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Crispy Baked Sweet Potato Chips

Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 25 minutes
Total Time 40 minutes
Servings 4 servings

Ingredients

For the Chips

  • 2 medium sweet potatoes about 1 ¼ pounds total, long and slim, scrubbed with skin on
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil or avocado oil
  • 1 teaspoon cornstarch optional, for a crisper finish
  • ¾ teaspoon fine sea salt for after baking

Optional Seasoning

  • ½ teaspoon smoked paprika optional
  • ¼ teaspoon garlic powder optional
  • ¼ teaspoon black pepper optional, coarsely ground

Instructions

Slice and Prep

  • Scrub the sweet potatoes and dry them, leaving the skins on. Slice on a mandoline at 1/16 to ⅛ inch, guard on, straight into a large bowl of cold water. Uniform thickness matters more than the exact setting.
  • Soak the slices 20 minutes to pull out surface starch, then drain.
  • Spread the slices on towels and press a second towel firmly on top. Both faces must be dry to the touch before they go in the oven.
  • Toss the dry slices with the olive oil and the cornstarch if using, until every round carries a thin sheen and none are sitting in a puddle. Do not salt yet.

Bake the Chips

  • Heat the oven to 375F. Lay the slices in a single layer on parchment-lined sheet pans with space around each one and no overlap. Bake one tray at a time on the middle rack.
  • Bake 18 to 25 minutes, flipping each round at the 12 minute mark. The edges curl and darken first, and that curl means the round has dried through.
  • At 18 minutes, pull the pan and lift off every chip that is already crisp and curled. Return the pan for another 3 to 5 minutes and repeat until the pan is empty.
  • Move the chips to a wire rack in a single layer as they come off. They firm up further as they cool. Salt while still warm, and toss with any optional seasoning in a bowl rather than on the pan.

Notes

  • Uniform slices are the whole recipe: a tray of mixed thicknesses can never finish at the same moment, so the thin ones scorch while the thick ones stay soft.
  • One tray at a time: two trays at once gives you two trays of mediocre chips.
  • Salt after, not before: salt draws water to the surface during the bake.
  • Cool on a rack, never on the pan: the hot pan keeps steaming under the chip and softens it again.
  • Bendy batch rescue: spread them on a clean pan, 5 minutes at 350F, then cool on a rack.
  • Storage: fully cool, airtight, room temperature up to 3 days. Never the fridge. Refresh 3 minutes at 350F.