Garlic Hasselback Potatoes with Basil Sour Cream

I don’t eat a whole lot of red meat, but every once in a while, I can’t help myself.  Tonight was one of those nights.  Tonight called for steak.   I knew that I couldn’t go all caveman on my family and just serve up a hunk of meat come dinner time.  What goes better with steak than a baked potato?  I ran across this recipe over the summer and have made it many times since.  The entire family loves it, even though one very young member swears she can’t stand potatoes. Go figure.

I love little red potatoes.  Nine times out of ten, when I’m making anything potato oriented, I use these little guys.  For this recipe, allow for two potatoes per person.

Start by slicing slits in each potato with a very sharp knife.  Don’t slice all the way through, though, just about 3/4 of the way down.  Each potato should have 5-7 slits.  After you slice the potatoes, thinly slice up a few cloves of garlic.

Next, you’re going to carefully put a few garlic slices in the slits of each potato.  Just one garlic slice per slit, or every other slit.  We’re not trying to drive away our neighbors here.  If you are trying to keep someone from getting too close, feel free to stuff them to their fullest.

Then, toss the potatoes in a large bowl with some melted butter and olive oil.  When you get ready to do this, it may seem like a lot of butter and oil.  For those of you, like myself, who are counting calories this may seem just downright mean!  Rest assured that a good bit of the butter and oil will stay in the bowl.  I’ve tried making this using just olive oil and the potatoes don’t crisp up nearly as well.  After you toss them and make sure that each potato is greased up a bit, place them on a cookie sheet.  Sprinkle them with some salt and pepper and they are ready to pop in the oven.

The potatoes need to bake for an hour, just like a regular baked potato, so that leaves you time to get the rest of your meal taken care of.  Or, if you’re like me, you’ll quickly list some old Halloween costumes on eBay hoping to make a quick buck.  Blue’s Clues costume, anyone?

You’ll also need to take a minute or two and whip together some herbed sour cream.  These potatoes would be perfectly wonderful without the sour cream, but why stop at just perfectly wonderful when you can go all out?  The original recipe calls for chopped parsley.  I didn’t have any chopped parsley, but my basil plant is still going crazy. (See my Presto! Pesto! post from a few weeks ago.)  I decided to substitute fresh basil.  I prefer basil over parsley anyway, so it seemed like a good trade.  Do whatever feels good for you.

After an hour in the oven, the potatoes were perfectly salty-crispy on the outside and garlic-buttery on the inside.  Everyone enjoyed them and I had the perfect side dish for my steak.  In fact, they were so good, I don’t think they need to be saved for steak night next time.  Chicken and potato night?  It might just work.

GARLIC HASSELBACK POTATOES WITH BASIL SOUR CREAM

Adapted from Sunny Anderson