Small Potatoes Potatoes

Small Potatoes Potatoes

Sorry for the hiatus, folks, I’ve been at the greenmarket! It abounds this time of year with the freshest produce, and it’s DIVINE. Baby lettuce, squash, sour cherries, blueberries, green beans – my head is spinning just thinking about the possibilities!

But sometimes you don’t feel like eating that fresh green stuff. Sometime you fuck up, ok? Sometimes you invite someone important over to your apartment for a late-night Limeade Fizzy (see last post) and forget that the late-night bugs have been on creep parade in your kitchen lately. Or sometimes you’re on a date and you bite into a sandwich but your teeth only make it halfway through, leaving you with stuff hanging out of your mouth like you’re White Fang. Or sometimes you have a 5-alarm nosebleed on a pillowcase last night and drop it in the elevator on your way down to do laundry, and Nate the Cute One finds it on HIS way down to do laundry and holds it out and says “I think you dropped this?” but he KNOWS, as he was present for an ill-conceived one-night stand, so all you can do is take the pillowcase from Nate and say “Thanks, I hope it washes out of your pants, too.”

Those are big fuckups. You can fuck up in small ways too. Sometimes you over-utilize your face in conversation, and see you’ve frightened the person you’re talking to. Sometimes the G&T’s at the company party are so strong that you fall into an exposed brick surface and are unable to care that your right knee is bleeding heavily. That’s actually a medium-sized fuckup.

No matter the size, fuckups suck. And when shit like that goes down, shiver me timbers, you need some fucking comfort food. You feel like eating something that came from deep under the ground, where you want to bury yourself and your memories.

Therefore, today, I give you: potatoes. Baked. I call them Small Potatoes Potatoes. They’re good enough to make any fuckup feel like small potatoes. Or maybe it’s just that the flavor explosion of all the fresh herbs sets your nervous system on fireand precludes any other sensation in your body for like three days.

Small Potatoes Potatoes

Ingredients (makes 4)

4 small potatoes

1 teaspoon olive oil

1 teaspoon ricotta cheese (fresh is best, asshat)

1 teaspoon mozzarella

3 drops lemon juice

5 flakes kosher salt

1 tablespoon each of: basil, chives, oregano, parsley, thyme, tarragon, and sage (if you don’t have these herbs on hand, get off your ass and procure them, whiner)

Note: I consider it a shitty myth that potatoes are flavorless. I’m sick of you shitting on my Irish ancestors, and people from Idaho. Josh Ritter is from Idaho, so leave it alone. There are as many delicious varieties of potatoes as there are ways to fuck up in a 24-hour period. So shut up about the blandness and get back to me after you eat a buttery-rich fucking BLUE potato. I eat them like Stacy’s Pita Chips.

Preheat oven to 400^o. Brush tops of potatoes with olive oil and wrap in foil. Bake for 30-40 minutes, or until you can violate them with a fork real easy.

Meanwhile, in a tablespoon, combine ricotta, mozzarella, lemon juice, and salt. Spoon inside still-warm potatoes. If you wait too long, like an idiot, the potatoes will be cold and taste like papier mache or fucking newspaper, so don’t hesitate.

While the cheese mingles and shit with the potatoes, finely chop all the herbs. It’s important to mix them well after chopping, as the flavor profile of each bite really depends on the intermingling of each and every last goddamn one of those herbs, ok?

Sprinkle all the herbs on top of potatoes, and serve. While it’s hot. Any leftovers can be frozen for, I don’t know, 10-12 years, you figure it out, and reheated.