Twice Cooked Crunchy Rosemary Roast Potatoes

This recipe is a slow food version of fast food potatoes, and as a bonus, they’re great for your gut health! How? Well cooked and cooled potatoes are rich in gut-nourishing resistant starch – a type of starch that is indigestible to us, but a favourite food for the good bacteria that lives in our digestive tracts. Along with strengthening the gut by feeding all that good bacteria, resistant starch has many other health benefits, including;

RESISTANT STARCH HEALTH BENEFITS

• Increases absorption of important minerals like calcium and magnesium

• Decreases absorption of toxic and carcinogenic compounds which can protect against bowel cancer

• Affect positive changes in microflora, particularly increasing bifidobacterium

• Decrease inflammation in the gut and other tissues

• Better digestion - RS bulks and softens stool, helps regularity

• Can help reduce fat stores as RS feeds bacteria not fat cells

• Helps you become more tolerant of the carbs you digest

• Help improve insulin sensitivity

• Improved blood sugar control

• Preserve Vitamin D in the body

• Protect probiotic bacteria

• Improved sleep and more

You can read more about resistant starch in my blog post HERE.

Resistant starch can be found in many different types of foods but one of the richest sources is potatoes. Specifically, potatoes that have been cooked then cooled and eaten. In fact, cooling cooked potatoes overnight caused the amount of resistant starch to triple! You don’t have to eat the cooled potatoes cold either. The resistant starch still remains even after reheating.

So, for example, you could boil a few potatoes, let them cool overnight and fry them up in a fry pan the next day. Or, make a batch of mashed potato, let it cool overnight and reheat for lunch or dinner. Whatever way you want to consume your cooked and cooled potatoes is up to you, but this recipe is one of my favourites, because who doesn’t love deliciously crunchy roast potatoes?

INGREDIENTS

• Approximately 2kg potatoes

• 1 tsp baking soda

• 1/4 - 1/3 cup melted chicken schmaltz or butter, ghee or olive oil

• 1 stem rosemary

• Seaweed salt to taste

• 3-4 tsp adobo seasoning

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INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 200C.

2. Wash the potatoes then chop into quarters or rough squares.

3. Add the potatoes into a large saucepan, add the baking soda and cover in water. Cook for 15-20 minutes, or until just tender.

4. Transfer to a colander and drain.

5. Spread potatoes out on a rimmed baking sheet in a single layer and cover in the chicken schmaltz or oil of choice + a good sprinkle of seaweed salt.

6. Place into the oven and bake for 1 hour.

7. After the hour, remove from the oven and add the rosemary and adobo seasoning and mix around evenly.

8. Place into oven again and cook for a further 20 minutes, or until golden brown and crispy.

9. Once they’re ready, remove from the oven.

10. Once they’ve cooled down a bit, pop them in the fridge overnight to create resistant starch rich potatoes.

11. When you’re ready to reheat it, pop it back into the oven to reheat.

12. Enjoy with any meal.