
Sweet potato puran poli (sakkaravalli kizhangu poli) is made with cooked mashed sweet potato along with jaggery and coconut as main ingredients. This taste very similar to the puran poli or paruppu poli we make that I have already posted. Check out the paruppu poli recipe. Sweet potato poli is really healthy with all those fibre along with its goodness. This will be a great snack for your kids. Make it with regular atta or whole wheat flour to make it even more healthy. When I got sweet potato for thiruvathirai, me and my MIL were discussing what can be done with sweet potato. In my childhood days, during the tamil month of margazhi or when ever we feel like, we used to boil water (Hot water for bath) in our own backyard with all the dried parts from coconut tree. The coconut fibre (thenga mattai), coconut shell (thenga oadu), coconut leaves (thennai mattai/ olai) are used as fuel for our stove 🙂.
Each one has its own way of burning. To start the stove, quick and easy to catch coconut leaves, then the fibre, which holds the heat steady but extremely smoky which makes our eyes burn, coconut shell burns well as well as holds heat for some time. It will be quite an adventure everyday to make our own hot water for our bath 😆.
Why I said such long story? I am coming to the point, in that fire, we sometimes throw in this sweet potato and it gets toasted well. The cooked sweet potato with smoky flavour will be amazing to eat. We do the same with tapioca and corn at times. I made sweet potato poriyal, sambar and now this sweet potato poli and yet I have one more to finish 😯. I guess I will use it up for my pongal kootu.

Sweet potato poli recipe
Recipe Cuisine: Indian | Recipe Category: Sweet
Prep Time: 3 Hr Dough resting time | Cook time: 30 mins | Makes: 12
Prep Time: 3 Hr Dough resting time | Cook time: 30 mins | Makes: 12
Ingredients
For dough
All purpose flour/ Maida – 1 cup
Turmeric – A pinch (optional)
Ghee or oil – 2 tbsp + 2 tbsp
Salt – As needed
Turmeric – A pinch (optional)
Ghee or oil – 2 tbsp + 2 tbsp
Salt – As needed
Method
- First prepare dough prior atleast 1 hr to 3 hrs before making poli. In a mixing bowl add flour, salt, turmeric, ghee or oil and required water.
- Knead well to make a loose dough. Add 2 tbsp oil over it and keep aside for minimum 3 – 4 hrs.
- Mean while you can prepare the puran / stuffing. Keep sweet potato in a container, inside pressure cooker. You can add little water as usual in the pressure cooker, but no need to add water to sweet potato. Idea is to steam it. You can add water and cook, but it could retain water and take bit longer to get puran done. So I opted steaming without water. Pressure cook for 4-5 whistles.
- Peel the skin once cold and mash it well without any lumps.
- Melt jaggery with little water just to immerse it. Filter it to remove any impurities.
- Add it to the sweet potato and heat over medium flame. Mix well.
- Once mixed, add grated coconut and cardamom. Keep stirring until it becomes thick.
- On cooling, it gets non sticky. So switch off accordingly. Once cold enough to handle, roll into equal sized balls.
- After 5 hrs, the oil or ghee would have slightly oozed out. Knead again to make it smooth and pliable. Divide into equal lemon sized balls.
- Flatten the rolled dough into thick disc. Keep the stuffing inside and cover it with the dough.
- Seal and flatten to thin polis. Oil will be oozing from the dough, so you may not need any oil for greasing, if needed use accordingly. You can check the video for better understanding.
- Carefully transfer to hot tawa and cook over medium flame. Drizzle sesame oil or ghee.
- Cook by gently pressing the poli with ladle so that golden spots appear. Repeat to finish and stack the poli.
Notes
- The mashed sweet potato I took gave exactly one cup, when mashed. So use this a guidance.
- Since we use oil, you may be getting a non sticky dough with little water itself, but make sure to add more water to make a loose dough, not a dough like the regular chapati dough, this should be really soft and loose to handle.
- You can use sesame oil as vegan option for ghee.
- You can use half maida, half wheat flour too.
- You can use more coconut or less, but increase or decrease jaggery as needed.
- You can use sugar instead of jaggery.
Stack the polis to make it soft and serve. Both hot or at room temperature, it tastes great. No one will realize it is made out of sweet potato.
Thank you for this lovely recipe!!
I found better way to use sweet potato raks… thanks a lot for sharing this post…
Wow..super yummy poli..
Hi, did you knead again with the oozed out oil in step 9?
Innovative share. Poli with sweet potato is just awesome.
Yes we should knead with that oozed out oil
This comment has been removed by the author.
Raks, I tried it and came out perfect . Your way of presentation is very brilliant and I love all your recipes.
I had tough time making this. First is sweet potato became gooey. I dont know whether it is because of nature of sweet potato or I heated for less time. Second outer maida. I didnt knead properly and had to add more oil. Still didnt get right consistency. Again I repeated whole process exactly in the way u mentioned. Came out perfect. Thanx.
Hi Raje, Thanks for all your posts, you make awesome cooking with simple steps and easy method, i have been using your website as reference for mor ethan 2 years now and your website is really helpful for those who learn cooking newly after marriage, the cooking all i know today is from your posts 🙂 Made this sweet poli too and came out really nice!! Thanks for your posts.. Today i do confident cooking just because of you.. THANK YOU.
Hi Rajee, I have been referring your website for about 2 years now and its really helpful for someone who started learning cooking after marriage. Your way of cooking is simple yet delicious, you use simple ingredients and make awesome receipies. Tried this sweet poli and it came out really well. All the cooking i know today is all from your posts!! Thank you.
I tried n my children liked it a lot.. Very different one… Thanks a lot
The recipe s great. I'm gonna try today. Actually I'm searching for ceramic cookware.. Which brand s ur pan in the pic n is it lasting long?
This is my first pan and it's GreenLife brand ceramic pan
Thank you
Thanks for the feedback.
Thanks a lot
Thank you
Nice recipe. could you please let me know if leftovers of the poli can be kept in the fridge?
Hi Raks, can we not add coconut gratings?
Sure, later, to serve, you can steam it in idlipot to reheat it.