Culinary Advisor
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New Potatoes with Mint and Butter
Created by Chef Thomas
The first new potatoes of June, boiled in salted water until waxy and tender, then rolled in melting butter with torn mint. Three ingredients and no reason on earth to do anything more.
The first Jersey Royals arrive at the market sometime in late May, and for a few weeks they are the best thing you can buy. Small, kidney-shaped, their skins still papery and thin. They smell of the earth they came from. I pick them up and they feel like the start of something.
You don't do much with a potato like this. You boil it in good salted water, drain it, and roll it in butter while it's still hot. Tear some mint over the top. That's the recipe. I could dress it up, add capers or shallots or a squeeze of lemon, and sometimes I do, but the honest version is the best one. Butter, mint, salt. The potato does the rest.
This is a June side dish, the kind you put in a warm bowl in the middle of the table next to whatever else you're having. A piece of fish. Some lamb chops off the grill. A plate of green beans. It doesn't compete with anything. It just belongs there, the way certain foods belong to certain months. I wrote it down in the notebook years ago: "Jerseys. Butter. Mint. First proper warm evening." I make the same note every year and it never needs updating.
There are few better feelings than putting a bowl of these in front of someone on a long June evening when the windows are open and nobody is in a hurry. We're only making dinner. But sometimes dinner is enough.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary AdvisorIngredients
new potatoes
Quantity
750g
scrubbed, not peeled (Jersey Royals if you can get them)
fine sea salt
Quantity
generous pinch
for the cooking water
unsalted butter
Quantity
about 30g
fresh mint leaves
Quantity
a small handful
torn
flaky sea salt
Quantity
to finish
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| new potatoesscrubbed, not peeled (Jersey Royals if you can get them) | 750g |
| fine sea saltfor the cooking water | generous pinch |
| unsalted butter | about 30g |
| fresh mint leavestorn | a small handful |
| flaky sea salt | to finish |
Equipment Needed
- •Medium saucepan with a lid
- •Colander
Instructions
- 1
Boil the potatoes
Put the potatoes into a pan of cold, well-salted water. The water should taste like the sea, properly seasoned, not timid. Bring it to the boil, then turn it down to a steady simmer. Small potatoes will take twelve to fifteen minutes, larger ones a little more. Test them with the tip of a knife: it should slide in easily but meet the faintest resistance at the centre. Overcooked new potatoes lose their waxy bite and turn floury. You want them just this side of done.
Start them in cold water, not boiling. They cook more evenly that way, the outside and inside arriving at tenderness together rather than fighting each other. - 2
Drain and dry
Drain the potatoes well and return them to the warm pan. Let them sit for a minute off the heat with the lid slightly ajar. The residual warmth dries the skins, which matters more than you'd think. Wet potatoes dilute the butter. Dry potatoes absorb it.
- 3
Add butter and mint
Drop the butter into the pan and shake it gently so the potatoes roll through as it melts. You want every potato glossy, coated in a thin, golden slick. Tear the mint leaves and scatter them in. Not chopped, torn. The rough edges release more oil and the scent comes up immediately, green and sharp and sweet. Toss everything together once more. A pinch of flaky salt over the top. Serve straight from the pan.
Chef Tips
- •Jersey Royals are worth seeking out, but any genuinely new potato, freshly dug, with thin skin that rubs off under your thumb, will do this job well. What you want is waxiness and sweetness. A floury potato won't work here. It needs to hold its shape and take the butter on its surface, not absorb it into a crumble.
- •Don't peel them. The skins of new potatoes are part of the pleasure: thin, barely there, with a slight resistance under your teeth. If the skins are thick enough that peeling crosses your mind, the potatoes aren't new enough for this dish.
- •Use good butter. Proper unsalted butter with a high fat content and a yellow colour that tells you the cows were eating grass. This is a dish of three ingredients. Each one is completely exposed. There is nowhere to hide.
- •Mint from the garden is different from mint in a supermarket packet. If you can grow it, grow it. It takes over everything, which is the only problem you'll have. The flavour is stronger, greener, and more aromatic than anything in a plastic sleeve. If the packet is all you have, use more of it.
Advance Preparation
- •This is not a dish that waits. New potatoes are best the moment they're dressed, while the butter is still melting and the mint is still fragrant. Cook them just before you sit down.
- •If you must get ahead, boil the potatoes and drain them up to an hour before serving. Spread them on a tray so they don't steam and go soggy. Rewarm briefly in a pan with the butter when you're ready, then add the mint at the last moment.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 195g)
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