There are many varieties of sweet potatoes with skin colors that can range from white to yellow, red, purple or brown. When you cut a raw potato, the flesh is exposed to air for the first time and rapidly begins to darken – apples do something similar. "The greenish colour can be due to a natural occurrence, when the water soluble pigments in the cooked sweet potatoes are exposed to air," AVA said. Raw Potatoes. Potato skins and fruit peels are the natural ways oxygen is blocked from reaching this enzyme. Sweet potato contains vitamin A and other healthy nutrients Reasons Potatoes Turn Black After Cooking: Potatoes occasionally turn gray or dark after they are boiled; this color change may be caused by the conditions under which they were grown or stored. There's no disadvantage to eating sweet potatoes unless you're prone to kidney stones from oxalates. Sweet potatoes require loose, well-drained soil and about 100 very warm days. According to the 2016 findings, if you want sweet potatoes with the lowest GI, you should basically do anything but bake them. There is an enzyme reaction that has to take place to keep the potatoes from turning black. How to eat sweet potatoes before they go bad. Salted water help dissolve the starch preventing bruising. The dark color doesn’t affect the eating quality or taste, but it doesn’t look very appealing.  How about sweet potato pancakes or sweet potato and ginger soup or sweet potato and black bean enchiladas? Freeze cut, cooked sweet potatoes in a resealable bag for up to 1 year. Starch from the potato will blacken/bruised when exposed to air. Get this: In their own skins, sweet potatoes cook up to only 103 calories a pop. Simply place the sweet potatoes into a bag, squeeze out the excess air, and pop the bag into the freezer. Why do potatoes turn black after cooking? Sweet potatoes are usually grown from slips started from roots (to start your own add another 40 days). Potatoes, along with apples, pears, bananas, and peaches, contain an enzyme that, when exposed to oxygen, reacts to produce discoloration on the surface of the potato or fruit. Why Potatoes Turn Gray . Sweet potatoes are a dicot (double embryonic seed leaf) plant from the morning glory family. Why Do Sweet Potatoes Go Brown? Once they are removed, oxidation begins. Immediately put the peeled potato into the water. Don’t run off, however, and eat a bunch of sweet potatoes raw. When you cut a vegetable, the enzymes in the cells (Polyphenol Oxidase, in case you were wondering), reacts with the oxygen in the air and the flesh turns dark.It is believed that these enzymes can help some plants to be more resistant to pests, so it has a function beyond irritating you when you open the fridge to a browning half sweet potato! If your knife contains iron, it can also make potatoes darken. Set sweet potato starts into the garden about the same time you set out tomato transplants in spring. 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