NOW CLOSED: Tell us what you think of James Martin’s recipes and win a £50 Love2Shop voucher

[AnnMumsnet]

This month, Celebrity Chef James Martin has sent our Mumsnet Potato Councillors the choice of two of his exclusive recipes that he has made for www.manyfacesofpotatoes.co.uk. The Councillors are to make one of them for their families and feedback their thoughts on this thread.

The recipes are Goat's Cheese and Potato Tart and Chicken and Potato Kebabs - both can be prepared in around 30 minutes. Photos on my profile

We want to give all of Mumsnet the option to try these two recipes, so feel free to try them this week and add your feedback on this thread - do tell us: how easy it was to cook, whether your family enjoyed it, and if you included your own twist? Everyone who does so will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £50 Love2Shop voucher.

James has also given us his top potato tips; see below:

If you can add to them or suggest any other top potato tips such as cooking, chopping or slicing potatoes then share them on this thread with the community and you will also be in the running for the £50 voucher that is up for grabs this month.

If you have any further questions on potatoes, feel free to post onto the thread and we?ll endeavour to answer them asap.

James Martin top tatty tips

1 Baking small new potatoes and stuffing them with cheese and crispy bacon makes a great canapé for a party
2 Always store potatoes somewhere dark and cold as this will make them last longer
3 If your curry is too spicy when cooking, add a potato as it will take out some of the heat
4 Peeled potatoes can be stored in cold water in the fridge for up to 24 hours before cooking
5 Use up leftover cooked potatoes in an omelette or frittata

In addition, for 100s of 30 minute recipes or if you would like more information on which varieties of potatoes are best used with specific meals then go to
www.manyfacesofpotatoes.co.uk.

James is also helping manyfacesofpotatoes search for Britain?s Best Potato Recipe for full details and to enter see manyfacesofpotatoes.co.uk/competitions

Thanks, MNHQ

We love jacket potatoes but never organised enough to put them in the oven for an hour and a half. Instead - prick them with a folk and microwave for 6 mins then pop in a hot oven for just 15 mins.

I don't know who James Martin is, but love potatoes and fancy the idea of chicken and potato kebabs so will try that one.

I haven't made my recipe yet and tbh I think they're a bit rubbish this time around. To make the kebabs you need a blender for the marinade, and for the tart you need an oven-proof frying pan. I have neither. This is the first time that equipment has been a barrier. I'm going to have a go at the tart using the oven with the door open and the frying pan handle sticking out... here's hoping melted plastic adds a certain piquancy .

We tried the kebeb recipe

how easy it was to cook, whether your family enjoyed it, and if you included your own twist?

Very simple to prepare and cook this recipe, my DCs enjoyed helping make /prepare the food as usual however they didn't like the kebabs, DH ate them but thought that they were too dry . Personally I didnt mind the dryness and ate most of them
On our skewers I did add onion chunks too for extra texture and flavour.

Anyway the potatoes needed cooking longer than the time stated. I would definitely add some more spice/chilli to the marinade if I make thid recipe again.

babster - I'm sure you could make the marinade by chopping the relevant ingredients and mixing in a small bowl? And I think you could do the frying pan stages in normal frying pan then assemble it all on a baking tray/ dish or shallow lasagne style dish and put that under the grill? Or I make omelettes with the frying pan handle sticking out of the grill and it's fine (no smouldering plastic handles here!)

I want to make chicken kebabs tonight now.

Can we just say what we think of James Martin?

He's from Yorkshire, isn't he?

We're having the kebabs tonight, I will report back. Going to have something on the side ready if it's as dry as everyone has reported so far. Love the idea of putting it all on a stick though, food tastes better off a stick.

printed them out.
DH will try the meat one alone.

I made the chicken and potato kebabs and they were simple to make and tasted wonderful. I love these recipes, step by step easy instructions and they can be adapted to include other ingredients.

My children adored the chicken and potato kebab - quite an achievement as they claim not to like chicken or potato. Result. It was very simple - I did serve it with a yoghurt and mint sauce which was good.

Potato recipes all welcome. I bought a sack last week - 12kg for £4. Bargain, but I'm now struggling for ways to use them all up. We've just had curried pea and potato fritters, which were delicious but quite hard work.

Pan roasted potato tart with goats cheese and red onion

Ease of cooking. Very easy, as the recipe suggested took a few minutes to prepare ingredients and overall about half hour to cook.

Did you and your family enjoy the recipe? Only myself and my dh ate it and we both really enjoyed it although a few of the potato slices were a bit hard so perhaps would have been better to par boil for a few minutes first.

Since taking part in this activity have you found anything surprising?

No, not really

Will u be cooking it again?
Yes, worked well as an extra to the chilli we were having. Would not be filling enough on its own. We would also parboil the potatoes next time.

Any other comments about the recipe?

The flavours of the thyme, goats cheese and red onion in balsamic vinegar worked extremely well together.

My potato tip is if you have left over mash then simply turn it into potato scones. All you do is add enough flour to the mash until the consistency is like dough. then roll out into smallish circles and cook on a hot frying pan (no oil). they are delicious hot with butter, yum

Ooh, one thing I have picked up is that you should roast your potato skins when you cook them with olive oil and see salt for about an hour and a half and they turn into these amazing crisps. Really. Unexpectedly. Nice.

Sea salt, not see salt.

My tart is in the oven. It looks like glorified cheese and onion crisps! Will report back once eaten!

OK, tart demolished. I used cheddar instead of goats' cheese, and we had it with omelette as it's not really a main dish on its own. I added seasoning, and a sausage that was lurking in the fridge. It tasted lovely but looked a bit of a hotchpotch!

Ease? Very easy. I used a normal frying pan with the handle sticking out of the oven, to no ill effects :)

Enjoyed? Yes, it goes well with omelette and salad. Might be greasy on its own, as well as not very filling.

Will you cook it again? Yes. Next time I'll use an ovenproof dish, fry some peppers with the onions, then crack eggs over it before baking in oven. The basic potatoes/cheese/onion combo is a winner.

Learn anything new about potatoes? No.

Haven't mad the goat's cheese and potato tart yet because I forgot to buy the goat's cheese when last shopping but do have to say that the list of ingredients/recipe seem a little short of robust.....

Mmmmmm love goats cheese, the 'tarts' should be named something else as I think of tarts being pastry.....however they were delicious, my fave ingredients, but I added a sprinkle of sweetcorn and ate them with salad. Very easy to cook, I kept the heat low so they cooked slowly. Tips for spuds....when using sliced potatoes in a recipe don't bother peeling them, lifes too short!

The kebabs were too dry for my kids as predicted, so I ended up with a couple more. It was okay, I do like the idea of dinner on a stick, but I think I'd fiddle with the recipe a lot.

DD decided on the Chicken and Potato kebab.

Potatoes took about 10 mins longer to cook than stated in the recipe. I don't have a grill and they were too long for my small George Forman so I ended up using the oven for the final cooking stages. I served them with a mint and yoghurt dip as I knew DD would say they were too dry. Loved the combination of the marinade though.
We had them with rice as DD is a salad dodger
I think next time I would add more veg to the skewers or maybe serve with corn on the cob

My potato tip is save your peelings, give them a rinse and pat dry, put them on a baking tray with a slug of olive oil and sea salt place in the oven at 220/gas 6 for 45 mins, leave to cool and use them for dips with homemade hummus/tomato salsa/onion & garlic (or shop bought) :o Delish

We did the kebabs and the tart last night with the DSC and DD's. All ate the Kebabs and generally consesus was yummy, and seconds. Goats chees tart not quite so popular as it felt quite greasy in your mouth. I enjoyed it though!

It was easy enough I felt, I'm no James Martin but it was a yummy heealthy (with a salad) dinner that made us all happy.

I have another (very basic) potato tip in that if you use an apple corer in potatos, you can then put bits of cheese/herbs/garlic in them and then replace the potato with the corer. Simple but effective.

I Proper love Potato's I do

We did the potato and chicken kebabs tonight. Yummy!

Preparation-wise, the recipe seemed about right. My potatoes were a bit on the big side, so I chopped them quite small, maybe about an inch in diameter. Whizzing up the marinade was no problem, I just used my hand blender though ds wrinkled his nose at the colour.
Had a minor panic when I couldn't find enough skewers! I was sure I should have more! Used some long handled teaspoons too, they worked just fine.
We have a gas grill which is quite fierce, so the cooking time was just perfect. Luckily, I also thought to line the grill pan with foil, as the marinade dripped off the chicken and burnt on to the pan.
Ds and I loved them, dh thought they were nice, but quite delicately flavoured. I think he'd prefer a bit more robust marinade, but then of course the kids wouldn't eat them. DD turned up her nose as usual . She doesn't like even a hint of burning on anything, but she did eat up most of the chicken, under threat of no pudding. However, on further interrogation, although kebab potatoes aren't as good as baked (her favourite) or chips, they were better than boiled or mashed spuds. Does anyone else's 7yo dd have to rank everything in favourite, second favourite, third etc? I didn't find them dry at all, perhaps because they were cooked fast?
All in all, I'd say this recipe was quite a success. However, the kebab making was a bit too fiddly for mid-week when I'm always in a hurry, so I'd save it for the weekend.
Also, I had some potatoes left over when I'd run out of skewer space and chicken, so I put them in the marinade and popped them in the space under the grill pan. They cooked a bit more slowly so weren't charred at all and were really scrummy - a bit like a hot potato salad.
I might try out the cheese tarts too, but I'd use cheddar or smoked cheese I think. I can't even cope with blue cheese, and frankly, i'm scared of goat's cheese.