ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times

DATE: Wednesday, February 5, 1997            TAG: 9702050050
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 8    EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: ALMENA HUGHES FOOD EDITOR

HOW SWEET IT IS - HEALTHFUL, TASTY AND INEXPENSIVE. COULD THE SWEET POTATO BE THE PERFECT FOOD?

During February, when special attention is paid to outstanding achievements by black people, George Washington Carver is frequently included among those whose contributions have affected food.

Carver, most often credited with demonstrating the importance of peanuts, should also be heralded for his work with sweet potatoes, from which he developed 118 products. The resourceful scientist used all parts of the plant, including its leaves as a vegetable.

"They're sort of like arugula without the spiciness - slightly sweet," said North Carolina Sweetpotato Commission spokeswoman Marianne Langan. "They're lighter in taste than many green vegetables and soft like lamb's lettuce."

Langan said she tried the leaves when a friend, who grows sweet potatoes, salvaged them from her crop. Private growers are probably the only source to get the leaves, Langan said, because they are not usually sold with the potatoes in super markets or farmers' markets.

Finding growers in Southwest Virginia is particularly a challenge because most of the state's commercial crops are grown in the sandy soil of Virginia's Eastern Shore.

J. William Mapp, regional marketing manager of the Virginia Department of Agriculture and program director of the Virginia Sweet Potato Board, said that during the 1960s, Virginia was the third-largest sweet-potato producing state after North Carolina and Louisiana. However, it is no longer among the majors. Its farmers now produce only about 1,000 commercial acres per year, with about half of that amount

being processed into products such as Mrs. Paul's frozen sweet potatoes or Campbell's soups.

During its production heyday, Virginia grew both sweet potatoes and yams, said Roanoke City extension agent John Arbogast. Sweet potatoes are moister and suitable for candying; yams are drier and better for baking. However, no Virginia farmers grow the dry variety any more.

Additionally, the term "yams" is really more of a marketing tool, Mapp said. "Technically, a yam is a tropical root plant that is not even available in the United States."

Still, people sometimes use the terms - and the potatoes, if they can find them - interchangeably, as in the following recipe for Apricot-Yam Loaf from dessert expert Alice Medrich's "Chocolate and the Art of Low-Fat Desserts" (Warner Books).

If you're lucky enough to run across some sweet-potato leaves, Langan said, they can be prepared much as you would prepare spinach - preferably cooked quickly with little water. Langan's friend cooked her leaves in a stir fry.

Even without their leaves, though, you - like George Washington Carver - will find that sweet potatoes taste good, are rich in vitamins A and C and high in potassium, low in sodium and fat free. They lend themselves to many uses. For example, in 1896, when Carver was appointed head of the newly established Agricultural Department at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, he demonstrated the value of soil regeneration by planting sweet potatoes as the rotation crop for cotton.

As early as 1918, Carver promoted the use of dehydrated foods, touting them as space- and weight-efficient. Following his advice, during the 1940s, several companies produced dehydrated cooked sweet potatoes.

During World War II, when scientists were asked to help in achieving good nutrition economically, Carver showed how a well-balanced and effective - though possibly boring - diet could be achieved with meals limited to peanuts and sweet potatoes.

In 1918, when supplies of wheat flour were strained by the sinking of supply ships, the United States Department of Agriculture used sweet potato flour to stretch wheat flour in baked goods.

A suitable syrup for baking, similar to corn syrup but lower in cost, can also be manufactured from the sweet potato.

Carver made a fake egg yolk from a Puerto Rican sweet potato. He also concocted tapioca, a breakfast food, a gingery-tasting delicacy, a vinegar and a domestic alcohol.

The most popular way of serving sweet potatoes is simply to bake them. Then, consider one of these ideas as a topper:

*butter and cinnamon sugar

*warm nacho cheese topping

*salsa and crumbled corn chips

*heated packaged onion and roasted garlic gravy

*packaged crushed cran-fruit sauce for chicken

*packaged sweet-and-sour sauce

*mandarin oranges blended with crushed pineapple

*cinnamon flavored applesauce

*chopped broccoli and warm cheese sauce

*warm mincemeat

*warm honey and chopped pecans

*whole berry cranberry sauce and toasted sliced almonds

*garlic and rosemary sauteed in light olive oil

*vanilla flavored yogurt and cinnamon sugar

For more inventive ways to use sweet potatoes, send a self-addressed stamped envelope to: North Carolina Sweetpotato Commission PK, 1327 Brightleaf Blvd., Suite H, Smithfield, N.C. 27577.

Recipes for:

APRICOT YAM LOAF

SCALLOPED SWEETS 'N FRUITS

COCONUT CRUSTED SWEET POTATO PIE

SWEET POTATO POLENTA

LENGTH: Long  :  103 lines
ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO:  1. (headshot) Carver. 2. STEPHANIE KLEIN-DAVIS/Staff. 
          Granny Smith apples, cranberries and spices turn sweet potatoes into
          Scalloped Sweets 'N Fruits, which you can saute in about 5 minutes. 
          color.