I didn’t grow up eating potatoes. It might seem strange, but as a kid I disliked potatoes in general and especially french fries. I have since mended my wayward youth. (I have even baked my own French Fries). It won’t surprise you to hear that the first kind of potatoes I learned to make didn’t require all the fuss of cutting matchsticks, baking and turning them repeatedly, etc. 

Picking your potatoes is half personal preference and half purpose. Large russet potatoes may make for fluffy baked potatoes or crispy fries, but they don’t tend to serve for a simple roast. I used small red potatoes the most. Any medium sized potato would work so feel free to use yellow or yukon golds if they are available. Yukon gold are a personal favorite of mine as well.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 – 2 lb. medium potatoes, cut into quarters
Extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp chopped fresh herb, thyme or rosemary
Salt
Pepper to taste

When I made these potatoes I roasted a chicken in the same pan, which made the cooking easier to clean up. If your roasting pan has the room you can thrown the potatoes in at the same time and get everything done together. Otherwise just using a plain baking sheet is fine, everything will turn out delicious.

Pre-heat your oven to 400 degrees. 

Cut the potatoes length wise twice, so you have long wedges. Pour some olive oil over the potatoes, add the herbs, and then mix the oil and herbs all over the wedges until well covered. Sprinkle salt over each wedge and don’t hold back. Each wedge should get a pinch or so of salt because potatoes really depend on being salted well. Grind some pepper over the wedges and turn the pieces cut side down onto the baking sheet.

You just need to roast these for 45-50 minutes, turning the wedges onto the other cut side about 30 minutes in. I wasn’t too concerned with that when I made the potatoes in the picture above, and I wish all of them ended up as brown as the few that were cut side down!