Every now and then you come across an ingredient that you fall head-over-heels in love with, you cook everything imaginable with it and spend hours dreaming about how to get just one more recipe out of it. For us, that ingredient is murasaki imo, or purple sweet potato. Similar to the pale yellow or white fleshed sweet potatoes usually favoured by the Japanese, these purple potatoes have more dry matter than the orange fleshed American variety, and a much stronger taste. A rich, fruity, almost winey flavour, an otherworldly, deep purple colour and the added bonus that they are packed full of vitamins make them a winner in our books for savoury dishes or desserts.
Japanese meals do not traditionally have a dessert course or end with something sweet. The time for a sweet treat is at around either 10am or 3pm, as a contrasting flavour to go with the slightly bitter green tea that workers would normally stop for. The confections served with tea vary from moulded higashi of sugar and rice flour to fresh fruits, and from jelly-like warabi mochi made from bracken starch to small French style cakes and tarts such as this Okinawan creation. Murasaki imo is mashed, enriched with cream, butter and sugar then piped into crisp pastry cases, just enough for three or four bites before you get back to work.
kakuni 