The sweet potato is native to the tropical regions of South America in what is present-day Ecuador. Of the approximately 50 genera and more than 1,000 species of Convolvulaceae, I. batatas is the only crop plant of major importance—some others are used locally (e.g., I. aquatica "kangkong" as a green vegetable), but many are poisonous. The genus Ipomoea that contains the sweet potato also includes several garden flowers called morning glories, but that term is not usually extended to I. batatas. Some cultivars of I. batatas are grown as ornamental plants under the name tuberous morning glory, and used in a horticultural context. Sweet potatoes can also be called yams in North America. When soft varieties were first grown commercially there, there was a need to differentiate between the two. Enslaved Africans had already been calling the 'soft' sweet potatoes 'yams' because they resembled the unrelated yams in Africa. Thus, 'soft' sweet potatoes were referred to as 'yams' to distinguish them from the 'firm' varieties.

The plant is an herbaceous perennial vine, bearing alternate triangle-shaped or palmately lobed leaves and medium-sized sympetalous flowers. The stems are usually crawling on the ground and form adventitious roots at the nodes. The leaves are screwed along the stems. The leaf stalk is 13 to 51 centimetres (5 to 20 inches) long. The leaf blades are very variable, 5 to 13 cm (2 to 5 in) long, the shape is heart-, kidney- to egg-shaped, rounded or triangular and spear-shaped, the edge can be entire, toothed or often three to seven times lobed, cut or divided. Most of the leaf surfaces are bare, rarely hairy, and the tip is rounded to pointed. The leaves are mostly green in color, but the accumulation of anthocyanins, especially along the leaf veins, can make them purple. Depending on the variety, the total length of a stem can be between 0.5 and 4 metres (1+1⁄2 and 13 feet). Some cultivars also form shoots up to 16 m (52 ft) in length. However, these do not form underground storage organs.

The sweet potato originates in South America in what is present-day Ecuador. The domestication of sweet potato occurred in either Central or South America. In Central America, domesticated sweet potatoes were present at least 5,000 years ago, with the origin of I. batatas possibly between the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico and the mouth of the Orinoco River in Venezuela. The cultigen was most likely spread by local people to the Caribbean and South America by 2500 BCE

Before the arrival of Europeans to the Americas, sweet potato was grown in Polynesia, generally spread by vine cuttings rather than by seeds. Sweet potato has been radiocarbon-dated in the Cook Islands to 1210–1400 CE. A common hypothesis is that a vine cutting was brought to central Polynesia by Polynesians who had traveled to South America and back, and spread from there across Polynesia to Easter Island, Hawaii and New Zealand. Genetic similarities have been found between Polynesian peoples and indigenous Americans including the Zenú, a people inhabiting the Pacific coast of present-day Colombia, indicating that Polynesians could have visited South America and taken sweet potatoes prior to European contact. Dutch linguists and specialists in Amerindian languages Willem Adelaar and Pieter Muysken have suggested that the word for sweet potato is shared by Polynesian languages and languages of South America: Proto-Polynesian *kumala (compare Rapa Nui kumara, Hawaiian ʻuala, Māori kūmara) may be connected with Quechua and Aymara k'umar ~ k'umara. Adelaar and Muysken assert that the similarity in the word for sweet potato is proof of either incidental contact or sporadic contact between the Central Andes and Polynesia.



The sweet potato arrived in Europe with the Columbian exchange. It is recorded, for example, in Elinor Fettiplace's Receipt Book, compiled in England in 1604.

Sweet potatoes were first introduced to the Philippines during the Spanish colonial period (1521–1898) via the Manila galleons, along with other New World crops. It was introduced to the Fujian of China in about 1594 from Luzon, in response to a major crop failure. The growing of sweet potatoes was encouraged by the Governor Chin Hsüeh-tseng (Jin Xuezeng).

Sweet potatoes were also introduced to the Ryukyu Kingdom, present-day Okinawa, Japan, in the early 1600s by the Portuguese. Sweet potatoes became a staple in Japan because they were important in preventing famine when rice harvests were poor. Aoki Konyō helped popularize the cultivation of the sweet potato in Japan, and the Tokugawa bakufu sponsored, published, and disseminated a vernacular Japanese translation of his research monograph on sweet potatoes to encourage their growth more broadly. Sweet potatoes were planted in Shōgun Tokugawa Yoshimune's private garden. It was first introduced to Korea in 1764. Kang P'il-ri and Yi Kwang-ryŏ embarked on a project to grow sweet potatoes in Seoul in 1766, using the knowledge of Japanese cultivators they learned in Tongnae starting in 1764. The project succeeded for a year but ultimately failed in winter 1767 after Kang's unexpected death.

Although the sweet potato is not closely related botanically to the common potato, they have a shared etymology. The first Europeans to taste sweet potatoes were members of Christopher Columbus's expedition in 1492. Later explorers found many cultivars under an assortment of local names, but the name which stayed was the indigenous Taíno name of batata. The Spanish combined this with the Quechua word for potato, papa, to create the word patata for the common potato.

Though the sweet potato is also called batata (בטטה‎) in Hebrew, this is not a direct loan of the Taíno word. Rather, the Spanish patata was loaned into Arabic as batata (بطاطا‎), owing to the lack of a /p/ sound in Arabic, while the sweet potato was called batata ḥilwa (بطاطا حلوة‎); literally ('sweet potato'). The Arabic batata was loaned into Hebrew as designating the sweet potato only, as Hebrew had its own word for the common potato, תפוח אדמה‎ (tapuakh adama, literally 'earth apple'; compare French pomme de terre)

Sweet potato dishes need to be classified into those that use the tubers (they are often cooked in a similar manner to potao) and those that use sweet potato greens (young leaves and shoots).

The alphabetical list of all the sweet potato-based recipes on this site follows, (limited to 100 recipes per page). There are 197 recipes in total:

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mafè tatou nènn (Naked Peanut Stew)      Origin: Mali	Ragoût de Porc aux Potates Douces (Pork Stew with Sweet Potatoes)      Origin: Cote dIvoire	Sweet Potato Dumpling      Origin: Liberia
Maffé Mauritanienne (Aubergines and Pumpkin)      Origin: Mauritania	Rapa Nui Cazuela      Origin: Easter Island	Sweet Potato Ice Cream      Origin: American
Maffe aux Legumes Arachide (Beef or Lamb in Peanut Butter)      Origin: Senegal	Rapa Nui Dumplings      Origin: Easter Island	Sweet Potato Pizza Base      Origin: African Fusion
Maffi Hakko Bangtura (Sweet Potato Leaf Sauce)      Origin: Guinea	Red Oil Greens      Origin: Liberia	Sweet Potato Pottage      Origin: Nigeria
Marrakech Vegetable Curry      Origin: Morocco	Red Oil Sweet Potato Greens      Origin: Liberia	Sweet Potato Pudding      Origin: Saint Kitts
Mashed Sweet Potato Stuffing      Origin: US Virgin Islands	Renga Renga (Burundi Sweet Potato Leaf Stew)      Origin: Burundi	Sweet Potato Roti      Origin: Jamaica
Mbatata Biscuits (Sweet Potato Biscuits)      Origin: Malawi	Rummed Yams      Origin: Aruba	Sweet Potato Stew      Origin: African Fusion
Mboro Mboro (Sweet Potato Leaf and Palm Oil Stew)      Origin: Senegal	Saint Kitts Chicken Bouillon      Origin: Saint Kitts	Sweet Potatoes Stuffed with Cranberry Sauce      Origin: American
Mexican-style Mackerel and Rice      Origin: Fusion	Saint Lucia Lambi Soup with Dumplings      Origin: Saint Lucia	Sweet Potatoes with Groundnuts      Origin: Zambia
Microwave Sweet Potatoes      Origin: Britain	Saka Saka du Mali (Malian Sweet Potato Leaf Sauce)      Origin: Mali	Tadjine Zdef (Mutton and Cheese Tagine)      Origin: Benin
Mouton à l'Arachide (Lamb with Peanuts)      Origin: Benin	Salt Cod and Sweet Potato Fish Cakes      Origin: Bahamas	Takihi      Origin: Niue
Mumu      Origin: Papua New Guinea	Saltah      Origin: Yemen	Tandoori Chicken Traybake      Origin: Britain
New Zealand Classic Roast Lamb with Mint Sauce      Origin: New Zealand	Samsas (Sweet Nutty Samosas)      Origin: Bangladesh	Thiebou dieune (Street-style Senegalese Fish and Rice)      Origin: Senegal
Nigerian Beans Porridge      Origin: Nigeria	Sancoche      Origin: Trinidad	Thieboudienne (Fish in the Manner of Dakar)      Origin: Senegal
Nigerian Goat Meat Pie      Origin: Nigeria	Sancochi di Galinja (Chicken Stew)      Origin: Aruba	Thiou a la Viande (Senegalese Beef Stew)      Origin: Senegal
Ojojo Meat Balls      Origin: Nigeria	Sancocho Dominicano (Dominican Stew)      Origin: Dominican Republic	Thiou Curry (White Rice with Curry Sauce)      Origin: Senegal
Olla de Carne      Origin: Costa Rica	Sauce Légume      Origin: Benin	Thiou Tiir (White Rice and Fish with Palm Oil)      Origin: Senegal
Oven-roasted Grey Snapper with Caribbean Sauce      Origin: Turks Caicos	Shattoo Water      Origin: Dominica	Tiga Dégué au Poisson Fumé (Smoked Fish in Peanut Sauce)      Origin: Mali
Patates Douces Frites (Guinean Fried Sweet Potatoes)      Origin: Guinea	Sierra Leonean Chicken and Sweet Potato Stew      Origin: Sierra Leone	Tiguadege Na      Origin: Mali
Paupiettes de porc au curry d'automne (Pork Rolls with Autumn Curry)      Origin: Saint Pierre	Somlar Kari Saek Mouan (Chicken Red Curry)      Origin: Cambodia	Tongabezi Chicken Curry      Origin: Zambia
Pemahun      Origin: Sierra Leone	Sopa de Trigo      Origin: Portugal	Trini Curried Pork      Origin: Trinidad
Pepián      Origin: Guatemala	Sopi Mondongo (Soul-food Soup)      Origin: Aruba	Truchas de Bonaito (White Sweet Potato Pockets)      Origin: Spain
Pepperpot      Origin: Antigua	Soupe aux Lentilles et Legumes (Lentil and Bean Soup)      Origin: Burundi	Tunu Ahi Ika      Origin: Easter Island
Pickle Chicken Curry      Origin: India	Soupou Gertö (Chicken with Tomato Sauce and Sweet Potatoes)      Origin: Guinea	Uli Petataws (Sweet Potato Fritters)      Origin: Indonesia
Pintade à l'Afrique (African Guinea Fowl)      Origin: Guinea	Spicy Sweet Potato Slices      Origin: Britain	Vanilla and Spice Candied Sweet Potato Galette      Origin: America
Pintade Farcie au Patates Douces (Stuffed Guineafowl with Sweet Potatoes)      Origin: Burkina Faso	Spicy Vegetable Curry      Origin: India	Verulam-style Curried Jackfruit      Origin: South Africa
Po'e (Fruit Pudding Cake)      Origin: Easter Island	Stewed Oxtail      Origin: Zimbabwe	Wouré Burakhè Magilinri (Sweet Potato Leaf Sauce)      Origin: Guinea
Pône (Sweet Potato and Pumpkin Pound)      Origin: Saint Barthelemy	Stuffed Peppers with Sweet Potato Mash      Origin: Fusion	Yam with Greens, Onion, and Okra      Origin: Nigeria
Poulet de Comores (Comorian Chicken)      Origin: Comoros	Sweet Potato and Coconut Soup      Origin: Pitcairn Islands	Yapese Sweet Potato Fritters      Origin: Federated States Micronesia
Pressure Cooker Vegetable and Coconut Curry      Origin: Fusion	Sweet Potato and Peanut Curry      Origin: Fusion	Yebeh (White Yam Porridge)      Origin: Sierra Leone
Pudding and Souse      Origin: Barbados	Sweet Potato Bread      Origin: Britain	Zimbabwean Sweet Potato Biscuits      Origin: Zimbabwe
Pudding de patates douces (Sweet Potato Pudding)      Origin: Saint-Martin	Sweet Potato Brownies      Origin: Britain
Pudding de Patates Douces au Safran (Saffron Sweet Potato Pudding)      Origin: Chad	Sweet Potato Casserole      Origin: Bermuda

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