Occasional Cook: Roast potatoes

Here is your weekly thread to talk anything and everything food. 

Share your cooking this week, ask for tips or recipes for a dish, tell us about your meals out.

Via kitchensanctuary.com

It's a been a lazy holiday week, and kinda cool and wet, so roast potatoes were in order. 

For years, I messed around trying to roast potatoes without following any particular technique, and with poor results. Then I found the method below, which creates perfect crispy yet fluffy spuds, and haven't looked back.

Peel and chop your potatoes - half the small ones, quarter the large ones. You don't want anything too small, or they will dry out. If your potatoes are smaller, adjust the roasting times.

Place in a saucepan and cover with cold water. Add a teaspoon of sodium bicarb. Bring to boil, then boil for five minutes.

Drain the water and return the spuds to the pan. Shake the pan vigourously, so that the outsides of the potatoes become a little broken and battered. Let them sit for 10 minutes. Add some butter, and season and add herbs if desired. The potatoes should have a mushy outside layer of soft potato and butter.

Spread the potatoes evenly on a tray - not touching, if possible. If you've been minimal with the butter, you may want to use some parchment paper, or they will glue themselves to the tray.

Bake in a medium oven for 40 minutes, turning halfway through. Then turn up the heat for the final 10-20 minutes, to get them extra crispy.

Guaranteed crispy-on-the-outside, fluffy-in-the-middle spuds!