Candied Sweet Potato Casserole
This Easy Candied Sweet Potato Casserole is naturally sweetened with honey and orange juice, then topped with crunchy cinnamon-spiced pecans for a cozy holiday flavor! Perfect for Thanksgiving, Christmas, or any festive gathering, this wholesome and delicious sweet potato side dish is warm, comforting, and guaranteed to impress your guests.
My family and I are getting excited about Thanksgiving and it’s just around the corner. Since my parents and siblings are in the Philippines and hubby’s parents are in England, when Thanksgiving comes we really don’t have our family to celebrate with us – it’s just the four of us, hubby, me, and our two little Americans.
We do miss them, especially during Thanksgiving and Christmas as it’s not often that we get to see them because the fares are astronomically high to travel abroad during the holiday season.
Thankfully, despite missing our blood relatives during special occasions, we have never really felt alone as our family has always been adopted by some very kind families from our church during Thanksgiving.
The past 12 years we have been in the US, we have never had to celebrate Thanksgiving on our own, and by God’s grace, we have another new family to join this time. It just feels wonderful that way.
This is why I decided for this post to make a classic Thanksgiving side dish – sweet potato casserole and perhaps share it with our host family this year. I usually bring Lumpia (Filipino Spring Rolls) as appetizers as that is often requested but I thought why not add another dish to the list and so here it is.
This Candied Sweet Potato Casserole gets its flavor from a combination of honey, orange juice, and orange zest. It’s easy to prep, and I like that it’s practically naturally sweetened but not overly sweet.
Here’s a quick rundown of how I make this Candied Sweet Potato Casserole. For printing, please check the recipe card below.
Chopped pecans flavored with cinnamon and a little sugar is sprinkled over on top to add extra crunch and yum.
I simply peel the sweet potatoes and then slice them thinly (1/4 inch or less) and then arrange them on a baking dish with overlapping layers.
Then I pour over the potatoes a combination of honey, orange juice and zest, butter and a little salt and bake it covered first. So, at this point, it would only be cooked halfway.
Thereafter, I sprinkle the chopped pecans mixed with a little sugar and cinnamon on top, baste it quickly and then bake it until the potatoes have softened. The result is a tasty sweet potato casserole with bright flavors of honey and orange that looks nicely caramelized, too, thanks to the cinnamon and sugar on top.
It’s not super-sweet (like dessert), but the amount of honey (or other sweeteners you prefer) can be adjusted to your taste. It’s certainly a perfect complement to roast turkey (or chicken and pork) for Thanksgiving and beyond. Hope you like it.
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Candied Sweet Potato Casserole
Ingredients
- 2 lbs sweet Potatoes (about 5 cups), peeled and sliced thinly
- 1 cup Orange juice
- ⅓ cup Honey (or Maple syrup)
- 6 tbsp unsalted Butter, melted
- 2 Oranges, zested
- ½ tsp Salt
- ½ cup chopped Pecans
- ½ tsp ground Cinnamon
- 3 tbsp brown Sugar
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 F. In a baking dish (about 2 quartz capacity – 8 or 9 x 11″), arrange the sliced sweet potatoes in overlapping layers. In a bowl combine the orange juice, orange zest, honey, butter and salt. Pour the mixture over the sweet potatoes ensuring that all slices are coated (to ensure better absorption of the sauce).
- Cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes. In the meantime, mix the pecans, cinnamon and sugar. After 30 minutes, adjust the oven temperature to 375 F, take the dish out and uncover and sprinkle all over with the chopped pecan mixture. Bake for another 25-30 minutes or until the sweet potatoes have softened.If desired, place under the broiler for a 1-2 minutes to caramelize the topping a bit. Enjoy!
Notes
Last updated on November 3rd, 2025 at 09:54 pm
Your Sweet Potato Casserole looks delicious. I like how it’s naturally sweetened with honey and orange juice as I’m not keen on overly sweet sides. Thanks for sharing.
Yes, I’m with you there. This has just the right amount of sweetness without being sickly. Thanks and enjoy.
What a classic and gorgeous casserole for the holidays. I love the candied top and my family loved this for Thanksgiving.
I love every ingredients you put in this candied sweet potato recipe and I am pretty sure that this one is delicious. I’ll try to make this for my family.
I can’t wait to try this candied sweet potato casserole recipe. My family is going to love it.
YUMMY! This looks so good, I love sweet potato! Can’t wait to try this. Thanks for sharing the recipe!!
Love sweet potatos. Amazing side dish to try for a holiday dinner. Thanks for sharing.
What an amazing and creative recipe to make over the holidays! The colour of the dish looks amazing and the flavours and combinations make me drool! Thank you for sharing this recipe for candied sweet potato casserole.
Wow, I love sweet potatoes and these candied casserole looks so delicious and comforting to try it soon. Beautiful pics.
I wanted a sweet potato dish that was not super sweet or mashed. I didn’t have orange juice, so I used apple instead. I did have an orange and used the zest. I personally thought that the orange flavor was too strong, in the future I would tone it down, maybe zest of half an orange. Otherwise, it was good and would be worth making again.
Recommendations on how to reheat this casserole? Covered or uncovered? Temperature and time?
We made it ahead to bring to dinner but are not sure how to reheat for serving it.
I would do it at 375F covered and then see if it’s heated through after 30 minutes then adjust the time accordingly. You can try that.
These are seriously mouth watering with all those nuts and glistening glaze I just fell in love with Sweet Potatoes!
Sweet potato casserole is one of my favorite thanksgiving dish. This year I will give your recipe a try. Looks delicious!
This is perfect for the holidays! It’s so simple, and the honey adds the best flavor. Such a great recipe!
I added a little bit of bourbon to the casserole and it was phenomenal.
I need to try adding bourbon next time! YUM!
That looks like a delicious upgrade to sweet potatoes. I love the maple in there with the orange!
This sounds absolutely scrumptious – what a fantastic side dish! Love the extra pecans on there!
PERFECTION! I’ve made it 3 times now and it just gets better and better 😉
You had me at candied LOL. Srsly, beautiful classic recipe that’s perfect for the holidays. Thanks for sharing!
I made this for my family last year and I’ve returned to say here I am again. 🙂 Thank you for the wonderful recipe!
Looks so yummy! I am adding this recipe to my Thanksgiving table!
Sounds delicious.Can you make without pecans( a few guests are allergic)? Would I just leave rpthem out or replace with something else?
You can replace them with marshmallows if you like. Or leave them out. Enjoy.
How many people does this recipe feed?
It should serve about 8 people but can easily be doubled if you need more.
How many people does this feed?
I’d say it’s about 6-8 servings but if you want it for a bigger crowd – just use a 9×13 baking dish and double the recipe. Enjoy.
The flavor is delicious, but I found it had way too much liquid which I wound up removing at the end. My guests loved it! Next time, I will do an hour in the liquid, drain it and then add the nuts, cinnamon, sugar mixed with a bit of syrup for the candied topping.
Yes, it produces extra liquid when cooking but you can easily drain that like you did. I personally prefer it more saucy. Thank you so much for the feedback! Appreciate you letting us know and glad you enjoyed it.