For a roast potato to really stand out, hitting that sweet spot of crispy skin and fluffy inside is key, but it's a skill not all home chefs can master.
TV cookery queen knows the craving for perfect roasties – with their "soft inside and a golden-brown carapace of crunch" – is a must, declaring it's "impossible to cook roast potatoes without needing them to be perfect".
aside, Nigella has let slip the crucial step to achieving roasted potato magnificence. Revealing her secret on her website, she swears by semolina for that flawless finish.
READ MORE:
Nigella explained: "I think dredging the potatoes - and this is a family practice, inherited through the maternal line - in semolina rather than flour after parboiling, then really rattling the pan around to make the potatoes a bit mashed on the surface so they catch more in the hot fat and turn out majorly crispy."
Ingredients- 2.5kg King Edward or Yukon Gold potatoes
- 640g goose fat
- Two tablespoons semolina
The recommended method starts by cranking up the oven to a fierce 250C/230C Fan/Gas Mark 9. You should throw in a generous amount of goose fat into a large roasting tin and heat it until scarily hot, which will take between 20 to 30 minutes, reports .
After peeling the potatoes, divide each one into three by shaving off both ends to form a neatly shaped wedge or triangle at the centre.
For a heavenly crunchy roast potato, celebrity chef Nigella Lawson has shared her top tips. Start by placing cut potatoes into a pan of boiling, salted water.
Boil them for just four minutes, then drain using a colander and return them to the now dry saucepan. This is when semolina comes into play.
Nigella instructed: "Shake the potatoes around to coat them well and, with the lid clamped on, give the pan a good rotate and the potatoes a proper bashing so that their edges fuzz and blur a little: this facilitates the crunch effect later."
After preheating your fat in the oven until it's sizzling hot, add the semolina-coated potatoes and roast for roughly an hour or until they're "darkly golden and crispy", turning halfway through. However, cooking times may vary depending on your oven - some might need just 25 minutes per side.
But for the ultimate crispy finish, Nigella says to leave them roasting up until the very last minute.
