Roasted potatoes seem like an easy thing to make but in reality it's really hard to make them well. You want them crispy on the outside and light and fluffy on the inside. The light and fluffy isn't too difficult but getting potatoes crispy by roasting them is actually kindda hard.
Skip right to the recipe. (I totally think you should read the post though)
Sometimes I worry for the children of today. Curled up on their couches, tablets in hand, spending hours on end texting friends like BiglipsKylie1765499 and Gah!Gah!RainbowSprinkles, while they could be doing far more meaningful and interesting things. Like playing Tetris. But they don't. They click and swipe and selfie. They have thousands of apps to be entertained by without having to move anything more than a thumb and possibly 3.4 brain cells.
When we were kids you know what we played with? A potato. A f*cking potato. We'd shove a nose on it and maybe a set of ears if we could find both of them and we played with a potato.
And we the potato players grew up to be Steve Jobs and Stephen Hawking and Bjork. Bjork wore a ridiculous cosplay Swan costume to the Oscars before cosplay was even invented and she looked like an idiot but she also looked like someone with at least a modicum of imagination. You know what today's kids are going to wear to the Oscars when they grow up??! Probably something pretty cool they found online but STILL, you get my point.
We developed imagination, and resilience, and night terrors about vegetables with faces. All because of that one toy. We. Kick. Ass.
We also love potatoes.
Crispy Roasted Potato Tricks
The first thing you have to do is:
- Cut the potatoes. It's the cut part that'll get crispy, not the skin.
This means you'll get crispier potatoes if you take a large potato and cut it into chunks. Smaller potatoes (like these I've used) that only get cut in half only have one cut side to get crispy. Whereas a large potato that you've cut into chunks often has 3 or even 4 sides without skin that'll get nice and crispy. I learned that little trick from a Heston Blumenthal recipe.
2. Boil the potatoes with salt and baking soda to cook them.
The salt adds flavour and the baking soda helps break down the potatoes which is what you want. I learned that little trick from a Serious Eats recipe.
3. Drain the potatoes then transfer them back to the pot with some olive oil or my favourite ... duck fat. The residual heat in the pot/pan will melt the fat. Duck fat gets potatoes crispier than anything else I've tried. Now shake the pan. Shake it and shake it and shake it. You can use a spoon to stir it all as well. You want to create kind of a potato slurry that coats the potatoes. THIS is the stuff that'll get crispy. At the very least you want to rough up the cut surfaces of the potatoes. A flat clean surface won't get crispy, a roughed up, bumpy surface will. If you potatoes absolutely will NOT rough up, run a fork over them.
4. Pop the potatoes into a 425 degree oven. I like using a cast iron skillet for the boiling portion so I can put it directly in the oven and only dirty one dish. Stir the potatoes around every so often. When the potatoes are crispy they're done. Depending on the size of the potato chunks this can be anywhere from 15 - 30 minutes.
*** Do NOT add salt to the potatoes before roasting them. Salt draws moisture out and you want the potatoes to stay as waterless as possible. This is true of most roasted vegetables. Add your salt at the end.***
Roasted potatoes are fine but slathering anything in something makes it better. In this instance we'll slather with a mayonnaise/grainy mustard sauce.
Ingredients
- Potatoes
- Baking Soda
- Salt
- Mayonnaise
- Grainy Dijon Mustard
- Fresh Dill chopped with some reserved for garnish.
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425.
- Cut potatoes into chunks so there are as many cut surfaces as possible.
- Boil potatoes in water with salt and 1 tsp. baking soda.
- Drain potatoes when they're easily pierced with a fork.
- Return potatoes to pan and add 1-2 Tablespoons of olive oil or duck fat.
- Swirl and shake the pan to rough the potatoes up.
- Put in 425 degree oven, stirring occasionally until done. (15-30 minutes)
- Mix together 2 parts mayonnaise with 1 part grainy dijon mustard and fresh dill. Adjust to taste with more mustard if desired.
- Remove potatoes from oven and toss in dill sauce. Sprinkle with reserved fresh dill.
You can increase or decrease the amount of mustard depending on how tangy you want the potatoes.
Now go play with your dinner.
Yum.
You must have some amazing upper body strength. No way I could shake my 15 inch cast iron skillet. Not even my 10 inch skillet. That would break my wrists.
I’m gonna try this though, even if I have to dirty more pots because my way of doing this takes too damn long.
The best thing about it is it really works. They're crispy, crispy. ~ karen!
Thanks for sharing the recipe - I'll share it with my potato luvin' FB family and friends.
Catching up on missed posts. Have you ever used or made ghee (easy and tasty) - I'm guessing it would work well.
Hi Karen! Boiling in a cast iron!?!? I didn't think this was allowed. What are the rules for cooking with cast iron pans?
I'm less of a fan of Mr. Potato, but loved my lightbrite. But the sad part was I didn't have electricity growing up, so I just had the box, and would put the paper over it, then push the pegs into the design, but couldn't ever turn it on. So I'd look the pattern I made then take it all apart. Talk about having to use imagination!
That's a sad story, lol! I wonder if holding it up to the sun and looking at it would have done anything. (Other than burn your retinas) ~ karen!
<.< Cosplay dates back to before we had history. Modern forms of cosplay date back decades, but humans have been having fun with cosplay about as long as we have been human.
I made them!! With Bacon fat!
😋
Krazzee K! Great plan with the potatoes. Turns it into a no fail, although I was not aware of your fondness for spudlingers. I figured the resmblance of my cranium to an Idaho Russett was a drawback. Unrelated, found one of Savannah's legs in the freezer. Any thoughts as to utilizing a ten year frozen goat leg in combo with crispy taters?
Made these tonight -- not sure what the problem was; they never crisped up (although some of the slurry that detached itself from the potatoes and attached itself to the skillet did). Still tasted delicious, but cooked way longer than 30 minutes with no luck. Maybe I shouldn't have stirred them (which I did perhaps every 5-10 minutes)...maybe I should have drained them more thoroughly -- any more suggestions?
Btw, added a little freshly ground pepper and fresh time leaves before roasting.
Hmm. I'm not sure what could have gone wrong Alice. What did you use as an oil? And what kind of pan did you cook them in? ~ karen!
Olive oil (2 Tbsp, plus more later, when I noticed they weren't crisping up), cast iron skillet. I will try draining them more thoroughly.
And of course it was *thyme*, not *time* leaves (although I wish I could find some of those!).
Actually, the good news is that there are less abductions, etc. than there used to be. The difference is that we now know about every one of them even if they are in another state so it seems like more.
Send those children outside! Be careful, though, or an overzealous neighbor will call the police if your little darlings are all alone in the park even though they are 10yo! Then you'll be accused of being a "free-range" parent. lol
Fresh dill is a wonderful thing!
Well, who would have thought I would learn lessons about roasting potatoes?! I knew most of it, but there are some damn fine tips here, thank you Karen! I have been a bit absent lately, due to relocating, and lots of changes. For the good. But I'm back, and ready to dive in to some great posts that I've either missed or merely skimmed due to lack of time. So I will be very busy going back to your time at Lynne's tree house, and drooling over the pics. You and Lynne are really the only bloggers I follow these days, so it's so awesome that you made it over there. What I wouldn't give!!
Hey, welcome back Tracie! Good to see (read?) you. ~ karen!