I love, love, love the color on these Purple Sweet Potato Biscuits! Back in early March, I picked up a bag of purple sweet potatoes not knowing what I was going to use them for. I love all things purple (maybe even slightly obsessed?), and wanted to find more ways to bake with them.
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I’ve already made Purple Sweet Potato Muffins and Purple Sweet Potato Rolls. Both are great recipes, but for some reason these Purple Sweet Potato Biscuits have really stood out. I love the color the sweet potatoes gives to these biscuits. There’s no food coloring, it’s all natural in color!
Luckily Tim was able to pick up a few more bags of purple sweet potatoes for me, but I am now getting to the last of them. I’m going to have to find some more! Anyone know where I can get some?
Confession time, I’ve made these Purple Sweet Potato Biscuits a bunch of times but haven’t gotten around to sharing the recipe. I know, I know. I feel a little selfish for keeping this recipe all to myself, but at least I’m sharing it now, right?
These biscuits come out crisp on the outside and soft and buttery on the inside. They have a slight hint of sweetness from the sweet potatoes for the perfect balance.
You could easily swap out regular sweet potatoes for the purple sweet potatoes. They won’t be the same color, but they would still be delicious!
Serving Suggestions
These Purple Sweet Potato Biscuits are great out of the oven topped with a little butter and jam. We have been using my Strawberry Lemon Freezer Jam, but you can use what ever kind of jam you like.
Tim has also informed me that these biscuits make good breakfast sandwiches in the morning. I also have a recipe coming up using these biscuits in a trifle so stay tuned for that!
Any leftover Purple Sweet Potato Biscuits can be reheated in the oven or air fryer. We really like to reheat in our air fryer as it give the biscuits a nice crunchy exterior, which contrasts perfectly with the soft inside.
What’s your favorite way to enjoy biscuits?
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Purple Sweet Potato Biscuits
Ingredients
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- 1 tbsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter, cold and cubed
- 1 cup mashed purple sweet potato (about 1 medium), chilled
- 1/2 cup sweet potato boiling liquid, see notes
Instructions
Mashed Sweet Potatoes
- Peel and chop your sweet potato into small-medium sized pieces. Place in a medium sauce pan and add enough water to cover.
- Bring to a boil, cover, and reduce to a simmer. Cook the potatoes until they are fork tender, about 7-10 minutes.
- Drain the liquid from the sweet potatoes into a bowl and set aside. Mash the sweet potatoes with a potato masher and set aside to cool. Once cool, put the mashed sweet potato and boiling liquid into the fridge to chill.
- I like to make my mashed sweet potato the night before so it can chill it overnight in the fridge. If you don't want to make it ahead of time, I would chill the mashed sweet potatoes for at least 30 minutes.
Making the Biscuits
- Line a large sheet pan with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Add the cubed butter and using a pasty cutter, cut the butter into the flour mixture until it resembles pea sized pieces.
- Add the mashed purple sweet potato and 1/4 cup sweet potato boiling liquid to your flour mixture. Stir with a rubber spatula or wooden spoon then slowly add the remaining 1/4 cup. You may not need all of the liquid depending on how much moisture your potatoes sweet have. Your dough should just come together. It is easier to add more liquid than adding more flour.
- Lightly flour a cutting board or piece of parchment paper. Pour the biscuit mixture onto your floured surface. Gently knead if there are pockets of flour that did not get incorporated.
- Pat your biscuit dough into a rectangle about 1 inch thick. Starting on the long end, using your hands or a bench scraper, fold the dough on itself to the middle. Fold the other end of the dough onto itself to the middle. You are essentially folding the dough like you would a letter. (See my video above if you want to see how I folded the dough.)
- Pat the dough out to a rectangle and repeat the folding. You will fold the dough a total of three times.
- After your final fold, pat out the dough into a rectangle, about 1 inch thick. Using your bench scraper or knife, cut into twelve pieces. If you want larger biscuits, cut your dough into eight pieces.
- Place the biscuits on your prepared sheet pan, making sure to space them out so they don't bake into each other.
- Chill the biscuits for 30 minutes.
- Preheat your oven to 450°F.°
- Bake the chilled biscuits for 15 minutes or until golden brown.
Notes
- If you don’t want to use your sweet potato boiling liquid, you can replace it with buttermilk but you will not get the same purple color.
- The biscuit dough freezes well so I will usually make a double batch and freeze some for later. Place the sweet potato biscuits onto a plastic or parchment lined sheet pan. Freeze until frozen solid and then store in a freezer bag. I like to write the baking instructions on the freezer bag so I don’t have to find the recipe when I want to bake the biscuits. I bake the frozen biscuits at 400ºF for 18-20 minutes or until golden brown.
- I have air fried the frozen biscuit dough and it turns out really well. I bake at 390ºF turning occasionally until golden brown on both sides.
These are lovely! But oh are they moldy looking haha! I had to google this because I left the dough in the fridge for a few hours and the color after that was quite surprising. None the less, they tasted great, especially with a little butter and cinnamon sugar on top 🙂
I’m so glad that you enjoyed these Whitney! I find that if I use purple yams instead of purple sweet potatoes, the color is not as purple.