OVEREVIEW
Sometimes the sauce makes the dish, and when you find a great one, it is worth having different preparations for the different seasons. We are evoking the spirit of tahini (one of our favourite sauces) with this, but making it with almonds in their skins, which brings a great nuttiness. We serve this with peaches in summer, pears in autumn and sweet potatoes in winter. Spring is reserved for green vegetables and they don’t really work with this almond tahini, so we make a special, luxurious pistachio version instead to drizzle over grilled spring greens, dressed with lots of lime juice.
Make the almond tahini
Pour the boiling water over the almonds and set aside for 20–30 minutes. Drain and place the nuts in a food processor. Blitz to a very fine crumb, then add the garlic clove and continue blitzing as you pour in the oil. Pulse in the sprinkling of sea salt and the vinegar, then finally add the cold water, continuing to mix until everything is well-combined. Taste, and adjust the seasoning as necessary.
It may seem a little runny now but the sauce will thicken as it settles. You may even need to add a touch more water and salt to loosen it just before serving.
Dirty cook the sweet potatoes
Set up your EGG for dirty cooking with no surfaces installed. The target temperature is 200˚C.
Wash the skin of the sweet potatoes really well and wrap each one in aluminium foil so that it is fully covered. Place the foil parcels directly on the coals. They will take about 45–60 minutes to bake and soften, depending on their size, and it is worth turning them every 10–15 minutes.
You can tell they are ready when the tip of a knife or a skewer can easily penetrate the whole way through. Pull the hot packages out of the embers and leave to cool for a few minutes until you can easily unwrap them.
Assemble the dish
When ready to serve, slit the still-warm sweet potatoes along their tops and push the sides out to reveal the soft inner flesh. Sprinkle with sea salt, spoon in a couple of dollops of almond tahini and top with the chopped smoked almonds. Drizzle generously with date molasses before serving.
Recipe from Honey & Co Chasing Smoke by Sarit Packer & Itamar Srulovich (Pavilion Books) Images by Patricia Niven.
