A Very Merry Ultimate Hasselback Potato Gratin

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UPDATED 11/23 :: Today, the Ultimate Hasselback Potato Gratin. My computer doesn’t want to acknowledge the word, “hasselback,” but sorry Mac … this is a THING. The presence of a potato on a holiday table is about as ubiquitous and obligatory as that of a large roasted bird … or gilded decor and twinkling lights … or a crooning Bing Crosby, whose voice has the power to deliver all of the cozy holidays feels. (We love him for that, don’t we?) This Ultimate Hasselback Potato Gratin recipe (essentially, a cheesy potato casserole), coincidentally, has that same power. Crowned by a fetching crispily-ridged top, these potatoes go double-duty by hiding a creamy, gooey layer of garlic-laced goodness inside. I KNOW right?!

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Hasselback Potato Gratin

Multiple personality disordered though they may be, the potatoes in this simple and unassuming casserole dish somehow manage to supersede the somewhat tired, cliched idea of casseroles altogether. Don’t get me wrong – I love a good casserole. But I also love the feeling of successfully making a good thing better – great, even. These hasselback potatoes manage to pull that off. And just like Bing, they can easily and (almost) effortlessly deliver all of the cozy holiday feels. It’s a love at first bite sort of situation here.

What is a Hasselback Potato?

Swedish in origin, Hasselback potatoes, (or Potato à la Hasselbacken, if you’re nasty) are a beloved potato side dish, where the potatoes that have been sliced, by making parallel incisions, almost all the way through many times, across the length of each potato, creating an accordion-like aesthetic, with many thin slices being made on every potato in the batch.

This Swedish side dish gets its name from Hasselbacken, the Stockholm restaurant where it was first served (love a fun fact). They’ve become increasingly popular in recent years, their resurgence largely credited to their addictively crispy outsides and gloriously tender, well seasoned insides.

If you want to check out the technique for a basic hasselback potato, this video is a nice reference. I LOVE her trick for using dowel rods to prevent the knife from going all the way through the potatoes.

What is a gratin?

Moving on. A gratin, by any other name, is one cheesy a** French casserole. But, this is a family show, so we’ll go ahead and expound upon its more technical, Google-able definition:

“A culinary technique in which an ingredient is topped with a browned crust, often using breadcrumbs, grated cheese, egg, or butter.

What is a hasselback gratin?

I’m honestly so glad you asked. The ultimate hasselback potato gratin featured in today’s post is really a best-of-both-worlds sort of situation. We’re taking the ridged, edgy perfection of a hasselback-style potato and merging it with the gooey, gooey lusciousness of a classic cheesy potato gratin.

So, we’re getting everything here – you really CAN have it all … everything one could ever want from a holiday vegetable side dish, that is (I’m taking this baby to Friendsgiving, me thinks). What seems like a “too good to be true sort of thing,” is really as true as true can be. This is one mashup that works perfectly, bringing out the very best in both the gratin and the hasselback techniques.

And we all know that potatoes like a good mashing, you know what I’m saying? If you make them, please do let me know what you think! I’ve made them a couple of times recently (to test them for you, of course) and the first time, I failed to set my oven temp high enough. The potatoes truly do need to cook at the specified 400 degrees F in order to fully soften, and to knock all of the rawness away.

Also, I almost always reach for fresh garlic in my cooking, but in the case of this recipe, I actually preferred using garlic powder (or everything spice, if you can get it). The flavor disperses and distributes so nicely throughout the cream and seasons the potatoes evenly – just what we want. Okay, with that – I give you my new favorite holiday potato recipe. Best spuds forever.

Hasselback Potato Gratin Ingredients

Freshly shredded extra sharp cheddar cheese
Grated or shredded parmesan cheese
Heavy cream
Garlic powder
Fresh thyme leaves chopped
Freshly cracked black pepper
Salt (plus more, as needed)
Russet potatoes peeled and sliced 1/8-inch thick on a mandolin (about 8 medium potatoes)
Butter or non-stick spray, for greasing the dish

Hasselback Potato Gratin FAQ’s

What are the best potatoes for a gratin?

Russet potatoes are great for a gratin. Good, old fashioned, russet potatoes work really well in this application, and that’s mostly due to the fact that they’re large, and you can easily and efficiently slice a ton of them to fill up the baking dish. This recipe requires almost 8 whole potatoes to fill the dish, since we’re doing things vertically, rather than in horizontal layers, so big baking potatoes are really the work horses we need here.

How to Make this Hasselback Potato Gratin

This is a long – very long – bake time. But just think – we’re cramming 8 whole potatoes into a little baking dish, creating a very dense, very tight mass of potato (deliciousness) that needs to get really soft and creamy. It’s going to take 400 degrees about 1 hour and 45 minutes to accomplish that. And it’s worth every minute of it. I promise.

DIRECTIONS

Adjust your oven rack to the center position and preheat to 400°F.
Combine the cheeses in a large bowl. Transfer 1/3 of the cheese blend to a small bowl, and set aside. To the cheeses in the large bowl, add the cream, garlic powder, thyme, salt pepper, and potato slices (you might have to do this in batches, if your bowl isn’t quite big enough). Toss with your hands (enjoy this!) until each slice is coated with the cream mixture. Taste the cream – if it tastes well-seasoned, then you’re good to go. If not, add a little more salt.
Grease a 2-quart casserole dish with butter or non-stick spray. Organize a big handful of the cream-coated potatoes into a tidy stack, and lay them in the casserole dish with their edges aligned vertically. Continue placing potatoes in the dish, working around the perimeter and into the center until they’re all in (accordion style), or the dish is totally full (your potatoes should be tightly packed; see note). Pour some of the excess cream/cheese mixture evenly over the potatoes until the mixture comes about 1/3 to halfway up the sides of the potatoes – no more! It will spill over if it gets too full.
Place the dish on a sheet pan covered in foil. Cover the casserole tightly with foil and place in the oven. Bake for 40 minutes. Remove the foil and continue baking until the top is a light golden brown, about 30 more minutes. Carefully remove from the oven, sprinkle with that remaining cheese waiting in the wings, and return to the oven. Bake until deeply golden brown and crisp on top, about 30 minutes. Let it rest out of the oven for about 10 minutes before serving.