#4.2: Yam Rice

January 13th, 2025

You remember when your mawmaw asked what you wanted to go with your rice and gravy? And you said, “Potatoes”. And she said, “Two starches!? I don’t think so.” Well now you get that chance. This dish gives you the gravy/sauce-soaking capacity of two starches cooked into one. We know rice and gravy is a classic that works: the gravy from a chicken stew or hamburger steak should be thick enough to stick to, and absorb into, each grain of rice. Same with mashed or smothered potatoes. You may have a side of potatoes on the same plate, but I’ll bet they weren’t cooked together. Yam rice is.

Yam rice is thought to have originated in southern China where yams were a commonly grown staple crop. The yams would be initially cooked with other local ingredients like herbs, mushrooms, and garlic, and then cooked together with the rice as a means of stretching out a meal and providing lots of nutrition and carbohydrates for a hard day’s work. Like so many delicious, humble, and simple foods found around the world, yam rice was born out of necessity and using what you had. Years later when people from southern China immigrated throughout southeast Asia, they brought this dish with them (and many others), particularly to Malaysia and Singapore. Today you can find yam rice throughout the hawker stalls in Singapore and some of the Chinese-Malay restaurants scattered around Malaysia. In Malaysia the most well-known places are Lee Heritage Yam Rice, BM Yam Rice (Michelin Guide), or Zheng Ji Famous Yam Rice. In Singapore, honestly, any yam rice you find at one of the many hawkers throughout the island is probably delicious.

The first time I had this dish and looked down at it, it kind of reminded me of a plate of jambalaya: rice grains that are colored a dark reddish-brown from the cooking process, with bits of other things scattered throughout. Except here those other things weren’t pieces of browned pork, chicken, and/or sausage; they were pieces of sweet potato. By itself it isn’t really world changing. It’s delicious, don’t get me wrong: the earthiness and sweetness from the sweet potatoes is absorbed throughout the rice and provides a nice change of texture from the monotonous rice grains; plus, any aromatics you decide to cook with the yams before adding to the rice (shallots, garlic, dried shrimp, etc), can add a whole new depth of flavors.

But where it really shines is next to a bowl of soup or some other braised meat dish such as braised pork belly (pictured below), bak kut teh (more of that one in a later post), turtle soup, braised or roasted duck, pork offal soup, or braised chicken feet, to name a few. I’ve had it with just about all of those main dishes, and I’ll tell you it’s an amazing accompaniment to all of them. Even the offal soup. Whatever is lacking from the yam rice (saltiness, umami, fat, spice), you can find it in one of those main dishes. I will always be amazed by the balance of all the flavor profiles in southeast Asian cuisine. So many times, eating around this part of the world I’ve said to myself after taking a bite, “How the f**k is this so good?”. The yam rice paired with anything sauce or soup-based that meets those four flavor profiles mentioned above will be delicious. What’s that? Gumbo, you say? Give it a try. Personally, I prefer gumbo with potato salad instead of rice. Blasphemous? Yes. Delicious? Yes.

How ya make it?

This one’s pretty easy, plus you already know how to make rice. Everybody and their momma got their own way to make rice in Louisiana, and I’m not about to preach to the choir. So, whatever you do to make a pot of rice, keep that at the ready because you’ll need it later. What’s different here is that you cook down all your aromatics and non-potato ingredients first, add the potatoes, then add that to the rice. Those “non-potato ingredients” could be anything you want, just keep in mind that these will set the shape of the flavors of the final product. I like shallot (or red onion), garlic, green onion, a little ginger, soy sauce, and sesame oil. Traditionally, dried shrimp and dried mushrooms are added at this point. You could even use ground meat (I’d recommend pork).

To get started you wanna cut up your sweet potatoes in equal sized cubes, about half an inch square. Make sure these are all around the same size so they cook evenly, and that they are not too big so that they cook in the same amount of time as the rice. How much sweet potato you use is up to you. I like a smaller potato/rice ratio, where there are fewer bits of potato throughout the cooked rice, rather than a blob of mashed potato with some rice in it. If in doubt, go for less potato. For 2 cups of uncooked rice, I’d probably try to use around 10 ounces of potato.

Next chop up all your aromatics so that they’re small enough to cook down during the rice cooking process. If you’re using ground meat sauté this first to get all those good brown gremees stuck to the bottom of the pan. Once the meat is cooked through, add the chopped aromatics, a bit of soy sauce and sesame oil (light on this oil; a little goes a long way). Season with salt and pepper to taste (a little salty here is ok, the rice/potatoes will absorb some). There’s another type of soy sauce called sweet or dark soy sauce that, when cooked down, adds a nice caramelization from the sugars. They probably got that Walmart. If not, don’t worry about it. You can add a pinch of sugar. Now cook all this until all of the liquid is evaporated and the vegetables are soft.

At this point add the sautéed mixture to the uncooked rice, mix thoroughly, and add the same amount of liquid that you would normally use to cook regular rice. I usually go for a bit more than a cup of liquid to a cup of rice. Cook normally, and once done fluff with a fork, and let steam for about 5 minutes before serving.

Now I know it don’t look too good based on the pictures, but it’s sweet potato and rice cooked together. How’s it supposed to look? Looks aside, the only supposedta is that it’s supposed to be a side dish to something warm and saucy/soupy. Next time you make a shrimp stew or you finally roast that deer neck that’s been sitting in your freezer, give this one a try as a side.

Allons manger!