Crispy Smashed New Potatoes

 I remember when my children were growing up, sometimes we would have a “picky bits”  supper, a finger food buffet.  Especially when we were getting towards the end of the week and close to pay day. 

These type of meals were not only fun to make and eat, but they were also interesting and something deliciously out of the norm!

Even my oldest daughter who doesn’t really like potaoes loves these!  They are simple to make and oh-so-tasty!  If you can boil a potato, then you can make these.

I made these as a part of a finger-food supper that included not only these, but also sausage balls and roasted broccoli and cauliflower florets!

 I wanted to use up the last of the new potatoes that my sister had put in the room for me.  I decided to make these.  You only need some fat (I used a mix of becel and oil) and some seasoning.  Easy peasy.

You will need to boil the potatoes first until they are nice and tender. This will take betwen 15 and 20 minutes tops. Do NOT peel them.  The crispy skins are part of their charm.

You want to cook them until they are quite tender, a fork or the tip of a knife should slide in quite easily.  Drain them really well and then pop them back into the saucepan and shake them over the heat of the burner so that they really dry out well.

Once you have done that you can add some fat to them. I used a mix of Becel (because that is what I have) and olive oil. You can use butter instead.  Shake them around in the saucepan with both fats and any seasonings.

 I used salt and pepper. (DUH!)  That is what I had, and then some chili powder that my daughter dropped off to me. She had been going to bring North American Chili powder to me when she came to the UK in April. 

I do hope she is able to get her money back from what she spent on the tickets for her and her brother. It will be a darn shame if she can’t.

They don’t have regular North American style Chili powder there.  Their Chili powder is just plain ground chilies and it would blow your socks off.  Literally!

I had made the mistake shortly after moving over to the UK of using their chili powder like I would have used the chili powder from home. I about killed everyone. You don’t want to be adding a TBS of that to anything if you value your life! 

So anyways, I did use some North American chili powder on this day. I also used some summer savoury.  Shake them all about in the fat and spices so coat and then you will want to place the potatoes onto a baking tray.  (Don’t throw away any fat left in the pan)

 Place them spaced pretty far apart. You are going to have to smash them down. And I mean gently. You don’t want to blow them to smithereens. I used the end of a can of beans and just gently pressed them down. 

As you can see, they break apart and you end up with lots of bits that are going to gild and turn golden brown in the oven.  I also took a sausag and skinned it and added chunks of it around the potatoes. (Even more flavour!)

Then you just bake them, until they are crisp and golden brown.  Yummiliciousy golden brown.  (Oh I need a manicure.  Reminder to self to buy some nail polish when I can.) 

Perfectly crisp and golden brown and ready to dip.  I used some of the blue cheese dip I had in the fridge here at the motel. But you can use whatever dip you want.  Ranch.  Onion. Sour Cream and Chive. Whatever takes your fancy!

I also added some broccoli and cauliflower to the baking sheet, drizzled with a tiny bit of olive oil. I cannot tolerate them raw anymore because of my diverticulitis, but they were lovely lightly roasted.

Moreish even   . . .  scrummilicious!

They went done really well with the potatoes and those sausage bits.  I probably should have rolled the sausage bits into balls, but it was still frozen when I put it into the oven.

This meant it was cooked perfectly  in around the same time it took to cook everything else!

These make for a wonderful finger food when you are getting together with people, a great side dish wih other things, and well, they are just something scrumptious to dig your teeth into! Enjoy! 

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