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Liquorsmiths Wild Mushroom and Gin Potato Gratin

A beautiful and rich, flavourful gratin that works both as a side or a main. Absolutely delicious!
Course Main Course, Side Dish
Cuisine French
Servings 4 people

Equipment

  • shallow dish

Ingredients
  

  • 75 ml boiling water
  • 30 g dried wild mushrooms The recipe calls for 20g, but my pot was 30g so I stuck the lot in.
  • 350 ml double cream
  • 6 cloves garlic cloves, peeled
  • 1 whole red onion The recipe calls for 2 shallots but I couldn't find any at the shop.
  • 1 tsp carroway seeds
  • 1 whole bay leaf
  • 1 tsp allspice berries
  • 1 tsp black peppercorns
  • 75 ml Old Tom 12 gin The recipe calls for Old Tom 55 gin, which I didn't have. 55 has an aquavit quality, with carroway and dill, so a herbaceous, fresh profile will suffice.
  • 1 pinch sea salt and black pepper
  • 400 g waxy potatoes
  • 300 g celeriac The recipe calls for 200g but I didn't want to waste the leftovers so put it all in.
  • 200 g Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese There is no cheese in the recipe, but for me a potato gratin just has to have cheese.

Instructions
 

  • Pour the boiling water over the mushrooms, cover and leave them to soften.
  • Put the cream in the pan with the garlic, onion (or shallots), caraway, bay leaf, all spice and peppercorns. Heat slowly, stirring and taking care not to boil the cream over. Cover and leave to infuse for at least an hour, the drain through a sieve and stir the gin though the cream. Taste the cream and season it well.
  • At this point, I didn't want to discard the left over bits from the infused cream, so I whipped them up in a food processor to layer through the gratin.
  • Drain the wild mushrooms, snip them into smaller pieces with scissors and add them to your infused cream.
  • Grate your Parmigiano-Reggiano and slice both the potatoes and the celeriac super fine. You can do it by hand with a bit of pateince, but I used the slicer on my cheese grater for ease. Careful of your fingers!
  • Preheat the oven to 170C. Layer the potatoes, mushrooms and celeriac into a ceramic dish, along with a little of the blitzed onions and cheese, seasoning as you go.
  • Pour over the infused cream, cover in foil and cook in the oven for an hour and a half.
  • Remove the foil, turn the oven up to 200C and pop back in for another 15 mins until the top is golden.
  • Once it's ready, let it sit for 30 minutes. The potatoes will soak up the liquid, making for a delicious, juicy gratin.

Notes

This recipe is my attempt at the wild mushroom and gin potato gratin from the Liquorsmiths Cookbook. I've listed the recipe details as stated in the book, and have noted any tweaks I have made.
Keyword cream, gin, gratin, Liquorsmiths Cookbook, mushroom, potato, potato gratin