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This Slow Cooker Italian herb potato recipe is one of those side dishes that earns its place at the table every single time. Just three ingredients, barely any prep, and the Slow Cooker does all the work while you go about your day.
Why You’ll Love It
Only 3 ingredients — potatoes, Italian dressing, and salt. That’s it.
Hands-off cooking — set it in the morning and it’s ready by supper, no babysitting required.
Surprisingly flavorful — the dressing cooks down into something tangy, herby, and rich in a way that tastes like you fussed.
Goes with everything — pot roast, baked chicken, pork chops, meatloaf. It fits right in anywhere.
Great leftovers — crisp them up in a skillet the next morning and they’re a whole different kind of good.
A Few Notes on Ingredients
The potatoes: I use small red or yellow ones, halved, maybe quartered if they’re on the larger side. They hold up better than russets in the Slow Cooker — russets will work, but they get a little grainy if they cook too long, and you have to watch them. I’ve used russets in a pinch and they were fine, just softer than I’d like. The reds have a firmer flesh and they look nicer on the plate, if that sort of thing matters to you.
The dressing: I use whatever brand is on sale. I’ve tried zesty Italian, I’ve tried regular, I’ve tried the store brand and the name brand and once a bottle that had been in the back of the refrigerator a little too long — that last one I don’t recommend, and I’m not sure why I even tried. Zesty gives you a sharper flavor; regular is milder. Either is good. I usually keep both on hand for other things — salads, marinades — so there’s almost always a bottle somewhere in this house.
The salt: just a half-teaspoon to start, then taste at the end. The dressing already has salt in it, so you don’t want to overdo it early on. My mother always salted things too early and too much, and I spent half my childhood wondering if food was supposed to taste the way it did at her table. It wasn’t until I started cooking for my own family that I understood how much easier it is to add salt at the end than to try to fix something that’s already too salty. There’s no fixing too salty. You just have to live with it.
Ingredients
2 to 2½ pounds small red or yellow potatoes, washed and halved (or quartered if they’re bigger — I eyeball this)
1 cup bottled Italian salad dressing, regular or zesty
About ½ teaspoon kosher salt, or a little more — taste it at the end and decide
Instructions
First thing: give the inside of your Slow Cooker a light coat of oil or nonstick spray. I didn’t do this the first few times I made this recipe and I spent twenty minutes scrubbing it afterwards, which sort of defeated the purpose of the whole effortless-supper idea. Don’t skip it.
Put your potatoes in — just pile them in, no need to arrange them artfully, nobody’s coming to photograph your slow cooker. Pour the cup of Italian dressing right over the top. Sprinkle on your salt. Then stir it all around so the potatoes get a good coat of the dressing. That’s really the whole setup.
Put the lid on. Cook on LOW for 4 to 5 hours, or on HIGH for about 2 to 3 hours. I almost always do LOW, because I’m usually starting this in the morning and I want it ready by suppertime, not by noon. The LOW-and-slow method also seems to give the dressing more time to really sink into the potatoes. Or maybe that’s just something I tell myself. I’m not a food scientist.
You’ll know they’re done when a fork goes through without resistance but the potatoes are still holding their shape — not falling apart, not grainy. If you’re unsure, test one. Eat it over the sink like I do and see how you feel about it.
Give them a good stir before you serve them, to get the cooking juices redistributed. Taste for salt. Serve them warm, with a spoonful of those herby juices ladled over the top. That part matters more than it might seem.
Variations
Adding sliced onions is something I resisted for a long time and then tried and had to admit was right, which is a sensation I find uncomfortable. The onions soften down and get sweet and they add something. A handful of baby carrots does a similar thing — more color, a little sweetness.
For a Sunday-supper version, I stir a tablespoon or two of butter in at the very end. It gives the potatoes a kind of glossy finish and makes the whole thing taste more indulgent than it is. Grated Parmesan or Romano over the top is also good, if you have it.
I tried adding chunks of Italian sausage once, thinking I could turn this into a whole meal. It worked, but it wasn’t quite right — too much going on, the flavors all muddying each other. I went back to the plain potato version.
Leftovers
They keep fine in the refrigerator, covered, for a few days. Reheat them in the microwave — they come out a little softer than they started, but still good. The better move, if you have any patience left in you, is to put them in a skillet with a little butter the next morning and let them brown up into something crispy. That version, with eggs and whatever meat is in the fridge, has gotten me through more slow mornings than I can count.
I’ve forgotten these in the back of the refrigerator more than once. Past day three or four, they start to get a little tired. Past day five, let them go. I’ve tried to save things that should have been thrown out and it never ends well — in cooking or in other areas of life, but that’s a different kind of post.
One thing I should have mentioned earlier: if you’re feeding a crowd, just add more potatoes and a little more dressing. This recipe is forgiving. It scales up without complaint, which is more than I can say for most things.