Roasted Potatoes

This was my first year planting a fairly productive potato crop. We had picked up a couple of types of seed potatoes at the Natural Gardner and planted them in March. They probably could have gone a little longer, but the tops were wilting and drying out, so we figured it would be time to harvest them.

A member of the nightshade family, the potato was first domesticated in Peru and Bolivia between 8000 and 5000 BCE. It was carried with settlers to other parts of the globe and is now the world's fourth largest food crop.

We didn't have much of a harvest with this crop, but I managed to make a nice dish of roasted potatoes using my usual oven technique. Its not rocket science, but I thought I'd share.

Preheat oven to 400...

This was the big harvest. The little turd-looking ones in the top right are purple seed potatoes that we put in the pantry to grow into seeds that will be replanted soon.  Wash all the skins completely with cold water and pat dry

This is the inside of one of the younger purple potatoes. I don't taste too much difference in flavor or texture, but they look pretty in a potato salad or lightly smashed.

Try to cut all the potatos to relatively the same size so they cook evenly.

I added some sweet potatoes that had started to sprout. We already had several sweet potato seedlings (slips) and planted a bunch already, so this was two we decided to sacrifice to the food gods. 

I also tossed in a bunch of quartered onions that were leftovers from a catered event the Salt Lick provided.  

I then drizzled some olive oil and sprinkled some of Emeril Lagasse's "essense" on it. OK, that sounds a little weird. but this is actually a good mix of salt and herbs that work really well on chicken and potatoes. I made too much when I did a roasted chicken a while back, so its been sitting in the cupboard taunting me. 

I covered the whole thing with aluminum foil and tossed it in the oven until they are fork tender. The combination of herbs and the sweetness of the potatoes worked great together and made a perfect side dish. 

Enjoy!