These perfectly roasted potatoes are the best roasted potatoes I think I’ve ever had, or made. I cook them at a lower temperature for longer, to develop a crunchy, golden brown layer that looks almost like caramelized glass. The yukon gold potatoes give a creamy inside for the most satisfying bite. I also add in cauliflower halfway through the cooking process, for an extra vegetable and flavor. Then I add in some shredded gruyere cheese to melt and crunch on top of it all. For a meal, pair them with my Steak Au Poivre recipe.

Learn how to get the most perfect crunch on any vegetable in this post.

Tips and Tricks for Perfectly roasted vegetables:

For roasted potatoes, or any roasted vegetable, one of the key things for a crispy veg is…

SPACE.

Lots of space on the pan. You need space between the individual pieces so that they don’t steam. You need airflow to reach all around them. You see, vegetables (including starchy potatoes) have a lot of water in them. As water cooks, what does it do? Steam.

Steam is the enemy of browning and crunchy crispness. So how do you create space? You don’t overcrowd your pan. “But Syd!” I hear you saying, “I need to feed a family of four and one sheet pan then will not be enough food for us!”

Yes. I know. You need two pans. It will result in one more pan to wash, but I promise you, it’s SO. WORTH. IT. And I am a lazy chef when it comes to dishes and extra cleaning. But here – you can’t cram things on. Use the extra dish and make extra good food. So, create space and use an extra sheet pan to avoid steam.

Thankfully, your oven is quite hot, and has this thing called a fan in it. In fact, some ovens even have a cooking preset that you can select called “Convection” where you can keep the fan blowing the whole time you’re baking.

Use Convection Setting

That’s the second tip for roasted potatoes. Convection – love it and use it! If you have a convection setting on your oven, use it when roasting vegetables. It creates a lot more airflow to get that steam out of the way and evaporated before it can make the veggies soggy. When we had to get a new oven, having a convection setting was the one thing I would not compromise on. That’s how important it is to me.

Now – something to note is that vegetables do cook and brown faster when they are on convection. So – I usually drop the temp I would regularly cook something by about 25 degrees. I also take off 5-10 minutes of time initially so that I don’t overcook anything.

If you don’t have a convection setting…

If you don’t have convection setting, or you don’t really care because you don’t know what you’re missing and ignorance is bliss – that’s okay. (No judgements… I get we aren’t all crazy or nerdy about ovens). You can still make crispy vegetables. Experiment with higher temperature cooking to evaporate that steam faster. Try this for the first 5-10 minutes, then drop the temp to cook the insides of the vegetables without burning the outsides.

I also recommend that once your vegetables are in the oven, you turn it off and then reset the temperature. This is because when the oven door opens, the temp drops. So by turning it on to the temperature again, you’re jumpstarting the oven to realize that “hey, I’m not at the temperature you asked for” Some ovens will do this automatically, but not all. Some ovens take a bit to realize. By doing it manually, you take care of it right away. And guess what? When the oven is heating up? The fan is on. So you’re sort of creating a semi-convection atmosphere by doing that.

Be generous with your Oil (healthy oil, that is)

I know that some people think “oil is bad” because it’s fatty. For a while there was a trend of “roasting” vegetables in water… The things people come up with.

Now, canola oil and palm oil and most vegetable oils are not great from a health standpoint. In fact, I rarely use them (I never use palm oil). They are not healthy. But thankfully, there are plenty of other options! Cold Pressed Avocado is my go to, because it’s got a higher heat point than olive oil, and it doesn’t impart a flavor. Coconut is great in other instances.

My preferred brand of Avocado oil is Chosen Foods brand (they came out as one of the best in a 2020 study on food fraud). You can find it in most grocery stores too! Don’t skimp on high quality oils, because some brands that are cheaper also incorporate soybean or other cheap quality or oxidized vegetable oils.

Using plenty of oil is key when trying to get a good crispy outside. It’s almost like frying (but much less oil, obviously). Be generous with your oil. I toss my vegetables in oil so they have a light coating all over, and then I drizzle a bit on the pan for a bit of “extra love” before dumping the bowl of coated vegetables on. This will give you a great crispiness on the outside of your veggies.

Perfectly Roasted Potatoes

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Perfectly Roasted Potatoes – this is a low and slow style of cooking potatoes, but if you start with these, they’ll be ready by the time the rest of your meal is finished.

• Author: thesommchef
• Prep Time: 5
• Cook Time: 50
• Total Time: 55 minutes
• Category: Sides
• Method: Roasting
• Cuisine: American

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

3–5 Yukon Gold Potatoes, washed and skin on

1/2 Head of Cauliflower

Salt

Pepper

Garlic Powder

~ 3/4 Cup of Gruyere Cheese, shredded

Avocado Oil, or cooking oil of choice

Chopped Rosemary or Thyme, optional for garnish

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Instructions

Preheat oven to 350F on the convection setting, if your oven has it. If not, use 360 on a normal oven setting. 

Cut your Yukon Gold potatoes into wedges, I typically cut in half the long-ways, then cut 3-4 wedges out of each half. You’ll get less or more depending on your potato size. You want the wedges to be about 1-1.5″. 

Wash and chop your cauliflower so it’s in florets. Set aside. 

Toss the potatoes in oil so they are lightly covered. Then add 1-2 Tbsp oil to your baking pan. Pour the vegetables, and any remaining oil, onto the pan. Sprinkle salt, pepper, and garlic powder over the top. 

Place in the oven for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, shred the gruyere cheese, and toss the cauliflower lightly in oil as well and put on a new sheet pan.  

Once 30 minutes has passed, check ONE of your potatoes. If the bottom is already crispy and releases from the pan quickly and easily, you can toss them. Otherwise, if they stick a lot, add a touch more oil near the sticky spots and just leave them be, and sprinkle the shredded cheese over the pan with potatoes.

Add cauliflower to the oven and Cook both potatoes and cauliflower for ~20-25 minutes. The potatoes should be crispy, the cheese golden brown, and the cauliflower soft with a little browning on the edges. 

Remove from the oven and using a thin, ideally metal, spatula, scrape the potatoes, cauliflower and cheese off the pans. If the potatoes are sticking for any reason, add a touch more oil and toss back in the oven for another 5 minutes before continuing, so that you can loosen the potatoes without ripping off the crust you worked so hard to get! In the future, add more oil to your pan so this doesn’t happen. 

Keywords: Sides, Roasted Potatoes, Crispy Potatoes, Potatoes, Roasted Vegetables

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