A chef has shared his recipe for delicious roast potatoes, and it involves an ingredient you may not have expected. Roast potatoes are a favourite in many parts of the world, with a huge array of ingredients used to make them. Roast potatoes are an easy dish and they are a staple in British households. Traditionally, they are made using British herbs such as rosemary and thyme, as well as salt and pepper. However, you can use pretty much anything to make roast potatoes, including lemons.
Yes, you heard that right. Chris Collins, who runs the recipe site Don’t Go Bacon My Heart, shared his recipe for lemon-infused roast potatoes, and he says they are “ultra crispy and super easy to make.” These potatoes aren’t just coated or sprinkled with lemon. They are actually infused with it before they are roasted with garlic and rosemary. To infuse them correctly, he adds some cut lemons to a pot with the potatoes and parboils them.
If you just coat them with lemon juice, Chris says, they can come out of the oven soft and limp instead of crispy. He adds squeezed lemons to the water to make sure the flavour reaches right into the middle of the potatoes. They are cooked in the pot for 15 to 20 minutes, until you can easily put a knife through them.
He then allows them to steam dry after boiling, making sure that some of the moisture is removed before they go into the oven, further ensuring that they come out crispy when they have cooked. You should do this until they stop steaming and/or are cool enough to touch and handle.
He opts to roast the potatoes with rosemary and garlic because he believes that they go perfectly with lemon. You might think you season the potatoes with these herbs, but you actually just place them on the roasting tray with the potatoes and allow them to soak up the flavours. You also add in the lemon skins here.
He also says thyme, basil and dill are great flavours to pair with lemon-infused roast potatoes. To make these potatoes, he uses 1kg of potatoes (diced), 3 lemons, 3 to 4 large sprigs of rosemary, a small bulb of garlic, 2 tbsp olive oil, salt and pepper to season at the end.
Once they are ready for the oven, they cook for between 35 and 45 minutes at 200C. In the comments section of the recipe, one person who tried this method revealed that these roast potatoes can be made in the air fryer.