Hasselback Potatoes

Without knowing it, my sister and I both picked this recipe off of Pam's blog and made it on the exact same night!  Scary, isn't it?  When I saw that she posted hers this morning, I figured I had better post mine as well to keep on the same track! :)  I'm sure this isn't the first, or the last time, that this has happened.  These potatoes had such a wonderful flavor and were really fun to eat.  I find that I am always making potatoes in the same way, and this gave me a great new option to throw in the mix.  A couple of notes for making this one: 1.) Like my sister, I found that these took quite a bit longer than I had planned to get tender.  Make sure you keep an eye on them, but do not remove them from the oven until the slices are tender enough for your taste.  A few of my larger potatoes ended up a bit crunchy.  2.) A lot of times I will use minced garlic as a time saver.  I had just purchased the new Pampered Chef garlic slicer so I decided to use that instead.  I'm so glad I did!  I don't think this is a recipe you can use the minced garlic shortcut with... it's well worth the added time to place fresh garlic in between the slices.  If you are making the recipe for little ones, I would suggest just placing a few pieces of garlic in random slices instead of in between each as the recipe calls for.  I LOVED it with the full amount of garlic, but I'm not sure my son would have eaten it with so much.  3.) Pam suggests placing a large serving spoon under your potato to keep from accidentally slicing all the way through the potato.  This worked really well and saved quite a few potatoes for me!

Hasselback Potatoes

3 Russet potatoes

Olive oil

Sea salt and black pepper, to taste

Dried basil, to taste

Fresh garlic, sliced very thin

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Wash all potatoes thoroughly.  Place each potato on a large serving spoon before slicing.  You don't want your cuts to go all the way through the bottom of the potato and the spoon catches your knife from doing so.  Season each potato with the basil, salt and pepper.  Place a thin slice of garlic in between each of your slices.  Place your potatoes in a baking dish and drizzle with olive oil.  Bake for 1 hour or until the potatoes are  tender.  (I found that mine needed closer to 1.5 hours.)  As Pam suggested, I served mine with butter and sour cream. 

Source: For the Love of Cooking