Sweet Potato Patties, with a Kick

I got the idea for this from a recipe I saw on Saveur.com . As is usually the case with me, I altered the recipe, although their basic recipe is intact. This is easy and DELICIOUS!

Ingredients (for 8 patties)

"about" 30-32 oz. canned sweet potatoes, mashed* (naturally, you could also cook your own)
4 green onions, chopped, including most of the green
1 small jalapeno, finely chopped (for more heat use a serrano, or part of a habanero)**
1 egg
1/2 cup flour
2 cups panko breadcrumbs
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon seasoned salt
(optional) 1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup oil (peanut, canola, sunflower are all good choices)

Mix the sweet potatoes, 1 cup panko breadcrumbs, the flour, green onions, chopped chili pepper, egg, salt, and black pepper in a bowl. Heat the oil in a 12" skillet over medium heat. Form eight 1/2 inch thick patties from the mixture and coat each in the remaining breadcrumbs. Fry 3 to 4 at a time, until golden brown on both sides. Drain on paper towels and sprinkle with a little salt. Yogurt is a good accompaniment to cool down from the spicy patties.

* I used two 15oz. cans, but sweet potatoes come in a variety of can sizes.

** You can make the patties as spicy hot as you like. I used 2/3 of a serrano + 1/3 of a habanero. If you don't like heat, or your stomach can't tolerate the heat, leave out the chili pepper.

WORD HISTORY:
Sauté-This cooking term for "frying something quickly and causing it to 'jump' by tossing it around the pan," goes back to Indo European "sil/sel," which had the notion of "leap, jump." This gave its Latin offspring "salire," with the same meaning, which then produced "saltare," still with the same meaning. This gave French "sauter," also meaning "leap, jump," and its participle form gave French "sauté," which was borrowed into English in the early 1800s.