A great, inexpensive dish for one or a whole crowd. I love these when I add them to one of my sheet pan roasted dinners. But pan roasting works, too. These little fellas are sort of like your best French fries—rounds instead of sticks or planks—crispy outside, soft and tender inside. Yum. Can be varied indefinitely.

The Irish figured out a long time ago that potatoes can be good in many different ways. And choosing either starchier potatoes, like russets, or creamy potatoes, like Yukon Golds, will give you a very different, but equally good, taste and texture experience.

Keys: Let the potatoes roast until you get the brown crispness you want on the outside. Don’t burn them, but blackened edges are ideal and add flavor.

1. Buy a bag of good quality, small red or white potatoes (1-1.5 inches diameter). My store sells a 1.5 lb. bag of organic reds that works well.
2. Wash, dry, then cut one pound of the potatoes in halves, or quarter the big ones to get pieces about the same size.
3. Put 3 tablespoons of olive oil in your skillet and heat over med-hi heat until shimmering. Choose a large enough skillet so that all the potato pieces are touching bottom somewhere.
4. Add potatoes and a liberal  sprinkling of Kosher (or not) salt and pepper. Lower heat to medium.
5. Add some additional seasonings such as thyme, marjoram, rosemary, sage plus red pepper flakes or not to your liking. I take a sampling of several herbs from my grow-box garden and experiment.
6. Let these pan roast for at least five minutes before turning. Then, turn, and let roast for another five minutes.
7. Turn again and keep this routine up until they’re done the way you like them, at least 20 minutes.
8. Turn off the heat. To finish, sprinkle with finely chopped parsley, fresh or dried, and stir to incorporate. Dress with a little olive oil or homemade vinaigrette if they seem too dry, but don’t get them too wet!
9. Serve as soon as possible. Can be stored for several days in fridge. Fantastic as a leftover.

Serving ideas

1. Crack one or more eggs onto the cooked mixture. Cover the skillet and let the eggs cook until just set. Serve one egg and the potatoes it sits on to each person.
2. Start out sautéing two to four slices of bacon, diced, per pound of potatoes and cook the potatoes in the bacon fat.
3. Add other stuff: sautéed onion, mushroom, or bell peppers, for example
4. Add grated cheese, any kind that melts well, toward the end, or just after turning off heat. Let it melt.