top of page
Writer's pictureskinnycooktla

Salted Caramel Yams

My Grandma, and her oldest daughter, Aunt Pat, were amazing cooks. But they both had a terrible habit of not writing anything down! At some point, in my early 30s, I realized I had better watch how they made my favorite dishes and learn how to make them. Naively, I thought I would remember what I saw and failed to write down many of the "simple" recipes. My memory has failed me in the nuances of some of these dishes.


Fortunately, I mastered Aunt Pat's Salted Caramel Yams that she made for Thanksgiving Dinners (she did not call them that--she only called them "My Yams"). Just for you, my few dear followers, I got up this morning and made Before-Thanksgiving Yams, so I could figure out an actual recipe (until today, I made them just like Aunt Pat...a little of this and a little of that)...

Salted Caramel Yams


Aprox. 6 Cups cooked yams, peeled and cut into chunks.

1/3 Cup butter

1 Cup brown sugar

1/2 Cup maple syrup

1 tsp salt

1/2 Cup heavy Cream

I have found that baked yams taste better than boiled yams, and boiled yams taste better than canned yams.

But yams in any cooked form will do.



Gather all your ingredients together, as this happens fast and requires you to stir constantly.




In a large, deep pan, melt the butter, syrup and sugar. Cooking at medium heat, bring this to a boil, add the salt.






Keep stirring until it begins to thicken (about 5 minutes). The sauce will begin to pull away from the pan a bit as you stir and you will know that this is thick enough.

Remove from the heat.




It won't take but a few seconds, after you remove the sauce from the heat, for it to stop boiling. Slowly add the cream with one hand and stir with the other. You do not want to add the cream to the boiling sugar, as it will curdle!

*Right here, if you want caramel sauce for ice cream, set this aside to cool and put into a glass jar--very yummy!!


Now add your pieces of yams a few at at a time and gently fold into the sauce.




I kind of chop the large pieces up. Some will turn mushy, some will maintain their form. This is how it should be.






As the yams still need to be heated, I usually put them into a glass baking dish and heat them in the oven at 350 for about 30 minutes.


I cannot begin to tell you how good these are...let me just say that I never liked sweetened yams until I tasted these!



Oh! And do not throw out your turkey carcass! The day after Thanksgiving, I will post the recipe for yummy Turkey Noodle Soup! Stay tuned...

14 views1 comment

Recent Posts

See All

1 Comment


Tiffany Begley
Tiffany Begley
Nov 21, 2023

Thank you!! It's so hard to cook with 'Grandma' measurements 😅.

Like
bottom of page