David, Julia and I are regulars at Tia Pol and El Quinto Pino, our favorite tapas places in Chelsea, and David’s favorite dish is always patatas bravas, or fried potatoes dappled with a spicy chile sauce and allioli (the Catalan version of aioli or garlic mayonnaise). (I usually get a second order so there are some patatas for me too.)
Recently, I’ve started making this dish at home and serving it as a side for grilled meat and roasted chicken. (I think it would be great with grilled fish too.) The smoky, fiery chile sauce is quick and simple to make. The allioli is too, once you get the hang of it, but it requires a little more care and patience. It’s worth the effort, though, because fresh, homemade allioli (like all homemade members of the mayonnaise family) is sublimely delicious –orders of magnitude better than packaged versions. And once you know how to make mayonnaise, you may never go back to Best Foods. (In a pinch, though, stirring a finely minced clove of garlic and some lemon juice into a cup of store-bought mayonnaise will work just fine.) And after your patatas are gone, your leftover sauces won’t go to waste. Dip vegetables in your allioli, or smear it on fish. Drizzle the salsa brava on steak or chicken. Wonderful.
Traditionally, the potato chunks are deep fried, and this, of course, makes them very tasty. I’m not really set up for deep frying at home, though, so I roast mine instead. It’s quicker, less messy, and they’re very nearly as good. And besides, I think I’d rather have my fat in the form of an extra dollop of allioli.
Recipe
(Adapted from “Patatas Bravas” in Saveur, posted August 29, 2010. Serves 4 as an appetizer or side dish.)
Ingredients
For the potatoes:
4-6 large Yukon Gold or russet potatoes
About 2 teaspoons of olive oil
Salt to taste
Roughly chopped Italian parsley to garnish the finished dish
For the salsa brava:
1/2 cup (120ml) canned crushed tomatoes
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 1/2 teaspoons red wine
1 teaspoon Spanish smoked paprika (preferably hot)
1/4 teaspoon sugar
1 serrano chile, minced
Salt to taste
For the allioli:
1 egg yolk (at room temperature)
1 small clove of garlic
9 tablespoons olive oil
1-3 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
Salt to taste
1-2 teaspoons milk
Instructions
1. Preheat the oven to 425F (218C).
2. Peel and cut the potatoes into about 1-inch (2.5cm) chunks. Transfer to a baking sheet and toss with about 2 teaspoons of olive oil to coat well.
3. Roast in the oven until they are a deep golden brown, about 30 minutes. Salt them to taste before serving.
4. In the meantime, make the salsa brava. Put the tomatoes, oil, wine, paprika, sugar and chile in a blender. Puree until smooth. Taste and season with salt. Set aside. (The sauce should be very spicy.)
5. And make the allioli. This requires a bit of care, but once you get the hang of it, it’s quick and easy. First, all the ingredients and the bowl should be at room temperature. (If, like me, you usually pull eggs from the fridge, you can quickly take the chill off them by putting them in a bowl of warm tap water for a few minutes.) And second, use a large, heavy bowl. Since you will whisk the sauce with one hand and pour the oil with the other, you won’t have a free hand to steady the bowl –a heavy one will stay in put as you work.
6. Run the small clove of garlic though a press or chop it very finely and place it in the bowl with the egg yolk. Whisk together for a full minute. This will break down the garlic, incorporate it into the egg and ready the egg to bind to the oil.
Measure the oil into a container with a spout. As you whisk the egg with one hand, pour the oil into the bowl with the other in the thinnest –and I mean thinnest– stream you can manage. (If the oil is added too quickly, the sauce will “break”; that is, the emulsion will fail, irretrievably.) And here’s another reason to use a large bowl: you have room to pour the oil against the side of the bowl rather than directly into the egg. You can then sweep it in with your whisk bit by bit, and if your hand slips and you pour in too much, you can just tilt the bowl to avoid flooding the egg with a ruinous amount of oil and then incorporate it gradually with your whisk. All of this probably sounds more difficult that it is –with a little practice, you’ll be able to do this in about three minutes without breaking a sweat, and you may never eat store-bought mayonnaise again.
When all of the oil is incorporated, you’ll have a gloppy, mustard-colored mess. Don’t worry. The 1 teaspoon of lemon juice will make it silky and smooth. Season with salt and add a little more lemon juice if you like. (I like it nice and lemony.) Thin the allioli with enough milk to make it drip slowly off of a spoon.
7. When the potatoes are done, pile them on a platter and liberally drizzle the salsa brava and the aioli liberally over them. Garnish with a shower of chopped parsley and serve with toothpicks or cocktail picks as an appetizer.
Or as a side dish to grilled meat or poultry.
And remember to serve plenty of your delicious sauces on the side.
