Skip This Step When Making Hasselback Potatoes (You're Ruining Their Texture!)

Crispy, creamy, salty, and loaded with all of your favorite toppings, Hasselback potatoes don't just look impressive — they bring a ton of flavor to the dinner table. There are tons of methods out there to get Hasselback potatoes just right, and it can be tough to figure out how to create a crispy exterior while maintaining a smooth, perfectly-cooked interior. Cookbook author and chef Rick Martinez, who launched his new Substack Sazón, spoke exclusively with Chowhound about the mistake you'll want to avoid when making Hasselback potatoes — and exactly what you need to know to create the super-crispy edges you want.

"I know some people parboil them — don't do that," he instructs. Partially boiling before baking the potato is setting you up to create a mushy mess, he says. Start with a raw russet or Yukon Gold potato — stay away from more waxy varieties such red new potatoes. Since you're going to be eating the skin, be sure to scrub your potatoes super-clean (using white vinegar to clean potatoes can help bring them up to restaurant-level). Then, make your almost-through-the-potato slices crazy-thin. "Like kettle potato chip thin," Martinez explains. (Try using the chopstick trick to get super-thin slices without cutting through to the bottom of the potato.) 

To ensure your potatoes unfurl beautifully and don't stick, Martinez has a simple tip. "Brush each potato with oil, butter, or a combination of the two before you bake. Get a little inside each cut," he says. 

After you've got your potatoes topped with butter or oil, you'll want to start the first stage of the roasting process. Before you place your spuds in the oven, Rick Martinez says, be sure you've given each one plenty of space — if your sheet pan is crowded, your potatoes will create too much steam, making it harder to get crispy edges. You'll also want to be sure you're using plenty of heat at the start of the roasting process. "The best way to do it is a dual-stage roast: You want to start high heat, like 425, 450," recommends Martinez. "Cover them with foil for about half the cooking time, so that's probably like 20 to 35 minutes, and then uncover and baste the potato with fat and cook for another 20 to 35 minutes."

If you're adding additional toppings like cheese or bacon, you'll want to place them on the potato for the last few minutes of cooking. This is also the time to pull out all the stops. If your oven has a fan, you'll want to put it to use, as Martinez says that this oven feature will help you get crispier edges. "Basically anytime that I want a crispy outside, I use the fan for some amount of time," he says, adding that this technique works even for treats like cookies. "Not the whole way through," he clarifies, "but usually like the last five minutes." With these tips, your Hasselback potatoes will have the perfect texture inside and out.