cooking potatoes

I ran into a very nice woman and dog the other day and we walked around the fields and talked. She's a good cook and, when I told her I grow potatoes, she asked "what do you do with potatoes?" (with her expression implying "why on earth would anyone want to eat potatoes...")

I sheepishly told her, "well I like to make French fries....." Then I thought it best to change the subject.

But I do enjoy cooking with potatoes.

In early summer, when I first dig small handfuls of new potatoes, I boil them briefly, chop, toss with olive oil or mayonnaise and herbs, and then serve as a very simple potato salad on greens with fresh peas.

Later we roast new fingerlings on the grill. Parboil no more than 4 minutes, toss with olive oil and rosemary, and then roast on a metal roasting tray. Yummy with a nice local grilled fish, fowl or meat.

And once the summer squash is coming out of your ears, I layer big white potatoes and sweet yellow squash in a casserole with onions, mild cheese and bread crumbs. This one goes best with a chardonnay and a big bouquet of garden roses. (I can't wait for summer....)

In the fall, when big baskets of crisp round tubers have been dug, there are my husband's favorites, fluffy baked Russets and pan-fried potatoes for breakfast with onions and peppers.

Unfortunately there is winter too. I didn't grow enough garden potatoes myself to last past fall, but I bought bags of beautiful spuds grown at our local CSA farm. (BTW: Why do these taste so much fresher and crispier and more flavorful than store bought? I can't figure this one out. Are the store bought ones last year's? Were they stored in an oven?) Anyway, I've been using these potatoes in warm soups. On New Year's Day we enjoyed potato pancakes with breakfast. And again I'm working to perfect my French fries. Photos and recipes of these winter versions of potatoes are here:




Potato pancakes (recipe from The Victory Garden Cookbook by Marion Morash)

1/2 lb potatoes (about 5), peeled and grated
1 egg, beaten
1/2 tsp salt
1 Tbs flour
1/4 cup grated onion
1 Tbs cream
olive oil for frying

Squeeze potatoes dry in a towel. Mix with egg all ingredients except oil. Heat oil to cover bottom of frying pan. Add potato mix and flatten it on pan. Fry about 3-5 minutes per side or until well browned. Serve hot.




French Fried potatoes (and other roots):

(I have a nice new fryer with a thermostat that's very nice for fries. The important thing is not to overload it. Small batches work best.)

Potatoes: wash and slice potatoes, and then rinse and dry with a towel. Fry 3 min in preheated vegetable oil at 340*F. Drain and cool. Heat oil to 375*F. Fry until browned (2-4 min). Drain and serve immediately. With sea salt...

Carrots, parsnips or beets: Wash, peel and slice. Heat oil to 375*F. Fry until browned (2-4 min). Drain and serve immediately. With sea salt...

Skippy's vegetable recipes
potatoes (Solanum tuberosum)

squash bread

My evening activity is making zucchini/squash bread. (While watching the awesome Chinese Olympics opening!) I grated a pile of overgrown squash - the ones that I didn't find until too late. My mom said to look for a car with an open window and put them in. But no, I grated them all. I ended up with a pile of baggies full that I froze.

I have been reading through Marion Morash's Victory Garden Cookbook again (I read this every year I think). Lots of squash ideas. I will try using my frozen grated squash in soups, pasta sauce and squash breads and cakes later.

Kathy's Summer Squash Bread
(From The Victory Garden Cookbook, by Marion Morash, where its called Lynn's Spicy Zucchini Bread. This version has my changes.)

3 cups flour: 1 cup whole spelt flour and 2 cups all purpose white flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp cloves
3 eggs
1 3/4 cup sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
3 cups lightly packed grated summer squashes
1 cup raisins
3/4 cup nuts (I used sliced almonds)

Mix the dry ingredients together. Beat the eggs with the sugar, oil and vanilla. Gradually beat in the dry ingredients. Stir in squash, raisins and nuts. Divide between two 9x5-inch loaf pans generously greased with butter. Bake in preheated 350 degree F oven until done (50-70 minutes).

Cucurbita pepo (squash)
Skippy's vegetable recipes

greens with potatoes and onions

I made a terrific casserole yesterday. All veggies from my garden or my recent CSA distribution: collard and beet greens, celeriac, potatoes and onions. Next time I'll make more, as this is really good the next day too.

Its a good warm dish for a freezing cold night. Its about 20°F outside now. I'm doing my best to avoid going out at all but the warmest times of the day. Bbbrrrr!

The recipe is adapted from my basic vegetable cooking resource: Marion Morash's Victory Garden Cookbook.

Greens with Potatoes and Onions:
5 Tbs butter
2 C chopped greens
salt and pepper
1 1/2 C sliced onions
Béchamel sauce (below)
2 C sliced cooked potatoes and celeriac (or potatoes only)
2/3 C grated cheese (your choice, I used cheddar and Parmesan)

Preheat oven to 370°F. Peel celeriac and cut into 1/2 inch slices. Cook celeriac and potatoes until tender - celeriac about 8 minutes, potatoes about 20 minutes. Make Béchamel sauce (below). Melt 2 Tbs butter in saute pan. Add chopped greens and saute until moisture is evaporated. Season with salt and pepper and set aside. In same pan melt 2 Tbs butter and saute onions until lightly browned. Butter 9" square baking pan. Smooth some Béchamel sauce into pan and then layer on potatoes and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Layer onions on top, and then spoon on the remaining Béchamel. Sprinkle on half the cheese and cover with greens. Sprinkle on remaining cheese and then dot with butter. Bake in preheated oven 30 minutes until heated through and lightly browned on top.

Béchamel sauce:
2 1/2 Tbs butter
3 Tbs flour
2 cups milk
1/2 tsp salt
pepper

Melt butter, add flour, and whisk to remove lumps. Cook 2-3 minutes until flour is golden. Remove from pan, add milk and beat vigorously until smooth. Bring to boil and salt, simmer at least 5 min to remove four taste. (Simmering longer will improve flavor.) Season with salt and pepper.

Variations:
- Marion suggests using turnips, but I really dislike these. Use at your own risk.
- Or make recipe using leftover mashed potatoes.
- Or top with buttered breadcrumbs.
- To omit bechamel - place well buttered greens on the bottom, cover with whipped potatoes beaten with butter, milk and and egg yolk. Dot with butter and bake.
- These flavors go great together. I bet lots of variations will work well.

Skippy's vegetable recipes
potatoes (Solanum tuberosum)

super kale soup

I planted this kale early last spring. It was bitter when tasted it in September. Not now. It made one of the best bowls of soup I've ever had.

We've had several good cold nights now, which helps improve the flavor of kale. Today, at 25F, as our first serious snow started to fall, I picked a big bunch. Since I also had some nice dried beans from my summer garden, I opened my Portuguese kale soup recipe.

Back in September and October, when these beans ripened, I didn't have time to do anything with them. I threw them in a bowl, put it in the basement and forgot about them. Now they are beautifully dried. I shelled both "tongues of fire" cranberry horticultural beans and green beans "Provider " and "Maxibel".


My Portuguese kale soup recipe is from my favorite vegetable cookbook: The Victory Garden Cookbook by Marion Morash
Portuguese Kale Soup
1 lb kale (6-8 cups)
1 lb potatoes
1 lb smoked sausage (kielbasa, linguica or chorizo)
--(I used local keilbasa from Stillman's Turkey Farm)
1 cup chopped onions
1/2 cup chopped carrots
4 garlic cloves
2 T olive oil
2 T butter
2 qt water or broth
2 c peeled, chopped and seeded tomatoes
1 1/2 cup cooked kidney beans
salt and pepper

Strip leaves from washed kale. Cut diagonally into wide slices. Wash, peel and chop potatoes. Cut sausage into slices, cook and drain fat. In soup pot, saute onions, carrots and garlic in oil and butter, until softened - about 5 minutes. Add potatoes and broth. Simmer partially covered 10-15 minutes or until the potatoes are cooked. Stir in tomatoes and beans. Simmer 5-10 minutes. Add kale and sausage then cook 5-10 minutes. Season to taste.


I do have to comment on how delicious the beans were. These were very easy to grow and are so yummy in soup. Beans are a really good source of home grown protein.

potatoes (Solanum tuberosum)
Skippy's vegetable recipes
Kale (Brassica oleracea, Acephala Group)

making red sauce

With four big bowls full of ripe tomatoes on my counter, last night I made up a quick red sauce. This was the real quick version. Just chop, cook, remove skins, then freeze. Oh, and lick out the pan - it was VERY tasty! I think the mix of so many varieties made it taste so good.

tomatoes (Solanum lycopersicum)
Skippy's vegetable recipes

HOT! habanero chile

I finally got the courage to try one on my garden habanero chiles - described as the hottest chile in the world.

I was warned to wear gloves, but I thought I'd try without first. I sliced the orange chile open and touched the cut edge with my finger and then tasted just a little bit, very carefully, only on the tip of my tongue. Well.... after scrubbing my hands several times with soap, drinking lots of water and washing it down with cheese and bread (and wine), I put baggies on my hands (since I didn't have any gloves) and even wrapped a towel over my face. Those are HOT!!! I will agree - wear gloves!

I was nervous about using them in our dinner. But went ahead and tried.

Recipe for chicken wings with chiles: Put 2 lbs of chicken wings in the oven at 375F for 2 hours uncovered in a thick cast iron pan. Add chopped chiles (I used 1 habanero and 1/2 Anaheim chile) and some barbecue sauce (I used Bulls Eye regular). Cook covered 30 min in oven. Pour off oil. Add more sauce. Cook uncovered another 30 min.

They were really delicious. But surprisingly, not very hot. I think I could have used at least twice the number of chiles, or added Tabasco or Frank's hot sauce as I usually do. My Anaheims are mild, and this one had a bug problem so I could only use half of it. For both chiles I threw away the seeds.

chile and bell peppers (Capsicum)
Skippy's vegetable recipes

Sunday night pizza

I wanted to share a photo of the delicious pizza we've been making often this winter. The sauce is from my garden last summer. I threw in many different tomato varieties, some carrots, basil, onions, cooked it down and froze it. The pizza also has the last of the cayenne chiles I grew, dried and crumbled. A delicious pizza. A taste of my garden on winter weekends.

We make a fairly simple pizza. My son makes the dough in the bread machine. A simple recipe from Beard on Bread, by James Beard. Mix 2 1/2 cups white flour, 1/2 tsp salt, 3/4 tsp active dry yeast, 1 cup warm water. Add more flour or water to give good dough consistency. That's all.

For the topping: sprinkle on lots of coarsely chopped garlic, a thin layer of pizza sauce, crumble on some cooked hamburger (ideally a nice local ground sirloin), then mozzarella and Parmesan cheese, crumbled dried chile pepper, and drizzle with olive oil.

We grilled this one outside. That was the less simple part of this dinner, since there was about 3 inches of ice to chop for access to the grill. But the flavor of the grill really makes it perfect! A couple of winter radish martinis puts it way over the top - but why not!

Skippy's vegetable recipes

capucijner peas for the New Year

I feel like its a BIG day! We ate my Capucijner peas tonight. Our first taste. Absolutely delicious!!!

I tasted them every step of the way. I'm not sure why the bacon is needed. Really like gilding a lily. The peas taste like ... peas. Almost like fresh summer peas in the middle winter. Aaahhh....

I found a simple recipe (below) for cooking Capucijner peas with bacon. The photo of the cooked peas at this site shows a nice pile of peas on the plate and sounds a lot like my aunt described eating often as she grew up in Holland.

Yesterday, I boiled the peas for about 30 minutes in just enough water to cover them. I had to keep adding more, since they really plumped up nicely and absorbed a lot of water. Then I let them soak overnight in the refrigerator.

As the recipe says, I cooked bacon, then sauteed onion slices in the bacon fat. I added the cooked bacon to the Capucijners as they warmed in their juices. (I tried not to snack on too many tasty little peas as they cooked....)

I served the cooked peas with a small piece of pork chop and a big salad with crumbled goat cheese and fresh picked Florida avocado. Not too bad at all with a nice glass of California chardonnay.

We ate my entire harvest tonight. It made two nice servings. I figure from the peas I saved for seed for next year, I will be able to grow about 10 times as much next year.

Here's a comment from Patrick at Bifurcated Carrots with lots of information about cooking Capucijners. When I get a bigger harvest, I'll try his soup.

Recipe from Klary Koopmans: "It's really easy. I usually fry up some smoked bacon lardons. The amount is really up to you - depending on how much you like bacon (smile.gif) When they are nice and crisp, I remove them from the pan (leaving the fat behind). In the bacon fat I fry a couple of onions, sliced into rings. When the onions are almost ready (nicely browned and crisp), heat up the capucijner peas. (heat them up in their liquid, don't let it come to the boil). Drain them, add the bacon, and warm through over low heat. Add a little pepper, you probably don't need salt because of the bacon. You could mix in the onions, but I like to serve them separately together with all the trimmings (mustards, pickles, etc.)

Pisum sativum
Skippy's vegetable recipes

cooked beans

I cooked up my shell beans yesterday. They aren't half as pretty cooked, but they were tasty.

RECIPE: To cook them, I the beans the beans in water 1 hour with 2 carrots, an onion and a bay leaf and then refrigerated overnight. The next evening I sauteed a sliced onion, carrot, garlic and piece of bell pepper in olive oil then added the beans and three oven dried tomatoes and cooked a bit. Then I added some fresh basil leaves.

Fabaceae
Skippy's vegetable recipes

pizza with tomato sauce

We have a convenient tomato processor that separates the skins and seeds from tomato juice and pulp. We add quartered tomatoes to the hopper and crank them through. The skin and seeds come out one side and the pulp comes out the other.

We ran about 25 big tomatoes through the tomato machine and make a nice batch of puree, which we simmered about an hour to make a nice sauce for pizza. We used a bit of this and froze the rest in baggies.

Almost everything is better grilled - pizza too! I cheat on the dough and pick up premade from Bertucci's. Then layer on fresh garlic, olive oil, tomato sauce, basil leaves, sliced tomatoes, onions and some salt. Add mozzarella and goat cheese. Grill over a hot hardwood charcoal fire on pizza stones.

Aaahh! Delicious!

Solanum lycopersicum
Skippy's vegetable recipes