Hasselback Potatoes with Spinach Pesto

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Hasselback Potatoes with Spinach Pesto

I’m sure you guys have been seeing a lot of green foods out there in preparation for St Patrick’s Day coming up tomorrow. Well I’m bringing you a green food that didn’t require any food coloring! And it’s delicious.

A lot of food blogs have featured the Hasselback potato. It is simply referring to how you slice and cook the potato as you can see in the picture. Using this procedure gives a delicious baked potato with crispy edges. And who doesn’t love some crispy edges on their potatoes?

I got the idea to top the potato with a spinach pesto from Joy the Baker. The spinach and garlic pesto gives great flavor to the potato. Hubby and I enjoyed these as a light lunch the first time we had them and they would also be great sitting next to a juicy steak!

Based on the recipe below, you will have some leftover spinach pesto. But we’ve been enjoying it on sandwiches, with pasta, or any other place you’d use pesto!

One Year Ago: Double Peanut Butter Cookies
Two Years Ago: Double Chocolate Brownie Roll Out Cookies
Three Years Ago: Cadbury Egg Bites

Hasselback Potatoes with Spinach Pesto

Yield: 4

Ingredients:

For the Potatoes
4 russet potatoes
4 garlic cloves
4 Tbsp unsalted butter
coarse sea salt
3 Tbsp olive oil

For the Pesto
2 loosely packed cups of spinach
2 garlic cloves
1/4 cups roasted almonds
2 tsp fresh lemon juice
1/2 tsp lemon zest
1/3 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
salt and pepper to taste
1/3 cup olive oil

Directions:

For the Potatoes
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

Thinly slice garlic cloves. Set aside. Rinse and scrub potatoes well.

Slice a thin layer off of the bottom of the potatoes. This will give them a solid base to rest on to get sliced. Slice into the potatoes but not completely through them. Slice potatoes, creating very thin rounds connected at a base. Slide garlic slices in between potato slices. You might actually need to shove them in… the potato might be pretty tight. Just be careful not to tear the bottom.

Place potatoes on a baking sheet. Generously sprinkle potatoes with salt. Top each potato with one tablespoon of butter. Drizzle with oil. Bake for 1 hour or until tender on the inside and crisp on the outside. Remove the pan about every 15 minutes to baste potatoes in the oil and butter on the pan. This will make the skin crispy and delicious and the potato extra buttery.

When cooked through and crispy, remove from the oven, cool for 10 minutes. Top with spinach pesto and serve.

For the Pesto
Place garlic cloves, spinach, nuts, lemon juice, zest and Parmesan cheese in the bowl of a food processor. Blend until spinach is broken down and, whiles still blending, slowly pour in the olive oil. Turn off food processor, taste and add salt and pepper as needed.

Recipe from Joy the Baker

Side Dish

2 comments »

12 Responses to “Indian Spiced Beans”

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Fun and Fearless in Beantown — January 11, 2011 at 5:09 pm

This does look easy and the ingredients seem really flavorful! I love simple meals like this that have a lot of flavor and make great leftovers 🙂
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2

Melissa — January 11, 2011 at 5:26 pm

I love Indian Food! I totally agree about the smell of garam masala cooking!
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Daisy — January 11, 2011 at 6:28 pm

sounds like a delicious easy meal! Great to see you and hubby last night!
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Mom-in-law — January 11, 2011 at 8:52 pm

BB – what is garam masala? What spices are in it (maybe I can recreate with what I already have).
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In and Around Town — January 11, 2011 at 8:55 pm

Looks like an easier dinner made a bit more fun with the Indian twist!
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Jen — January 11, 2011 at 9:00 pm

Mom-in-law: I buy garam masala at a small Indian market near our place. I did a quick Google and came up with this recipe.
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Bridget — January 12, 2011 at 4:15 am

I love garam masala!!! It’s one of my favorite ingredients.
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We Are Not Martha — January 12, 2011 at 6:23 am

Yum! I love Indian food and this is a great way to make it at home without a whole lot of work. And pretty healthy, too 🙂

Sues
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Robo Stir — January 12, 2011 at 3:43 pm

These Indian spiced beans look great! Thanks so much for the recipe.
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Michal Najman — January 7, 2013 at 10:28 am
This will be cooked in Prague today with minor modifications 🙂 (Occhio beans..)
- beantownbaker — January 7th, 2013 @ 8:52 pm
  
  Oh fun! I hope you enjoy them.
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Rebecca Cooper — April 28, 2015 at 6:53 pm

Would be helpful if the can size of the tomatoes were provided.