Make a feast from this budget staple

by Romy Gill

There are certain ingredients we find it easy to overlook, and so it is with the humble potato. Yet potatoes are so versatile that there are countless ways to prepare them for a side dish, or to give them a starring role in mains from curries to samosas. They can be squeezed onto an unused shelf in the oven above or below whatever you’re cooking, or put centre stage of breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Potatoes are an integral part of India’s cuisine, forming the basis of dishes from potato-based curries, through spiced potato cakes, to a flatbread dough made using mashed potato. Because they take on the flavour of whichever spices and oils they’re cooked with, you can make delicious dishes from them without buying lots of extra expensive ingredients. All of the following recipes work well with a good all-rounder, such as the Maris Piper, which is delicious in curries but also good roasted, mashed, fried, chipped or baked.

Potatoes as a side dish

Spices are paired with potatoes in any number of Indian side dishes. Bombay potatoes are one of the most popular sides, often served alongside a curry.

One of my favourite side dishes is aloo chaat, a combination of many flavours and textures all in one bowl. I make it with green chillies, mint and coriander chutney, tamarind chutney, yoghurt, fennel seeds and pomegranate.

I also add potatoes to a sabzi, an Indian spiced vegetable dish, to make it more substantial.

Potatoes all day

There are regional potato dishes throughout India, and potatoes are eaten for every meal. They are cooked as the spiced filling for a crêpe in the Southern Indian breakfast dish, masala dosa.

Elsewhere in the country you’ll find a host of potato dishes for every meal, including tender, spiced chunks of potato nestled in crispy samosa pastry; deep-fried balls of spiced mash coated in gram flour known as batata vada; the hearty and satisfying Northern Indian potato and pea curry (aloo dum); potatoes cooked with greens and spices in saag aloo; and potatoes simmered with cauliflower and spices in aloo gobi.

The simple baked potato can be taken up a notch with spices – try my recipe for a baked potato filling made with cheese and spices. And vada pav, a roll stuffed with mashed and spiced potato fritters, is also popular.

In Bengal, you can enjoy a bhapa aloo, baby potatoes cooked with panch phoron (a Bengali five-spice mix), mustard paste, coconut and curd cheese. In Bihar, litti chokha is one of the most common dishes: stuffed dough balls served with chokha (spicy mashed potatoes or aubergine).

During trips to Kashmir, I tasted the hearty and satisfying dum oluv – potatoes simmered in a spicy, red, yoghurt-based gravy. A variation is bharwan dum oluv, in which baby potatoes are stuffed with khoya (curd) or paneer and spices and served in the same rich gravy – a more labour-intensive dish, but especially delicious.

As potatoes grew in popularity across India, they began to replace other ingredients in some regional dishes. In Gujarat, potatoes are often added to khichdi (a simple rice and lentil dish) instead of the pulses. In Bihar, the khichdi (known as khichri) is served with aloo ka bharta – mashed potatoes with onions, chilli and mustard oil.

Fried potatoes

Fried potatoes are common in all sorts of recipes, from Bengali alu bhaja (crispy fried potatoes usually served with rice and dal for lunch) to alu bhujia from Northern India (a dry snack that is almost crisp-like, made with potatoes and gram flour).

One of my favourite recipes is aloo tikki, potato patties my mum would make once a week. These are sometimes filled with paneer, sometimes with squashed peas. She served them with spiced chickpeas, on their own, or with chutneys.

Potato parathas

A potato paratha is a great base for many fillings – including potatoes in the dough makes it very soft, with a texture that is moist but crispy when cooked. I make a kati roll with it.

Aloo paratha is stuffed with a spiced potato filling and cooked in ghee or butter, and is a staple in the north, east and west of India.

How did potatoes become popular in India?

It’s thought the Portuguese introduced potatoes to the Malabar Coast in the south west of India, where they were known as batata. Later in the 17th century, the British East India Company introduced potatoes – known as alu – to Bengal and beyond, and incentivised the poorer members of the community by giving them free potato plants and a small payment to grow them.

In 1856, when Nawab Wajid Ali Shah (the last King of Awadh) lost his kingdom and was exiled to Calcutta, it is said his chefs began to add potatoes to biryanis to replace more expensive ingredients like meat. This paved the way for the famous Kolkata biryani, which features golden-brown fried potatoes and mild spice.