Nigella's Potato and Mushroom Gratin (with lemon chicken)

So as I mentioned before, a favourite cookbook in my house at home is "Nigella Express". My mum has made some of the soups from the book, all of which are lovely and very easy to make! Nigella may use fancy ingredients, and sometimes the recipes are not that healthy, but they are lovely warming recipes to make for friends or for a dinner party and they're usually something quick to rustle up.

I have never made a gratin so I wanted to give it a go and I'm very glad I used this recipe because it was quite quick! There was a lot of chopping but after that it was very easy. I wish that I had taken a photo of the gratin all nicely cooked out of the oven in the dish I made it in but I just was excited to eat it so had spooned it onto our plates before I realised! So it looks quite messy in the picture sitting next to the rocket and the chicken, but it was lovely and well worth making if you want to make a quick dish that will look quite impressive! Another great thing about the gratin, is that it uses just full fat milk and not cream, so it isn't as fatty as a gratin could be!

Again this is Nigella's recipe, so I am not claiming it is my own! :

Ingredients:

3 average-sized baking potatoes ( 750g) - thinly sliced

350ml full-fat milk

3 x 15ml tablespoons white wine

2 x 15ml tablespoons butter

2 teaspoons garlic oil (I didn't have any garlic oil, so crushed two cloves of garlic instead)

250g chestnut mushrooms - finely sliced

salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 220c and butter a shallow baking dish or gratin.

Put the sliced potatoes, milk and white wine in a saucepan and bring to the boil, season with salt and pepper to taste and stir occasionally. Then leave at a simmer while you get on with the mushrooms.

Warm the butter and oil (or crushed garlic cloves) in a frying pan over a medium-high heat. Add the mushrooms and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened for about 3 minutes.

Pour the mushrooms and their garlicky, buttery juices into the pan of potatoes, stir to mix and pour straight into the gratin dish. Bake in the oven for around 45 minutes or until the potatoes and mushrooms are golden and crispy on top.

I also marinated a chicken breast in lemon and finely sliced garlic and cooked in the oven for around 30-40 minutes to go with the gratin and then arranged it on a plate with the gratin and a handful of rocket.

Enjoy!

Love FF x