Black Garlic & Grilled Potatoes
Grilled new potatoes with black garlic vinaigrette, dill sour cream (with lemon & shallots), fried red chilies & garlic slices, fontina, fresh chives & tarragon
You heard it here first: black garlic is the new Jerusalem artichoke. While it’s apparently been around in high-end cuisine for quite a while, my bet is that this will become the new trendy superfood before we know it. And it deserves it, too. It’s fancy, it’s healthy, it’s got a rich, molasses-y, balsamic-y, tamarind-y flavor, and it goes through a strange, heated fermentation-like process to get there. We first discovered it in Yotam Ottolenghi’s cookbook Plenty More, and we haven’t looked back since.
Recipe
Ingredients: 1 ball pizza dough flour for dusting semolina flour for pizza stone olive oil salt & pepper hunk of fontina cheese, grated 1 lb baby Yukon gold potatoes 1 red chili, thinly sliced 4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced fresh chives & tarragon (or other herbs of your choice), roughly chopped
For the dill sour cream: 1 cup sour cream 2 tablespoons fresh dill, roughly chopped 2 tablespoons lemon juice, plus a bit of zest 2 tablespoons finely chopped shallot pinch each of salt, pepper & sugar, to taste
For the vinaigrette: 6-9 cloves black garlic (depending on the size of the cloves), peeled 4 tablespoons olive oil ¼ teaspoon salt 1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar pepper to taste
Directions: To start making this pizza, preheat your oven to 550° F, and your grill or grill pan to medium high. In a pot of boiling salted water, blanch your whole potatoes for about 10-15 minutes, or until just tender.
While the potatoes are boiling, prepare your vinaigrette by combining your black garlic with the salt and 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a small bowl, mashing with a fork until you get a chunky paste. Switch to a whisk and add the rest of the oil, plus the vinegar & pepper, whisking until emulsified.
Drain the finished potatoes in a colander, then toss them with about a tablespoon of your vinaigrette, so they are all lightly coated. Then lay them out on the grill and cook until they have nicely browned grill marks on both sides. When they’re finished, cut them in half & toss them with the rest of the vinaigrette.
Meanwhile, whisk together all the ingredients for the dill sour cream, and set aside.
In a small saucepan, heat half a cup of olive oil over high heat. Add the garlic and chili slices and turn it down to medium, frying for 5-10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the garlic is golden brown and the chili is crispy. When they’re finished, remove with a slotted spoon and drain on a paper towel-lined plate.
Finally, prepare your dough using the instructions on the right. After you’ve baked it for a minute, brush it lightly with olive oil & sprinkle about two thirds of the fontina across the dough. Add the potatoes and sprinkle the remaining cheese. You can add dollops of the dill cream here, or wait until you take the pizza out if you want some variation in temperature. Same goes for the fried garlic & chili—depending on how brown they are, you might want to add them at the end so as not to burn them in the oven.
Bake the pizza until the cheese is melted & the crust is a nice golden brown. Add the remaining ingredients, sprinkle with the fresh herbs, and enjoy!