Fried potato and cheese cakes with baked tomatoes, basil and garlic

One of the good things about working with fresh foods is that you can get the maximum amount of flavour from the food without really having much to do with it. And I think its great to work with fresh fruits and vegetables, not the least because there is so much you can do with them, with so little.

Today I made these wonderful little potato and cheese cakes, which are sort of like aaloo cutlets, except they are much better, if I may say so, and for some fresh infusion in the palatte, some baked tomatoes in basil and garlic.

So here's what I did.

For the potatoes:

I had about 5 medium sized fresh potatoes, and the thing to look for while getting fresh ones, is look for ones which have their skin breaking out in places, revealing the golden flesh inside. You boil them till they are tender. Meanwhile, I took half a cup of mozerella and half a cup of cheddar cheese, grate them together finely. Plus set aside a few cubes of cheddar to be filled inside the potato cake. Now you can use any kind of cheese you prefer, but I really like the milky strands of mozerella and its mild sort of pungent taste.

Ok, so when the potatoes are boiled, I peel them while they're hot, the skin comes off so much more easily that way, then mash them up with a fork in a big mixing bowl, add the grated cheeses, a good shake of salt, fresh ground pepper, chilli flakes for some heat, a tablespoon of mustard paste, some fresh corrainder leaves chopped roughly and the juice of one lemon. Mixed it all together. Then heated some olive oil for frying, got shallow bowls for some bread crumbs, cornflour and one beaten egg. Shaped each potatoe cake with my hands, put a tiny cube of cheddar in each, dipped them in the egg, then the cornflour, the egg again, and finally the bread crumbs. When I had shaped four of these, I fried them till they were golden brown, then put them on a platter, spritzed some lemon juice on top, and garnished with fresh corrainder leaves and lemon.

For the tomatoes:

Use the freshest tomatoes possible. I got together four medium sized tomatoes, cut them in half. Slicked a baking tray with some olive oil, put the tomatoes, cut side down into the oiled tray, then put the cut side up again, and covered them with crushed garlic, fresh ground pepper, salt, and last but not the least basil leaves. Wonderful aromatic little leaves, these will do wonders for your tomatoes. Finally some more olive oil on top of the tomatoes and the juice of one lemon squirted all over. And what this is going to do is, that its going to make some wonderful aromatic juices blended together with the tomatoe, garlic, basil, lemon. Give them about an hour in the oven on gas mark 4, turning them the other side with some tongs after about 30 minutes. When they're done, I take them out of the tray with the tong, and pour all the delicious aromatic juices over the tomatoes. And I'm telling you the flavour is going to hit your mouth and infuse it with a fresh almost summery taste.Voila!

And you can serve it with roasted lamb chops, baked chicken, or beef steaks. All yum!