Potato fans are a good option to baked potatoes. Italian cuisine often use baked potatoes as a side dish to go with meat and fish dishes.
Potato fans can easily replace them. In this recipe i used herb butter as dressing but they can also be filled with cheese (Gorgonzola, Pecorino, Parmesan) or with bacon. It’s an easy recipe but above all it’s chic and tasty.
Potato fans are often confused with Potatoes Hasselback (hasselbackpotatis), a popular dish of Swedish cuisine that owe their name to the Stockholm Hasselbacken restaurant. The traditional recipe requires that potatoes would be cooked with their skin. On the contrary, potato fans are peeled, blanched in boiling water and cooked in the oven.
Perfect as a side dish and ideal to enjoy with Roast Turkey Breast with Parma Ham and Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto, potato fans have a tasty and crispy crust but a soft, warm core in them. Bring to the table their incredible taste and you will leave your guests in awe!
See also: Red Potatoes and Green Apples. A side Dish Recipe
Baked Potato Fans with Herb Butter Recipe
- Prep Time: 30 Min
- Cook Time: 45 Min
- Yields : 4
Ingredients
- 8 little potatoes, of about 80 g (3 oz) each (choose a quality of potatoes suitable for cooking in the oven)
- 150 g (5 oz) of unsalted butter
- 1 tablespoon of chopped mixed herbs (such as rosemary, sage, thyme, tarragon, chives, laurel)
- 2 grlic cloves
- 1/2 untreated lemon
- fine salt
Directions
How to make Herb Butter
Let soften the butter (cut into flakes) on a plate at room temperature (1). Add the mixed herbs (2), a pinch of salt, the grated lemon zest and a few drops of lemon juice (3).
Mix the butter with a spoon until it’s smooth and homogenized (4). Place the butter on a sheet of baking paper (5) and make a small cylinder, closing the ends of it (6). Finally, put it in the refrigerator for at least half an hour.
How to make Potato Fans
For this recipe it’s important that potatoes would be all of the same size.
Peel and wash the potatoes (1). Dip them in a large pot with salted boiling water (8) and cook for about 10 minutes, then drain them. Cut each potato doing some close and parallel cuts, without taking them off at the base. Place the potato on a spoon to help you in the work (9).
Place the cut potatoes in a baking pan (previously covered with a sheet of baking paper, wet and squeezed). Put the Herb butter on the potatoes, inside and between the cuts, sprinkle with a pinch of salt and add sprigs of the aromatic herbs and the garlic (not peeled) (10).
Bake Them in a preheated oven at 200°C (400 F) for about 45 minutes or until the potatoes will be cooked, with a crispy crust on the surface (11). Take out of the oven and let them rest 2 minutes before serving.