Sweet Potato Bacon Cakes

Sweet Potato Bacon Cakes - made June 21, 2014, modified from Paleo Leap

I love sweet potatoes. I haven't mastered how to make crisp sweet potato fries yet (mine come out too soft and never crisp enough unless I happened to burn them) but I thought this would be a good variation of a fried potato patty or something like a hash brown.

I'm not big on bacon but it was a nice addition to this for texture. The only issue I had with these is, once the egg was added in, the mixture was too soft and goopy to form into decent patties. It was also hard to turn these over and most of mine fell apart when I tried. I managed to get a couple of them to fry up whole but the others became more like hash than hash brown patties. Still, these were pretty tasty. Probably because I love sweet potatoes in almost any form. Next time I'm going to omit the egg and just try to fry them as mostly sweet potatoes, bacon and green onions and see if they hold up without anything to bind them other than the mashed sweet potatoes.

1 pound sweet potatoes, quartered
4 slices bacon, chopped (I used nitrite-free bacon from Trader Joe's)
3 green onions, sliced thinly
1 egg
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon butter (or use a paleo-friendly oil/fat if you want these to be paleo appropriate)

1. Place the sweet potatoes in a large saucepan. Add cold water to cover and bring to a boil; lower the heat and let simmer until the potatoes are fork tender, about 5 to 8 minutes.
2. Fry the bacon in a skillet over medium-high heat until crispy. Set aside.
3. Mash the potatoes in a large bowl. Shred and add the cooked bacon as well as the green onions and egg. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
4. Form 4-6 patties with the sweet potato mixture.
5. In a large skillet placed over medium-high heat, melt butter. Fry the potato cakes until the outsides are golden and the insides are heated through, about 4 minutes per side.