A quick and easy 30-minute meal made in a skillet! This ground turkey and sweet potato skillet meal comes together lightning fast and easily for a nutritious, paleo or whole30 dinner worthy of putting on repeat.
In real life, a good 70 – 90% of my meals that I don’t make for the blog come out of a skillet. No lie. This is how much I enjoy skillet meals.
Just have a look at the Salmon Stir Fry with Vegetables, Butternut Squash Ginger Chicken Stir Fry, and 30-Minute Vegetable and Ground Beef Skillet I posted recently.
The reason is threefold:
1.) Skillet meals are super versatile – you can use all sorts of in-season fresh produce, spices, sauces, and animal proteins.
2.) Meals made in a skillet usually require hardly any time at all! The majority of my meals take under 30 minutes to prepare. This is a HUGE selling point for me, because I am truly lazy in the kitchen when I’m not developing a new recipe. I get how people come home from work and don’t feel like cooking. I getchu, boo.
3.) Super low cleanup. The only tools I use for whipping up a skillet meal are a cutting board, knife, vegetable peeler, skillet, and spatula or wooden spoon. BOOM! Low-fuss, no stress, goof proof.
For this skillet rendition, I simply cooked up a sweet potato, added in some ground turkey, spices, and broth.
I covered the skillet to allow everything to cook through, then stirred in some chopped cherry tomatoes and chives.
SO easy, so simple, definitely a lazy-human’s meal, but we won’t judge ourselves for eating well, will we?
My one piece of advice is keep close watch on the sweet potato.
If you over-cook it, it will turn into mush once you have added the turkey. Sweet potato mush is non-sexy. We’ve all been there, but we prefer our taters taught, know what I’m sayin’?
I kept this ground turkey sweet potato skillet simple for a reason – to inspire you to get crazy with your add-ins! Here are some…
Recipe Adaptations:
- Add other vegetables, like broccoli, zucchini, carrot, bok choy, spinach, kale, cabbage, etc.
- Mix up the spices and dried herbs, or add fresh herbs.
- Incorporate a sauce! Add coconut aminos (or liquid aminos), teriyaki sauce, or curry paste and coconut milk if you’re feeling frisky.
- Make it Low-FODMAP by omitting the onions and garlic.
- Make it AIP by omitting the tomatoes.
Let this be your base camp to all the skillets!
And since we’re on the topic…
You can 3000% use ground beef or chicken instead of turkey.
Go forth and skillet to your heart’s desire.
My work here is done.
More Healthy Skillet Recipes:
- 30-Minute Mexican Chicken and Zucchini Skillet
- Eggplant, Chickpea and Chard Shakshuka
- 30-Minute Ground Turkey Skillet with Vegetables
- Mediterranean Shrimp Skillet
- 30-Minute Teriyaki Beef Skillet with Vegetables
- Mexican Vegan Black Bean Sweet Potato Skillet
- Crispy Skillet Salmon with Lemon Dill Caper Sauce
My cookbook, Paleo Power Bowls, is now available! CLICK HERE to check it out. Thank you for your all your support!
If you make this Ground Turkey Sweet Potato Skillet, please feel free to share a photo and tag @The.Roasted.Root on Instagram!
Ground Turkey and Sweet Potato Skillet
Ingredients
- 2 Tbsp avocado oil
- 1/2 medium yellow onion finely chopped*
- 1 large sweet potato chopped
- 4 cloves garlic minced*
- 1 pound ground turkey
- 2 tsp dried oregano
- 1/2 tsp sea salt to taste
- 1/4 cup chicken broth or water
- 1 cup cherry tomatoes halved
- 3 chives chopped
Instructions
- Heat the avocado oil in a large cast iron skillet. Add the onion and saute, stirring occasionally, until onion begins to sweat, about 3 minutes. Add the sweet potato, cover, and cook for 5 minutes.
- Remove cover, scoot potatoes to the side, add meat and seasoning. Brown on each side 2 minutes. Stir to mix sweet potato and turkey together. Add broth. Cover and cook 5 minutes.
- Remove cover, cook 2 minutes.
- Add chopped tomatoes and chives and cook just until everything is warm. Serve and enjoy!
Notes
Nutrition
We loved this! We’ve had it twice and the baby and the grown-ups were huge fans. I added a bit more Oregano and tossed in some Parsley flakes for fun to bring down the sweetness. It was so good!!!
Aww I’m happy you and your family enjoyed it, LauriAnn! Thanks for sharing!
I think I chopped the sweet potato way too large. Next time I’d go for quite small chunks because my big ones have taken more than 20 minutes to cook. Just a thought for anyone else who chops big!
Thanks so much for sharing your experience, Kristen! The size of the sweet potato chunks will impact the cooking time, so I’m glad you brought that up! I should have mentioned it in the post 🙂 xo
Ps.. I also added spinach
You forgot to mention when to put garlic. (I put at same time as onion).
Thanks so much for catching that, Raine! I do the same, so you nailed it 🙂
this was a delicious and easy whole 30 meal. thank you!!
I’m happy you enjoyed it, Linda!
Doing an Elimination Diet during the month of January (Institute for Functional Medicine sponsored) for the purpose of getting rid of inflammation in the body. This recipe fits perfectly into that diet. Made it for dinner and added lots of fresh grated ginger and fresh cilantro. It made a delicious lunch the next day too. Served it over brown rice. Thank you for the recipe and all the tips for variations.
My pleasure, Brenda! I’m happy you enjoyed the recipe and that it’s suitable for your elimination diet. Thanks so much for the feedback! xo
My husband and I LOVE this recipe. We add sage, rosemary, red pepper flakes and coconut aminos. It’s SO flavorful. Thank you!
I’m so happy to hear it, Emily! Thanks so much for swinging back around to share your experience! xo
So healthy- but very bland as written. Def needs more spices, salt, maybe cheese, sauce, etc. I also put in some kale for greens. Great starting point, though!
Thanks so much for the feedback, Barb! Adding grated cheese and salsa would definitely ramp up the flavor 🙂
When should you add the garlic? (I’m not seeing it in the recipe.) I’ve made this dish several times now and it’s very tasty, especially with feta. Thank you!
Hi JJ!
I add it at the same time as the turkey. So happy you enjoy the dish! Feta sounds amazing…I’ll try this next time I make it! xoxo
Added black pepper and feta. Feta really makes the difference.
Ooh, I love it! Thanks, Yolanda! xo