Three-Cheese Scalloped Potates

Scalloped Potatoes with New Potatoes

Update on Eileen's Scalloped Potatoes Post from a couple of years ago (Christmas Dinner):

I just made these potatoes with new baby potatoes. I sliced them thinly and layered with the sliced onion, cheese, flour, butter, salt & pepper as directed.

I used the cheese I had in the house, so mine was a combination of parmesan, cheddar and creamy toscana. It came out perfectly!

I am just sharing this to encourage you to play around with the recipe as much as want, or with what ingredients you have on hand. This recipe is wonderful and really versatile. 

Enjoy!

Freezing Scalloped Potatoes?

Can you freeze Scalloped Potatoes? Do you bake them first?

Potatoes with smoked salmon

This will be a new favorite appetizer at our house. We made it when we had friends over to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. It filled all my criteria -- based on Irish cuisine (potatoes and salmon), was orange and green, really easy to make, looked pretty, and most importantly, tasted delicious!

I sliced 4 red potatoes, tossed with olive oil, s&p and baked at 400°. I flipped them 1/2 way and baked them for about 30-45 minutes, depending on thickness. I blotted them on paper towels. (I made these in the morning and they kept fine during the day.)

I mixed a little cream cheese, sour cream and capers and topped the potatoes with that. (This can also be made ahead and stored in the fridge until you are ready to assemble.)

Then topped with slices of smoked salmon and chopped chives for garnish.

Loved it!

My husband has already requested it for my son's First Communion in a couple of weeks.

Scalloped Potato Recipe?

Regina, Where is your Scalloped Potato recipe posted? Was it 3 cheese? I want them this weekend:)
Thanks

By request

It’s a great compliment when someone requests one of your recipes, but, if you’ve been to three cookouts this month, and been asked for your signature dish every time, you and your family have probably had enough of it. Each summer I like to add a new favorite to my classics so we don’t get bored.

These next couple of days, I’ll post recipes I’ve been asked for recently. If there’s one you’d like me to post, just let me know.

My Classic Potato Salad has a lot of ingredients (my friend Lynne would be very disappointed in me, the list of ingredients should never be longer than the list of directions), but it’s easy—dice, shake, and toss. The Warm Potato and Green Bean Salad (Lynne requests this one all the time!) has several selling points: It’s served warm (great for last-minute plans), it includes a vegetable (almost every gathering these days includes someone avoiding carbs, they can just pick out the potatoes), and it has no mayonnaise (no spoiling in the hot sun).

Classic Potato Salad

1 bag small red potatoes, boiled and diced
1 t onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
2-3 hard-boiled eggs, chopped
2 pickles, chopped
1½ T oil
1 T vinegar
1 T pickle juice
½ c Miracle Whip salad dressing
salt and pepper, to taste
1/8 c Dijon mustard
½ c sour cream
dill and parsley to taste (fresh, if you have it)
basil or tarragon to taste (fresh, if you have it)

Place potatoes, onion, celery, eggs, and pickles into large bowl. Shake condiments in a jar for dressing. Pour over potatoes. Toss salad—shaking in a covered plastic bowl works best. Chill. Top with fresh herbs before serving.

Warm Potato and Green Bean Salad
from The North End Italian Cookbook

2 pounds fresh green beans, tips removed, snapped in half
1 pound new potatoes, unpeeled
2/3 cup olive oil
6 tablespoons white wine vinegar
6 garlic clove, minced
2 tablespoons oregano, dried
2 tablespoons fresh parsley, chopped
2 pinches red pepper flakes
salt and pepper, to taste

Steam green beans 8-10 minutes, until tender. Drain and place on serving platter. Boil potatoes until just tender. Drain, do not rinse, let cool, then cube, leaving skin on. Add to green beans. Using a large spoon, gently toss beans and potatoes with remaining ingredients. Serve salad at warm or at room temperature.

The little black dress of sides

I look for certain specific things in my side dishes:

1. They need to be easy and hands-off (for the most part).
2. They need to be kid-friendly. I have 4 of my own, I feed nieces, nephews, clients' kids, neighbors' kids, friends' kids and kids' friends. They need to be kid-friendly.
3. They need to be versatile. Dress them up; dress them down. Serve them with with burgers or chicken fingers, serve them with scallops or NY sirloin.
4. Bonus points if they fit foods with different flavors: Mexican, Italian, Indian.

In short, I want a go-to side for every occasion, just like the little black dress. So, I was thrilled when I came across a recipe for Crispy No-Fry Fries in The Sneaky Chef cookbook. I've adapted it in so many ways I can't count. Steak fries, below, is my norm. New potatoes (great at this time of year!) cut into quarters so they're nice roasted potatoes that dressed up our lamb on Easter Sunday (please note, my sister who was hosting Easter doesn't like cornmeal, so we tried some without. Don't. They add the texture that's so important to the finished product.) Sweet potatoes (peel these first), and add a 1/2 teaspoon each of cumin and a touch of curry with the olive oil, egg white, and salt. And as far as flavors go, the possibilities are limitless: Add 1 teaspoon of Italian seasoning or 1/2 teaspoon each chili and cumin to the oil, egg white, and salt; or sprinkle 1-2 tablespoons of Parmesan cheese on with the cornmeal. What's your favorite? Work it in!

Bear in mind that the recipes call for you to keep the skin on when you cook these potatoes -- which is great, because that's where all the vitamins are (according to potatoes.com, 1 potato has 45% of the daily value for vitamin C and 620 mg potassium (comparable to bananas, spinach, and broccoli)). However, potatoes, when eaten with the skin on, are one of the "dirty dozen," fruits and vegetables that the US Department of Agriculture has found that, even after scrubbing, consistently contain higher levels of pesticides. So, it's a good idea to buy organic potatoes for this recipe.

Steak fries
serves 4

1 lb russet potatoes (for steak fries), new potatoes (for roasted potatoes), or sweet potatoes, peeled
1 large egg white
1 T olive oil
1 t kosher salt
1 T cornmeal

Preheat oven to 400°. For steak fries, cut each potato into halves, and then into thick slices; for roasted potatoes, cut into quarters.

Whisk together egg white, oil, salt (and any seasonings you might be using). Toss potatoes in a mixing bowl with egg white mixture.

Line a cookie sheet with aluminum foil and spray with cooking spray. Place potatoes in a single layer on the cookie sheet. Dust with cornmeal (and Parmesan cheese, if using).

Bake 50 minutes, or until golden brown.