Turkey Taco-Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

Turkey Taco-Stuffed Sweet Potatoes - made February 10, 2019 from Cookin Canuck

This is another easy recipe to make and has the added advantage of being healthy-ish. You can omit the cheese at the end if you want dairy-free. I like recipes like this because they're easy for a non-cook like me to make and I like the base ingredients of sweet potato and ground turkey. I'm less of a fan of tomatoes but can eat them mixed into something, as in this case. Plus, bonus, it uses up some of my Penzey's spices.

My only trouble spot (you know there had to be one), is I didn't cook the sweet potatoes long enough. The original directions said to microwave them for 4-5 minutes. I tried that but they were still hard as rocks. So I ended up boiling them until they were mostly tender. I say mostly because I was afraid of boiling them too much and having them end up mushy, in which case, they would've fallen apart when I tried to scoop out the sweet potato and still leave the skins.

You can't actually scoop out all of the sweet potatoes and just leave skin as the skins would fall apart without any sweet potato to hold them together. So I carefully cut the insides out but left some sweet potato around the rim. That mostly worked. But the inner sweet potato was still a bit too firm so I ended up mashing them, pan frying them then baking them a little longer. But hey, other than that (ha), these turned out pretty well. Like I said, pretty healthy, at least compared to some of the other stuff I eat.

2 medium-sized sweet potatoes, cooked whole (can be boiled, microwaved or baked)
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin, divided
1/4 + 1/8 teaspoon salt
1/4 + 1/8 teaspoon ground pepper
3/4 pound lean ground turkey
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1 1/4 cup canned crushed tomatoes
1/4 cup grated cheese (I used cheddar)
2 tablespoons minced flat-leaf parsley

1. Cut cooked sweet potatoes in half, length-wise. Carefully scoop the flesh out of the potatoes, leaving a thin layer around the edges. With the back of a fork, mash the potato flesh until most lumps are gone. Stir in the olive oil, 1/2 teaspoon cumin, 1/4 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Divide the mashed sweet potatoes evenly between the potato skins. Place on a baking sheet.
2. Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Lightly coat with nonstick cooking spray. Add ground turkey and cook, breaking up with a wooden spoon until cooked through. Stir in the garlic, chili powder, remaining 3/4 teaspoon cumin, oregano, paprika and remaining 1/4 teaspoons of salt and pepper. Cook for 1 minute. Stir in the crushed tomatoes.
3. Preheat the broiler. Spoon the turkey mixture into each sweet potato skin. Top each with 1 tablespoon grated cheese. Broil until the cheese is melted, about 30 seconds. Garnish with parsley.