Potatoes In Salt Crust Recipes

SALT-CRUSTED POTATOES

Steps:

• Combine the salt, pepper, and herbs in a large bowl. Pour the oil into a large cast iron skillet and set over medium-high flame or charcoal grill. When the oil reaches a slight smoke, add the potatoes in a single layer and fry until they get nice and crackled on all sides. Cover the potatoes completely with the salt mixture, and cook for about 1 hour until the salt forms a cooked crust and the potatoes are tender. Break open the crust to serve.

SALT-CRUSTED POTATOES

Steps:

• Combine the salt, pepper, and herbs in a large bowl. Pour the oil into a large cast iron skillet and set over medium-high flame or charcoal grill. When the oil reaches a slight smoke, add the potatoes in a single layer and fry until they get nice and crackled on all sides. Cover the potatoes completely with the salt mixture, and cook for about 1 hour until the salt forms a cooked crust and the potatoes are tender. Break open the crust to serve.

SYRACUSE SALT POTATOES

Steps:

• Wash the potatoes and set aside. Fill a large pot with water; stir in salt until it no longer dissolves and settles on the bottom. Place potatoes in the pot and bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer until potatoes are tender but firm, about 15 minutes. Drain; cover to keep hot.
• While the potatoes are cooking, melt the butter in a small pan over medium high heat, or in microwave. Serve immediately poured over potatoes.

SALT-BAKED POTATOES

Steps:

• Put oven rack in middle position and preheat oven to 425°F.
• Prick potatoes in several places with a fork. Coat each potato with egg white, then crust potatoes completely in salt. Bake potatoes in a shallow baking pan until tender when pierced with a sharp knife, about 1 hour.
• Crack off as much salt as desired from skin before serving.

SALT-BAKED NEW POTATOES WITH PINK-PEPPERCORN BUTTER

Steps:

• Heat the oven to 400 degrees. Wash the potatoes.
• In a large bowl, mix the salt, rosemary needles, peppercorns and 1 cup water together with your hands, crushing the peppercorns a little between your fingers and bruising the rosemary needles to release their sticky oil, making a moist, fragrant and pink-and-green speckled sand. (You might have to add a few splashes of water if the mixture needs more moisture to feel like wet sand.)
• Transfer a little less than half this salt mixture into the bottom of a wide, shallow, heavy ovenproof skillet or casserole to make a salt bed about 1/2-inch thick.
• Nestle the potatoes into the sand, close to one another but not quite touching, if possible.
• Pack the rest of the salt mixture over the nestled potatoes, and rub and brush and smooth it with your hands until you have tightly encased the potatoes in a little salt sarcophagus. The rounded tops of the potatoes will just show as bumps under the salt cast.
• Bake the potatoes for 30 to 40 minutes, until a cake tester easily pierces the potatoes and tests warm on your chin or the back of your hand. The salt casing will dry and harden like clay - and smell delicious while baking.
• While the potatoes roast, prepare the compound butter: Grind the peppercorns in a mortar and pestle with the whole branches of rosemary to create an oily, coarse powder. Remove the bruised rosemary sprigs, shaking off any clinging pink peppercorns, and discard. (You just want to extract the oily flavor from the rosemary, not the needles themselves.) In a small bowl, mash the oily peppercorn powder with the salted butter using a fork until well blended.
• To serve, rap the salt-packed potatoes forcefully on a sturdy surface that can handle it, to crack the salt crust from the force. A few solid raps will loosen the potatoes inside. If the cast needs a little more help, use a regular dinner knife like a spade to just pop open the salt crust along its fault lines. The potatoes are easily plucked from the dry salt. Set out with the compound butter in a small bowl on the side.

SALT-CRUSTED FINGERLING POTATOES

Steps:

• Put the potatoes, water, and Kosher salt into a pot and simmer uncovered for 10 minutes. With a wooden skewer, test to see if they are tender. Pour off most of the water, reserving as much salt as possible.
• Lower the heat and keep a watchful eye on the potatoes. The goal is to let the water evaporate so the potatoes are coated in salt. Be careful not to burn the salt or the potatoes. Cook another 3 to 4 minutes, then remove the potatoes and let cool.
• Use a kitchen towel to wipe the excess salt off each potato, leaving only a light dusting of salt on each. Clean the potatoes one by one so the skins don't break.
• To make the dipping sauce, start by putting the garlic cloves on a skewer. Char them on an open flame. Brush off the blackened skins and roughly chop. Place the parsley and cilantro leaves, the roasted garlic, black pepper, and olive oil into a mini-blender and puree to a smooth consistency.
• Pour the sauce into a small bowl. Serve the potatoes and sauce at room temperature.