hello this is chef john from food wishes comm with potatoes Romanov that's right
I'm not only certain how authentic the recipes are that I post but this time I
am really certain since I was shown how to make this incredible potato side dish
by its creator chef Jon Shing although now that I'm remembering he did credit
his mom back in Buffalo is showing him how to make it but the point is I
learned this directly from him in his steakhouse in Las Vegas about ten years
ago and it really was one of the most memorable parts of the trip in that it's
one of the few things I can remember but anyway let's go ahead and get started
by buying some very large russet baking potatoes okay accept no substitutes it
has to be large russet potatoes for this and what we want to do is make sure we
scrub those very clean since we are gonna use the skins for this recipe and
then what we're gonna do is go ahead and wrap these in foil and by the way you
only need three large potatoes for this recipe but I'm gonna do four since I had
four and I'll just say one two fry with some eggs so don't let that throw you
off we only need three and then what we'll do once wrapped is go ahead and
give him the old poka poka with some kind of small pointy knife and
that will allow steam from the inside of the potato to escape all these big and
that's it once foiled and poked we can go ahead and pop those into the center
of a 400 degree oven for approximately an hour and a quarter or until very
tender and of course since we never want to guess in the kitchen we're gonna go
ahead and test those with a knife and if that doesn't slide right in they're not
done put them back in for a while but these were perfect and then what we'll
do as soon as these are cool enough to handle let's go ahead and unwrap them at
which point we want to let these cool all the way down to room temp because
one of the secrets to this recipe is wrapping these and popping them in the
fridge overnight before we use them and I guess it doesn't have to be overnight
but they really do need to be completely cold when we grade them alright so this
is me the next day pulling them out and what we'll do is go ahead and grate
these with the skins on a cheese grater and if you're not big on potato skins
and you're a little bit worried about this don't be okay they're almost in
perceivable in the final dish although have you said that when you get down to
the end of a potato you'll probably be left with a large
piece of skin which can discard so I went ahead and Grady to
three potatoes as shown at which point we can go ahead and start adding the
rest of the ingredients including some type of onion and in my case shallot
which in case you're not familiar sort of looks like a small red onion and it's
often described as a cross between an onion and garlic but I don't actually
love that description I mean kind of sorta but it really is a unique oniony
flavor and by the way no matter which kind of onion we use we really do want
to dice it very finely with a very sharp knife okay because in the classic recipe
this does not get cooked before we mix it in and by the way in the blog post
I'm gonna talk about all your other options for this as well as I will also
talk about the amounts since I used a really large amount and probably more
than the average person will want but anyway bottom line we're going to need
some minced onion and then once that's prep we'll go ahead and grab a couple
forks with which we're gonna mix everything together and we will go ahead
and toss our freshly minced shallots in along with what looks like a ridiculous
amount of salt but it's not because that's large grain kosher salt so it
always looks like more than it is and you really do need like a teaspoon of
kosher salt per large baked potato for something like this and then besides the
salt we're also gonna want to season this with some pepper but not freshly
ground black pepper this time we're gonna use freshly ground white pepper
which I don't use a lot of but that's what chef Jon recommended and then we
will also do a little touch of cayenne even though that is not in the original
recipe and then what we'll do before we add the rest of our ingredients is give
this a quick mix using the old fork toss and clean method which means we dig down
underneath with our Forks and then toss everything up and then after doing that
a time or two we clean off our forks and repeat and the reason we're using this
method is one of the secrets to this dish is not to mash these potatoes so we
really do want to be gentle and then what we'll do once that's been mixed
just stop and add our cheese which should be a nice sharp white cheddar and
then once that's in we will mix it until just combined using the exact same fork
toss and clean method make sure you probably could use your fingertips for
this but I really do think the force will cause less smashing and mashing oh
and can you use the different cheese if you want
sure should you know please use a white cheddar and for heaven's sake Grady
yourself okay there are pregrated Cheddar's and
there are great Cheddar's but there are no great pregrated Cheddar's but anyway
we'll go ahead and very carefully mix in our cheese at which point we can add the
last ingredients lots and lots of sour cream and please not the low fat one
we're gonna need that fat and then once we have that dollop tear in there we'll
go ahead and fork that in again being as gentle as we possibly can okay above and
beyond the flavor one of the things that makes this dish so incredible is that if
done properly we end up with the texture of a perfectly baked potato that has
just been freshly mixed with some sour cream so we will very carefully toss in
that sour cream until just barely combined at which point we will stop and
very carefully transfer this into some kind of buttered baking dish and as
we're transferring this in it's critical not to compress the potatoes any more
than it is necessary to get them into this dish okay so we want to pile these
up as high as we possibly can and then just kind of use the tip of our fork to
settle everything down a bit and by the way this will kind of sink and settle
down as it cooks so it really literally can't be too high and then to finish
this off I'm gonna do a little dusting of cayenne over the top and by the way
if you wanted to toss a little extra cheese on the top go ahead but there's
so much already mixed in I really don't think you need to and I actually think
it looks better if you don't but suit yourself and that's it we are now ready
to transfer that into the center of a 425 degree oven for about 30 minutes or
so or until it's piping hot all the way through and the top is browned and it
looks just like a magnificent Steakhouse side dish and that's it we really don't
have anything left to do except start eating and I really would have trouble
picking my favorite all-time potato side dish but believe me this would be way up
near the top of the list and even though it kind of looks like a mashed potato
casserole the texture is not even close this really is so much lighter in
fluffier and is meant to mimic the texture of a freshly baked potato that
you've just mixed with sour cream and this really is almost identical to that
experience and maybe even more so which is all thanks to cooking and chilling
and grading those potato first and also of course being very
gentle as we mix this and making sure we're not compressing it and of course
if you want to dress this up with maybe a little bit of bacon or some chopped
herbs go ahead alright this is the classic version but that's up to you
I mean you are after all the David Hasselhoff of your potatoes Romanov and
speaking of large hunks of meat don't just eat this out of the dish use it as
an excuse to buy a couple nice big strip steaks which you will then sear to a
beautiful medium-rare and then serve with the pan drippings and that my
friends is really how you want to enjoy these incredibly delicious potatoes even
if you're vegetarian maybe do a cheat day and try this it really is tremendous
I mean if there's a better protein and starch pairing than this I really want
to try that but anyway that's it my 100% authentic version of potatoes Romanov so
sincere thanks to chef John and of course his mom for showing me how to do
this classic and I have no idea why it took me ten years to do a video for it
hopefully you do not wait that long which is why I'll finish up by saying I
really do hope you give this a try soon so head over to food wishes comm for all
the ingredient amounts of more info as usual and as always enjoy
you