting overly fussy.” 

Some tips for using sweet potatoes

• Barrel-aged spirits work well with sweet potatoes. “Baking spices are a natural flavor pairing for them,” says Adler. 
• Sweet potatoes like Beni Imo shine in cocktails with rich, rounded flavors and creamy texture (and particularly well with aged rum and sherry). “Cook and puree sweet potato thoroughly so it integrates smoothly,” says Dijkstra. 
• Undercooking a sweet potato means it’ll stay starchy. But overblending turns it gummy. 
• Use a fat-based liquid. “A little milk, oat milk or another fat-based option helps create a smoother syrup or puree,” says Osipenko. 

And finally, a few sweet potato cocktails

“Sweet potatoes are earthy and pair well with whisky, and we accentuate that earthiness with house-smoked honey,” says Rex at the Royal’s Wolfson (the drink was created by Bar Manager Matt Hunter). “The puree adopts the smoky profile from the honey to become a well-rounded sugar component for the cocktail.”

The Okinawa is a cocktail inspired by the Okinawan purple yam. Available at San Francisco’s Bar Iris, the drink balances the earthy sweetness of the yam with the tart brightness of calamansi and the depth of aged rum and kakuto (a Japanese brown sugar spirit).

“Especially around fall/winter, the sweet potato adds a bit of familiarity to our cocktail, reinforcing a lot of the warm baking spice notes we pair along with it for nostalgia,” says Saffron’s Colin Williams, regarding this sweet potato take on a classic cocktail.

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