Ember-Roasted Sweet Potatoes With Aged Feta Recipe
Cooked in hot coals until fluffy on the inside and charred on the outside, these sweet potatoes need little adornment—honey, briny feta, and chile flakes or hot sauce—to become a smoky, satisfying fireside treat. “When you cook with fire, you don’t want raging flames.
“When you cook with fire, you don’t want raging flames. You want well-controlled embers,”
You want well-controlled embers,” says chef Scott Clark, of Dad's Luncheonette, so be sure to let your fire die down before burying the potatoes. If you don’t have access to a fire, roast the foil-wrapped sweet potatoes in an oven at 425°F for 50-60 minutes for a similar result.
Photos and recipes excerpted from Coastal: 130 Recipes From a California Road Trip by Scott Clark with Betsy Andrews © 2025. Published by Chronicle Books.
Photography © Cheyenne Ellis. Featured in “Building the Ultimate Picnic Spread on the California Coast” by Scott Clark as told to Betsy Andrews in the Spring/Summer 2025 issue.
See more recipes and stories from Issue 204.
Ingredients
- 4 medium sweet potatoes, scrubbed, ends trimmed
- ¼ cup ghee (clarified butter), divided
- 1 Tbsp. plus 1 tsp. kosher salt, divided
- 6 oz. feta, crumbled (½ cup)
- Honey and crushed red chile flakes or hot sauce, for serving
Instructions
- Build a large fire in a firepit or a charcoal grill and let it burn down to glowing embers.
- Rub each potato with 1 tablespoon of the ghee and 1 teaspoon of the salt and wrap tightly in foil. Break up the embers with a fireplace shovel, then bury the potatoes, seam-side up, completely in the embers. Cook until the potatoes are soft in the center when pierced through the foil with a fork, 45–90 minutes. (Cook time will vary depending on the size and shape of the potatoes and how hot the embers are.)
- Remove the potatoes from the fire and carefully unwrap them. Halve the potatoes and top generously with feta, honey, and chile flakes or hot sauce.
- Who: Scott Clark · Cheyenne Ellis · Betsy Andrews · Courtesy Chronicle Books
