Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Mini Potato & Kale Gratins Featuring Summer Fresh Kale Dip

Getting to take part in the Summer Fresh 2013 Blogger Tour was a ton of fun and a great way to learn about how a large and successful company like that runs, but one of the best parts of the day was getting to try out a number of Summer Fresh's new products! All of the products I got to try were fantastic, but the one that I couldn't get off my mind was, surprise surprise, Summer Fresh Kale Dip.

My love affair with kale continues with this new and easy way to make kale apart of your diet. It's easy to get sick of kale when you are continually using it in the same way, which for me is always a mostly raw salad, but Summer Fresh's new Kale Dip allows you to make kale apart of just about any meal in a new and interesting way. Before ending our day-long tour, Summer Fresh handed each of us a large box full of exciting new Summer Fresh products (with the kale dip being a last minute addition) and asked us to play around with them to create an appetizer AKA "Appy" recipe featuring one of the products they sent home with us. The best part about all this? All of the submitted Appy recipes will be voted on by the public, and the winner will win a grand prize worth $850!

With a fridge full of new Summer Fresh products I was inspired to cook up a storm! I tried making a number of different recipes using the products provided, some of which were tasty successes, and others...not so much. The hands down winner in my book was the Mini Potato & Kale Gratins that I made, featuring Summer Fresh's Kale Dip. I knew I wanted my recipe to feature mostly vegetables, with very few ingredients and steps to make. With scalloped potatoes still fresh in my mind from perfecting them at chef school, I had the idea of creating mini potato gratins using Summer Fresh Kale Dip in between the layers of potato and gruyere cheese, as opposed to the most commonly used milk or cream. I had no clue if my recipe would work out, especially after seeing the disaster that was my  baked bloomin' onion that I had intended to be dipped into Summer Fresh's Jalapeno Greek Yogurt Dip, but amazingly, they turned out so fantastic! The tiny gratins, which were made in muffin tins, are the perfect Appy size, were crazy easy to make, and tasted so incredibly delicious thanks to the creaminess that the Summer Fresh Kale Dip added to the dish. Whether I win the contest or not, I already feel like a winner having this great recipe to turn to for my next party or gathering!

See it up on the Summer Fresh site here!

Ingredients:
3 Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled & very thinly sliced
1 x 227g/8oz Summer Fresh Kale Dip
about 3/4 cup gruyere cheese, grated
butter, to grease pan
salt & pepper, to taste

Directions:
  1. Preheat oven to 375ยบ. Grease a 12-cup muffin tin with buter.
  2. Layer one or two potato slices into the bottom of each muffin cup. 
  3. Top with about 1/2 tsp Kale Dip, a very light sprinkle of gruyere, and a bit of salt and pepper. Continue layering potatoes with the kale dip, cheese, salt, and pepper until potatoes reach the top of the cup. 
  4. Cover tray with tin foil and bake for about 30-minutes, or until tender when inserted into the centre with a knife. Remove foil half way through cooking. Run a knife around each cup and carefully pop out and serve immediately. 
Listening To:

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Looks AMAZING! We can't wait to try it. It seems like a healthy comfort food, which is always a plus in our books.

Great to meet you at the blog event!

- Monica