Where to purchase yams

So where did all of the confusion come from? A true yam is a starchy edible root of the Dioscorea genus, and is generally imported to America from the Caribbean. It is rough and scaly and very low in beta carotene. Depending on the variety, sweetpotato flesh can vary from white to orange and even purple. The orange-fleshed variety was introduced to the United States several decades ago. Today the U. Think you know the differences between yams and sweetpotatoes? Take our quiz and test your root knowledge!

Sweetpotatoes are almost always sweeter than yams. They have versatile flavor easily altered by cooking methods. Starchier and more potato-like, usually not very sweet. Versatile; flavor easily altered by cooking methods. Yams are a rough-skinned, starchy veggie with pale flesh, while sweet potatoes are smaller and tapered with smooth skin.

Yams are commonly cultivated and consumed in parts of Africa, South America, Asia, and the Caribbean. There's a very good chance that if you're buying "yams" at an American grocery store, they are actually sweet potatoes. This includes canned yams and candied yams, which are all made from sweet potatoes. Even though they are completely different vegetables, yams and sweet potatoes get lumped together because of bad marketing. The confusion all started when the orange-fleshed variety of sweet potatoes was introduced to the United States in the s.

Enslaved Africans in the United States were already referring to existing sweet potatoes as yams because of their resemblance to the African staple crop, and the name stuck. Unless you shop at a grocery store with an impressive international produce department or are visiting an African or Caribbean market, you likely won't come across true yams in the US.

They are considered a specialty item and don't typically make it into a standard American produce section. If you see a vegetable or canned good labeled as a yam, it is most likely a sweet potato.

Like sweet potatoes, a number of yam varieties are cultivated, some reaching several feet long. Sweet potatoes, despite their name, are not closely related to regular potatoes.

There are a number of varieties of the root vegetable, but the most well-known in America are orange-fleshed varieties that are frequently labeled as yams. Sweet potatoes and yams are two very different vegetables, but because of some incorrect marketing in the s, sweet potatoes are frequently referred to as yams.

Yams are a staple crop in Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean and are not commonly found in America. Sweet potato flesh comes in a variety of colors, including the orange that is often mistaken for yams. If you encounter vegetables labeled as yams in your local grocery store, chances are they're the orange-fleshed variety of sweet potatoes.