What's the difference between a yam and a sweet potato? Is there a difference?

[AliceTheCamelHasGotTheHump]

I just bought something very interesting. It's a white fleshed tuber, about the size of my shoe, bark covered (or what looks like bark) which peels off very easily leaving a pretty pink dye on the skin. White inside. Very hard. Very tree-like. Quite gnarled and eye-y.

I'm going to roast it in wedges and see what happens.

I thought they were the same thing, or at least very close relatives of the same family.

Sounds like a yam.

Sweet potatoes look more like potatoes and tend to have pinky skin.

they are different but there are also different kinds of sweet potato (orange/ white flesh)
yams texture is different but closer to the white flesh sweet potato

are you sure you did not get celeriac?

One is traditionally grown in um....... Africa I think

The other is grown in North America

One is nutrionally great

The other is similar to lettuce nutrionally

Of course I cant remember which is which though!
Yams are fatter, sweet potatoes are longer and thinner - I think

I hope it roasts okay. It seemed a bit brittle - snapped easily.

I've had orange sweet potato (delicious, brilliant for babies, perfect with Sunday roast, readily available from Sainsbos) and also purple sweet potato (not as nice, didn't roast well). This definitely isn't celeriac, but there aRE SIMILARITIES. Oops.

It sounds like a white fleshed sweet potato, is it from New Zealand?

Well, The wedges weren't gooey and squidgy inside like sweet potato wedges. They tasted quite potatoey. They were nice, but not mind blowing. I bet it would be nicer boiled actually, or chunked into a casserole.

Yam is much fatter and bigger than sweet potatoes, and is usually boiled and often floavoured, I think. It is eaten like potatoes.