Roasted Garlic and Minted Baby Potatoes

In the mood for some good old carbs? How about a spin on boring old potatoes?  Well...I have a recipe for you!



You can park these potatoes beside any steak, salad or steak salad. Or just eat them all by themselves, I won't judge ;)

Potatoes are an excellent starch to serve with any meal, but it's important to remember that they are a starch, particularly a root vegetable. This has implications for how many potatoes it's healthy to be eating on a daily basis. Let's do a little reading, shall we?

First off, what on earth is a starch?

Well it is basically a really long chain of sugar molecules- a polysaccharide of glucose. 

What happens to starch when you eat it?

Digestion of Starch
The same 4-ounce potato has approximately 23 grams of starch, which is a complex carb. Starch starts breaking down in your mouth. As you chew, more saliva is secreted. Saliva clings to starch and begins deconstructing these large, branched compounds. Starch converts into maltose, a smaller, simpler carbohydrate, right in your mouth. Maltose heads down to your small intestine, where it converts to glucose and is free to enter your bloodstream to fuel cells.

Glycemic Index Rating

Because potatoes are comprised of more than 92 percent carbohydrates -- in the form of sugar and starch -- they are relatively high on the glycemic-index scale... Mashed potatoes and boiled white potatoes are 82 and 87 on the glycemic scale, respectively. Sweet potatoes are a little lower, having a glycemic index rating of 70, according to Harvard Medical School. 

What is the glycemic index? See here!

 But first, Cookin' Tunes:
Sweater Weather [Max and Alyson]
When I Was Your Man [Fifth Harmony and Boyce Avenue]
Dreams [Leighton Meester and Dana Williams]

Roasted Garlic and Minted Baby Potatoes

30 baby potatoes

10 shallots

1 whole garlic clove

6 fresh mint leaves

olive oil (as needed)

salt and pepper (to taste)

1. Wash and cut baby potatoes into bit-size pieces. Add them to a large bowl.

2.  Peel and cut shallots into halves. Add to potato mixture.

3. Chiffon mint leaves and add them to the bowl with a pinch of salt and pepper.

4. Add about 4 tbsp of olive oil to the large bowl. Mix until all the potatoes and shallots are covered lightly in olive oil. Pour out the mixture evenly onto a baking tray.

5. Preheat the oven to 350F. 

6. Slice the top off of a whole clove of garlic. Drizzle olive oil over the top of the garlic clove and place it, open face up on the baking tray.

7. Put the baking tray into the oven for 45 minutes- make sure to turn the potatoes at about 20 mins so we can get a good brown on both sides! Add salt and pepper to taste.

8. You can serve the potatoes with whatever you want! Same goes for the garlic, but the most awesome thing is literally squeezing the garlic out of the clove case onto a piece of fresh bread. It spreads like butter and tastes like roasted garlic perfection.