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Gratin Dauphinois
No cheese, no eggs — just potatoes lacquered in garlicky cream that reduces in the oven to a custard; the Dauphiné's quiet masterpiece
- Prep
- 20 min
- Cook
- 90 min
- Serves
- 8
Ingredients
- Waxy-floury potatoes (Agria/Desiree) — 1.5 kg
- Double cream — 500 ml
- Whole milk — 250 ml
- Garlic — 15 g (10 g simmered, 1 clove for the dish)
- Unsalted butter — 30 g
- Fine salt — 12 g
- White pepper — 1 g
- Nutmeg — 0.6 g
- Bay leaf — 1
- Thyme — 2 sprigs
Method
- Rub a gratin dish with a cut garlic clove; butter it thickly.
- Peel potatoes; slice 3 mm on a mandoline. DO NOT rinse — the starch binds the cream.
- Warm cream, milk, sliced garlic, bay, thyme, salt, pepper and nutmeg to 85 °C; infuse 10 min; remove bay and thyme.
- Layer potatoes flat in the dish, pouring warm cream between layers; finish with cream just reaching the top layer.
- Press down; bake at 150 °C for 75 min until a knife meets no resistance.
- Raise to 200 °C for 10–15 min to bronze the top.
- Rest 15 min — it carves into neat spoonfuls instead of collapsing.