Gratin Potato - Mission Toscano

Toscano is one of my favorite restaurants in Bangalore and I did not want to miss the cooking demo they had last week on French cuisine and who would miss the amazing three course meal....for a price of course...it was a nice experience ...got to learn a lot and also met few nice people out there.

I got to learn 4 dishes and I will try to create it in my kitchen and it is going to be called 'Mission Toscano'......yeah I have a thing for silly names....how else do you think I ended up with 'Cherie's STOLEN recipes".........hopefully I will get to take part in the next months demo too.....I can add more recipes to the 'Mission Toscano' list

Gratin potato is a very simple accompaniment with pastas and steaks......I think, I am more of a 'mashed potato' person.

Ingredients
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• 5 large Potatoes
• 200ml Milk
• 200ml Cream
• 1 medium Onion ,chopped
• 1tbsp chopped or crushed Garlic
• Salt to taste
• Pepper to taste
• 100grams Mozzarella , grated
• 100grams Cheddar, grated
• 2 sprigs fresh Rosemary
• 4 to5 tbsp Butter

Method
1.Prepare cream: Place a saucepan on medium flame, add 1 tbsp butter ,when butter melts add chopped onion and garlic and fry for few minutes,till onion is translucent.Now add milk,cream,salt and pepper.Throw in rosemary sprigs and bring to a boil.Keep this aside.Let the cream be little salty,the potato will absorb it.
2.Remove the skin of the potatoes (do not soak in water-aim is to retain as much starch as possible in the potatoes.it is the starch that is going to hold the gratin together).Cut potatoes to thin slices-I used a mandolin to get super thin slice, you can test your knife skills.
3.Blanch the potatoes -Throw the sliced potatoes into a pot of salted boiling water and blanch for 2 to 3 minutes (more time if the potato slices are thick),drain the water.
4.Now assemble the gratin- butter an 8 inch baking pan, get set for layering ,put one layer of cream,arrange the blanched potato slices on top of cream, now another layer of cream,sprinkle some salt and pepper,apply tablespoon of butter and spread around, sprinkle some grated cheese on top now potato layer and cream again butter, repeat layers.I got up to 5 layers.
5.Let the last layer be the cream.top with the rosemary sprig and bake in preheated oven for 25 minutes.Remove sprinkle grated cheese and bake again for 10 more minutes till the top browns slightly.