Not dead yet

Hi everyone, I know it's been a while. There have been a lot of changes at Chez Kate and to my regret, the cooking has been cut down to weekends and holidays.

I have a new day job. It's utterly wonderful and comes with a ninety-minute commute. By the time I get home, I'm not up for doing much more than pouring a bowl of Cheerios (they help the cholesterol level. Oatmeal is for cookies).

But it's now warm and Austin the minimalist got his mitts on a huge piece of salmon. While I have been known as the Person Who Makes Salads (tm), I decided to break out of the box and make something with potatoes. The salmon was going to be grilled with a sesame ginger glaze, so I needed something that would match.

Kitchen Inferno had the perfect solution. Roast potatoes with a Thai-chile vinaigrette. There was a fair amount of chopping to do, but rather worth it. Here's our ingredient list:

1.5 pounds small red potatoes, quartered. (I actually used small Yukon, and they came out with a perfect texture.

Canola oil (since I had some help from my dear Nexx, we ended up with rice bran oil. It was light with a tiny hint of nuttiness. Not cheap enough to use every day, unfortuately)

For the vinaigrette:

.25 cup rice wine vinegar

2 T minced fresh ginger

1 clove of garlic, minced 

2 T sesame oil

3/4 cup canola oil (see rice bran oil above)

2 t minced fresh Thai chiles

2 T minced fresh cilantro

Salt and pepper to taste

Black sesame seeds, green onions and fresh cilantro for garnishing.

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I had to do a fair amount of tweaking for this recipe. There were five of us for dinner and two of us don't have my love for things hot. So while I expanded the recipe, I added some poblanos to mellow out the dressing a bit. I ran a bit short on rice vinegar, so I ended up adding more peppers to add to the acid.

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Lightly coat the potatoes with canola oil and roast in a 400 degree oven for about 25 to 30 minutes, until the potatoes are browned and tender.

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I roasted for about 45, stirring once to get an even roast. These are the best roasting potatoes I've worked with. I shall remember this.

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While the potatoes are roasting, prepare the vinaigrette. While the potatoes are warm, toss with viniagrette. Top with black sesame seeds, green onions and fresh cilantro.

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I love the way these came out. I would not recommend making the viniagrette too far in advance they way you might with some recipes. This took on a little bit of a burn from the peppers, but not too much. I also chopped a few extra peppers for folks to use as a garnish.

There were no leftovers, I consider that a success. I think this dressing will also work on cucumbers and plan to try it on a few other things.

Thanks for reading. I have not abandoned the blog and will try to be here a little more often.

Cheers!