Happy New Year, hungry Hivers and everyone else. I wish you a very tasty and easy year ahead, let's stay healthy and sane if we can.
Today, I'll show you one of my "go-to" recipes when I have guests over, especially for the first time. The reason is simple, everybody always loves this meal and it's super easy to make. It does take some time to cook, but it doesn't have to be monitored, so you will be able to do something while it's baking.
We call it French potato, even if the origin of this dish is not familiar, maybe it was really from France. It tastes so good and creamy, you have to try it.
This recipe is so simple that I thought if it's something I should write about, but on the other hand, it is delicious beyond expectations, so I went for it.
As always I started with preparing everything I need for the recipe, and realize I do that because my cooking is interrupted a thousand times by my toddler. So, if I don't prepare and see everything I have to use in a certain dish, I will forget about it.
After cutting up all the potato I needed (you can always add more if you see that you need it) I would usually soak it in cold and clean water for a few minutes. It has to do something with the potato letting go of excess starch and taste better.
While that was resting in the water I prepared the baking tray by covering the bottom with a stick of butter and adding garlic. I added garlic powder because it was easier and faster, you can add fresh garlic if you prefer.
The rest of the recipe is to put the potato in the baking tray until you fill it up or spend all the potatoes you have. Make thin layers as it will cook faster and sprinkle in between with some seasoning. In my case and recipe, I used "Vegeta" which is a famous season in our country. It's dried veggies and herbs with salt.
Whatever you use, make sure it's salty because potatoes need a lot of salt to be tasty.
After that, you make another layer of potatoes and another layer of seasoning. Until you run out of potatoes. Then it's the creamy part of the recipe, you should simply cover it all with heavy cream for cooking until all the potatoes are covered. Depending on the dish or the tray, you will need up to 300ml of heavy cream.
In the end, top it off with some grated cheese. You can't go wrong here, so add as much you can fit in, go cheese crazy. Hey, it's the Holidays, right?
Because it will be cooking for at least an hour, probably more, I covered it with some aluminum foil to protect it from burning and I removed the foil for the last 15 minutes so that cheese can get that golden brown and crispy color and taste.
If the dish is made of glass that you can bake in, like mine, put it in a cold oven and let it heat up slowly to 180c.
Enjoy!
With love,
Tamara
