I Yam What I Yam

The first official cartoon in the Popeye the Sailor series, I Yam What I Yam, was released by Paramount Pictures in 1933. Around that same time a campaign began which promoted the development of orange-fleshed varieties of sweet potatoes and marketed them as "yams" to distinguish them from drier, standard sweet potatoes. The campaign worked so well that confusion about yams has persisted.

True yams are a starchy tuber that is a staple crop in many parts of the tropics. They can grow to 100 pounds and more. Yams are seldom grown or seen in the United States. The vegetables generally sold as yams in supermarkets here are moist, orange-fleshed sweet potatoes, such as the red-skinned Garnet and the brown-skinned Jewel. They contrast with other types that tend to be drier and slightly less sugary, with either yellow, white, or purple flesh. But they are all, in fact, sweet potatoes.

To cause further confusion, the sweet potato isn't a potato at all. It is a member of the morning glory family. This explains why Washington, a major U.S. potato producer, doesn't produce sweet potatoes. In fact, North Carolina is the largest sweet potato producer in the country.

No matter what they're called, there's no disputing the appeal of sweet potatoes, especially this time of year. They've become a year-round staple of many pub menus in the fried form but are more likely to be seen during winter, baked into a pie and accompanied with marshmallows. Sweet potatoes are also used in savory applications where one would normally use standard potatoes such as soups, gratins, and gnocchi. In Korean cuisine, sweet potato starch is used to produce noodles. In Japan, the alcoholic beverage shochu is a sometimes distilled from sweet potatoes. We recommend heading to your nearest Asian grocery store and purchasing some okinawan sweet potatoes. Their deep purple color would make a striking contrast to the typical orange pies you see this time of year.