Food & Drink

Laoise Casey recipe: Smashed Roast Potatoes with Wholegrain Mustard Dressing

Laoise Casey's smashed roast potatoes

Smashed Roast Potatoes with Wholegrain Mustard Dressing

Serves 2 as a side dish

This works well with Maris Piper or Rooster potatoes. For an alternative try sweet potatoes.

When you lightly roast the fine capers they become sweet and crunchy.

You could also add some chopped gherkins and fresh herbs such as parsley, chervil or tarragon.

Ingredients

400g potatoes, Maris Piper or Rooster

5 tbsp. olive oil

1 tbsp. fine Lilliput capers

1 tbsp. white wine vinegar

1 tbsp. wholegrain mustard

Squeeze lemon juice

Method

Slice any bigger potatoes in half so that they are all in the same size. Place in a saucepan of well-seasoned water. Boil for ten minutes, drain and allow to cool slightly.

Preheat oven to 190C, with a baking tray inside with 3 tbsp. olive oil. Smash or crush the potatoes with your hands or a spatula. Roast the smashed potatoes for 30 minutes on the baking tray or until golden brown and crispy. Add the capers for the last 5 minutes of cooking.

Make the dressing in a large bowl by whisking the remaining olive oil with the white wine vinegar and wholegrain mustard. Pour the dressing over the potatoes while they are still warm and stir gently. Dressing them while warm allows the flavours to develop.

Finish with a squeeze of lemon juice just before serving. Serve warm or at room temperature.

About the chef…

Laoise Casey is a chef and writer from Dublin now living in East London. In her former life she was a human resources manager.

After completing a diploma at Leiths School of Food and Wine, Laoise worked at The Dairy in Clapham for two years and now works at Paradise Garage in Bethnal Green.

She also works as a freelance food stylist and writer, including a regular column for the Evening Standard. Laoise writes for various publications including The Irish Post, The Irish Times and The Independent. She has been featured by The Guardian and Hot Dinners.

She has recently launched a Kitchen Essentials series with the YouTube channel, Wild Dish, which features step by step videos to basic cooking techniques including how to make a vegetable stock, sweat onions and make yoghurt.

In 2017 she will be teaching at Leiths School of Food and Wine.

Keep an eye out for Laoise on RTÉ One’s Nationwide in a special edition, which will be aired in January, about the Irish in London.