Sweet Potato Black Bean Burritos with Avocado Cream

First recipe! Woot! This also happens to be one of my favorites and one of the first I altered to make it vegan. Totally easy. Taking a recipe you already love and just tweaking it a bit might be the best way ease into being vegan or maybe just because you can't handle dairy (like me) or want to cut back on meat. Who knows? It's good to know there are options out there. : )

So! In this case, I just took the original recipe, adapted it for my taste, and used dairy substitutions to make this yumminess happen.

Sweet Potato Black Bean Burritos with Avocado Cream

adapted from Cookie + Kate

Ingredients

Burritos

• 1 medium sweet potato
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon paprika 
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne
• sea salt and black pepper
• 4 to 6 tortillas
• 1 jar Roasted Red Peppers (I used already sliced only needed about half the jar)
• 1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
• 1+ cup shredded non-dairy cheese (I used Daiya Pepper Jack)

Avocado Cream

•  1 ripe avocado
• 1/2 cup mild salsa, jarred
• 1 garlic clove, roughly chopped
• 1 to 2 teaspoons fresh jalapeño, deseeded and roughly chopped (I used jarred slices, actually)
• 1 lime, juiced
• 1 tablespoon packed cilantro leaves (I didn't have fresh so I used dried)
• up to 2 tablespoons water, to thin as necessary
• sea salt, to taste 

Toppings

• 1 1/2 cups chopped romaine lettuce
• 1 small onion, finely chopped (optional)
• finely chopped jalapeño (optional)
• non-dairy sour cream (Tofutti brand is awesome)
• salsa

For the burritos, Preheat the oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit. Wash and peel the sweet potato. Chop them into large, bite-sized chunks. Toss the sweet potatoes in a bowl and coat with the olive oil, cumin, paprika, cayenne pepper and salt and pepper. Pour the sweet potatoes onto a large baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Arrange the sweet potatoes evenly in a single layer. Bake for about 45 minutes, flipping the sweet potato chunks halfway, until they are golden brown around the edges.

Make the avocado sauce: in a food processor or a good blender (I actually just used my Magic Bullet blender since I have neither of those things), combine the avocado flesh, salsa, garlic, jalapeño (skip this if your salsa is spicy) and lime juice. Blend. Add the cilantro and blend again. Add water to thin out the sauce if you want; the sauce should glop easily off a spoon. Taste and blend in some sea salt or add another squeeze of lime if necessary. 

Make sure the oven is still on at 450 degrees Fahrenheit. Place your tortillas on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. In the middle of each tortilla, put down a couple strips of roasted red pepper, then pour black beans down the center and top it all with roasted sweet potato chunks. Sprinkle 1/4 cup or more of jack cheese on top. Pull one edge of the tortilla over to the center of the burrito, then pull the opposite edge over to overlap a bit. Gently roll the burrito over. Repeat with remaining burritos. Bake your burritos for about 5 minutes on the middle rack, until the cheese is melted and the tortillas are lightly crisp. I usually get 4 burritos if I'm using 8" tortillas or 6 from 6" tortillas. Either works. 

Transfer a burrito or two onto a plate and spread avocado cream on the top. Garnish with onion, sour cream, lettuce, salsa, or whatever else you have or sounds good. Dig in!! 

These burritos also reheat in the oven incredibly well as long as they don't have the avocado cream or garnishes on it yet. 

If you try this recipe, let me know how you liked it! Comments always welcome.