The potato C or D?

The potato can be a hazard when grown, tho, this can be true both in the present time and historically - ok, so you can argue that it was the monoculture of a non-endemic crop and the attitudes of barbaric foreign landlords that were the reasons behind the Irish Potato Famine, but there's no getting away from it that it was the fact that potato plants can be infected with one of the nastiest, most infectious forms of fungal pathogen - the potato blight Phytophthora infestans, which were a major contributory factor. Potato blight can be a problem in more trivial ways today too - particularly the fact that it can spread to other related crops of the Solanaceae, as my father found out to his peril when he threw out potato peelings in the garden next to his prize tomatoes and they all died of potato blight.

http://southernfood.about.com/library/weekly/aa110997.htm

The best non-fried potatoes I had were in Poland, because they boiled them in beef stock. Seems obvious in retrospect. I usually hate non-fried potato.

You do realise we'd prolly loathe each other if we ever met?

Anyway, back to potatoes...

I think most ppl experience similar Childhood Food Trauma Incidents.

Smee - nevah! We are family, yeaaaahhhhh-aye!!!

(I had Mexican Sweet Potato and 3 Bean Wrap for lunch, this is why I ask...)

(Pringles = classic though, but I don't really count that as potatoes, I think they could essentially be made of anything, cardboard would probably taste heavenly if thinly sliced, properly fried and spiced.)

Pierogies.

Knishes.

all sorts of indian foods.

MarkH, please enlighten my ignorant hungry ass. This sounds like a treat.

http://www.ok.org/homemaker/chanukah62/images/latkes.jpg

If you think potatoes are boring, you should try some of the other starchy tubers: yucca, malaga, etc. There are even more tastless than potato.

Bubble and squeak: I quantity mashed potato, approx equal quantity of cooked green veg. Mix well, season, then push the whole lot into a frying pan into which you've melted some butter. Cook slowly over a gentle heat until a crust forms. Turn over and repeat on other side.

Sweet potato mash with chilli garlic and rosemary. Cut sweet potato into smallish chunks, boil until soft, towards the end of the process take a thick slab of butter and melt it until it froths, fry one clove of garlic, sliced, one sprig of rosemary, stripped and one small red chilli (seeds in, sliced thinly). When the garlic aroma is released it's ready to mash the potato with.

Garlic baked potatoes. Cut each potato along it's horizon, then score deeply in a cross-hatch fashion, brush it with a mixture of oil and garlic, really working the oil into the incisions, then dust with paprika and bake for an ohour at gas 6.

Potato varieties from the past week alone: mashed (yukon golds, with the skins in it), sliced & fried (like wedges, these were red-skinned taters), in veggie soup (idaho russets), and then there were the YAMS mashed with butter & cinnamon & salt & brown sugar.

CLASSIC.

http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/hil/hil-23-a.html

mashed-and-then-baked potatoes are amazing and very midwest. shitloads of butter, chives on top.

About two hands' worth of thin-skinned potatoes; Yukon Gold, most red potatoes, etc. Cut them into pieces about the size of golf balls or eggs. Leave the peel on.

Bring salted water to a boil, add potatoes, and simmer for 15-20 minutes; pierce with a fork to find out if they're done.

Reduce heat to very low as you drain the potatoes and plonk them back into the pot. Add half a stick of butter and dash of salt and mash with a potato masher or a large, thick fork (steal one of the ones from T.G.I. Friday's, I've taken like five to use for things like this and makeshift roasting racks).

Add several spoonfuls of sour cream and mash again until incorporated, making sure potatoes warm up.

Add heavy cream, a few drizzles at a time, mashing and mashing and mashing, until potatoes cannot absorb any more liquid. At this point the potatoes will be not just creamy but glossy.

Mashed Potato Black Bean Cakes

Prepare mashed potatoes as above. Leftovers work just dandy.

Blend prepared (i.e., canned or soaked-and-cooked) black beans in a Cuisinart. Roughly chop some pickled jalapenos; mince some garlic. Combine beans and potatoes together in 1:1 proportion, mix in jalapenos and garlic, and add to non-stick pan, with a little oil or butter, over medium heat, forming into a patty. It won't be a solid, firm patty like a hamburger; you're not likely going to be able to flip it. Let cook until the potato in the bottom has started to brown, and then "flip" (which ends up being "mix around") and brown again. Repeat. Enough of the liquid has probably cooked out now to keep it more or less together; serve.

tep that bean thing is killing me.

you want starch! i'll give you starch.

Any thin-skinned potatoes, cut about the size of two Starbursts stacked on top of each other. Enough to cover the bottom of a pie plate.

Four slices of bacon, cut into five or six pieces each, uncooked.

Half an onion, thinly sliced.

A scant handful of pickled jalapenos, chopped.

Toss potatoes with a little oil or melted butter, just enough to barely coat them; and sufficient salt, hot paprika, garlic powder, and cayenne. Toss in onion and jalapeno. Plonk into pie plate. Add bacon on top. Bake at 375-400 until bacon is crispy and potatoes are golden, slightly crunchy, and fully cooked.

I highly recommend you neither make nor eat this.

Ingredients
Small potatoes 500 gms.
Boiled onion paste 1 cup
Garlic paste 1 tsp.
Ginger paste 1 tsp.
Tomato puree ½ cup
Red chili powder 1 tsp.

Coriander powder 1 tsp.
Turmeric powder 1 tsp.
Kasoori methi 1 tsp.
Garam masala powder 1 tsp.
Fresh cream 50 ml.
Cashewnut paste 1 tsp.
Curd (Yogurt) ½ cup
Oil 2 tsp.
Salt As per taste

Preparation

1 Peel, wash and prick potatoes with a fork. Deep fry in moderate hot oil until potatoes are golden brown in color. Keep aside.
2 Heat oil in a pan. Add Boiled Onion Paste and cook on a high flame, stirring continuously until onion paste changes color to light brown.

3 Add paste of cashewnut and beaten curd/yogurt, mix well.

4 Add ginger paste and garlic paste, stir for half a minute and then add red chili powder, coriander powder, and turmeric powder. Stir for a few seconds. Add tomato puree and cook on a medium flame for 3 minutes.

5 Add 2 ½ cups of water. Bring it to a boil and add fried potatoes. Season with salt. Reduce flame and add Garam Masala Powder and methi.

6 Cook for ten minutes on a slow flame.

7 Finish with fresh cream and serve hot.


Heaven.

http://www.osric.com/~jeremy/potatoes.gif\

PO..TAE..TOES!

Mashed potatoes, per above recipe.
4 quail, preferably whole and not butterflied; if they're butterflied, you'll need to tie them up after stuffing them.
1 bulb roasted garlic
A little finely chopped celery
A little finely chopped onion
a little chicken sausage, preferably seasoned with apple, onion, and/or sage; crumbled and well-cooked
A little minced sage
a tablespoon or two of unseasoned breadcrumbs
a couple tablespoons Tabasco Chipotle hot sauce
a little melted butter
a little brown sugar, or better yet dark molasses sugar
a little hot water, possibly

Combine mashed potatoes, garlic, celery, onion, sausage, sage, and breadcrumbs. Taste and salt if necessary. Stuff into cavities of quail, just as if they were very very small chickens. Melt butter and Tabasco sauce together; use half of it to cover quail.

Bake at 375 for about 12 minutes. Combine remaining Tabasco-butter sauce with brown sugar, adding hot water if necessary to get the sugar to dissolve. Brush/pour/drizzle/whatever on quail and bake another 4-5 minutes until well-glazed and fully cooked.

Serves one single mother and one bastard lovechild.

A George Foreman Grill is ideal for this, actually, because of the top grill part.

Potato, sliced thick, like half as thick as a pack of cigarettes.
Red wine vinegar, or malt vinegar
A little oil
Sea salt
Cayenne
Garlic powder

You can vary those seasonings, of course. Sit the potato slices in the vinegar for 10-15 minutes, just enough to give them a little tang. Turn on and warm up grill. Sprinkle salt, cayenne, and garlic powder on both sides of potato slices. Place on grill and drizzle with a little oil. Close grill and grill until crispy on the outside, soft-like-a-baked-potato on the inside ... varies by potato type and so forth, but probably 20-30 minutes (it's surprisingly slow). Check periodically and add a little oil to keep them from sticking, if necessary.

ps. i love this thread title's avoidance of any inopportune quayl-ization bastard spelling alltogether.

Vinegar Chicken

Chicken, any pieces, on the bone. Chop them up with a good, heavy, sharp knife -- again, keeping it on the bone. Like, take a thigh and whack it into three pieces. Ditto the drumsticks. You can half a wing segment if you want. A breast can easily be cut into six or eight pieces, or more. You want finger-food-sized pieces. Keep the skin on.

Dried chile peppers, like the crushed red peppers sold for pizza and pasta, or dried Thai chiles crumbled up, or whatever you like.

Vinegar, red wine vinegar works best, Pompeiian is my preferred brand. Balsamic will not work at all. "Distilled white vinegar" is crap and should not be used for human consumption. White wine vinegar is all right. Malt vinegar is second-choice to red wine vinegar.

Onions, just a little bit of diced onion, optional.

Salt, key to getting the skin to crisp.

Chop up the chicken like I just told you, sprinkle the skin with salt, and let sit fifteen minutes. Heat to medium or medium-high, depending on your stove, a non-stick or cast-iron pan with just a little bit of oil, and add the chicken pieces skin-side down. Add the onions around the chicken, stirring them if necessary, and once the chicken skin has browned and crisped, flip over, sprinkle everything with dried chiles to taste, and add enough vinegar to come up on the chicken a bit. Probably half a cup.

Cover, bring down to a simmer, and let cook for 10 to 20 minutes depending on the size of your chicken pieces. If necessary, remove cover, so that when the chicken is done the vinegar has reduced down until it's nearly syrupy and clinging to the chicken and onions.

Handy for cooking, and protection from that pesky burglar

(couldn't resist, Pink;>)

"You gotta be pretty hungry to eat a potato!"

(wtf?)

Today is the day I RAGE Alexin NYC style re: the Yukon Gold. The Yukon Gold potato is a fucked-up changeling, tricking gourmands who have no idea about how potatoes work. There's the Russet, which does EVERYTHING, and the red potato, which serves a nice number of purposes that the Russet can't (plus totally different flavor), the Yukon Gold is just a bastardly abomination trying, pointlessly, to combine the two, with embarrassing results.

'dur duh me a Yukon Gold kinda waxy doh bluh guh"

I've read some crazy stuff in my life but hating on the buttery, tender Yukon Gold takes the prize. better than the Russet for any cubed-potato stovetop dish.

new board - I Hate Potatoes

yukon golds are good
russian fingerlings are the best

Yeah, russets can't do EVERYTHING. They fall apart. Good for fluffy mashed potatoes though.

What can't they do, Lindsey, that a Yukon Gold can, besides act as a foolhardy trick of marketing?

If they fall apart, you're cooking them wrong.

Guys I am a person with the surname of McCracken who grew up in Idaho I can only rep for the Russet.

russet street team

Well, you got me there, Abbott.

Also I used to edit newsletters for the Idaho Potato Commission so I am about a close-minded as a person can get on this important issue.

sounds like someone's in bed with the potato industry

http://www.boiseweekly.com/imager/ready_for_a_close_up/b/story/1013333/5346/Feature_MarilynMonroe.jpg

Norma Jean says, "If you eat Yukon Golds, you don't like sex."

Srsly mashed potatoes w/Yukon Golds are way too gloppy.

Big Tuber

the russets do fall apart in like soups and stuff,no? the waxy ones do better with that iirc.

i buy red potatoes 95% of the time and yukon golds 4% of the time but never russets. the skins are thick and gross and i hate peeling potatoes (even if the recipe says peel!) so i don't understand russets :(

The IPC has its tentacles in every decision made in this country since prohibition. Enough is enough.

red and yukon are extremely versatile imo

russet = baked potato

My mother has this really great recipe for sweet potatoes. Peel them, slice them pretty thick (2/3" to 3/4"). Put them in one layer in a large skillet that has a tight fitting cover with butter, brown sugar and cinnamon, plus enough water to come about halfway up the sides of the potato slices. Cover them and simmer/steam them until they're most of the way done, then take the cover off and let the water evaporate as the potatoes finish cooking. Don't turn them. The butter, sugar and cinnamon will turn into a beautiful glaze and the bottoms of the potato slices will get a nice caramelized coating. (Be careful at the endgame; they will try to scorch on you.)

Much better than mashed with marshmallow topping. The slices are like little sweet potato steaks.

It's easy to find russets that don't have thick gross skins in the loose potato bin. The skin of a well-scrubbed baked potato is sometimes my favorite part.

Esp. when the potato has soaked up plenty of salty bloody steak juice.

yukon golds are amazing when roasted in the oven. they don't take as long to roast as other kinds and they're really hard to fuck up too.

Don't boil the damn things for more than 10 minutes in soups, they're not beef, people!

i like the name of yukon gold, it's like a food that is as precious as gold and comes from the yukon

http://mrcoffee4.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/yukon.jpg

Maybe I am a snot about Russets in the same way that the idea of (me) using a rice cooker offends me.

Yukon Gold has to overcompensate in its name bcz it's inferior.

more like u-conned, right abbott

y'all are crazy. pretty much all potatoes rule

i use my rice cooker several times per week!

The starch granules in Russets can absorb more water than Yukons, which admittedly gives them a much narrower margin of prep error, but also grants them their superpowers.

If you want something that doesn't have this ability (ie 'doesn't fall apart' at all), go for the completely uncompromised red potato, which makes great potato salads. Don't mess with Mister In-Between!

^IPC talking

IPC doesnt' rep for the red at ALL wtf bro.

PCP > IPC

This is SCIENCE talking.

oh they have their fingers in every potato pie

abbott i don't think we can be friends

;_;

FROM THE IPC WEBSITE ie. THE BELLY OF THE BEAST

Grilled Idaho® Potato Salad with Warm Goat Cheese and a Yellow Tomato Vinaigrette

Yield: Serves 4

Ingredients:
Grilled Potatoes:

2 Idaho Russet Potatoes, peeled, sliced into 12 pieces about 1/2 inch thick and then punch out with a round cookie cutter.
3 small Purple potatoes, peeled, sliced into 12 pieces about 1/4 inch thick and then punch out with an oval cutter.
8 tiny Idaho red potatoes, left whole

brownie you are getting too close to some dangerous shit, I'd stay away if I were you.

potato salad w/ goat cheese is the best

it's been affecting family abbott, maybe i'll take a breather

Do you know how many eyes potatoes have?

ALWAYS WATCHING U

abbott your rice-cooker opinion is also nuts, in countries where rice is the daily staple everybody switched over ages ago why the same reason you don't make toast over an open flame: because now there's toasters

velko otm re: russian fingerlings

Dude I know I have problems, it's just I PERFECTED making rice on the stovetop so I can't rob myself of that pride.

abbott your rice-cooker opinion is also nuts, in countries where rice is the daily staple everybody switched over ages ago why the same reason you don't make toast over an open flame: because now there's toasters

ummm hello, i am a broiler i make nice toast for you!

you'll find me at the top of the oven

J0hn D. u are no Luddite.

I am posting this from an abacus btw.

I am posting this from an abacus btw.

Would not translate well to excelsior thread but MASSIVE LOLS anyway.

I actually still make stovetop rice btw though that's because I have ruined two rice cookers whereas cooking pots are made of tougher stuff. but! before the wreck of the two rice cookers there was no denying that there's a reason why everybody loves the rice cooker: it works better

oh man, my aunt had this ancient coal burning oven and she would open up one of the tops to make toast over the flame and that shit was like the tastiest shit in the universe

i've never owned my own rice cooker. just had housemates and saw them screw up rice even with the rice cooker. like abbott i am proud to be able to make perfect stovetop rice. brown, basmati, plain white, mexican, i can do it all and pretty well

i recently switched to stovetop rice cooking, it's easier to clean than the rice cooker and i am lazy

^^that too.

i prob will never get one. stovetop rice is so easy, and i'm generally not a fan of getting appliances for things that i can just as easily do w/ more basic tools

i don't even like microwaves. cook that shit up in a pan or a pot and it tastes a lot better

http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2008/11/the_pot_and_how_to_use_it.html

I got a great Water Boiler you guys should buy... only $39!

rice gets stuck on the bottom of cooking pots for me, also no built-in timing mechanism

If there was some kind of entropy machine that made things cold quick I wld buy that.

I got a great Water Boiler you guys should buy... only $39!

for real, right? shit's ridiculous. tho i can understand it for like a workplace or something. my office has no staff kitchen so i want hot tea they can be nice. otherwise there is a stove and kettle/pot for this purpose

Rice cookers are great, I'm too lazy to make it on the stovetop.

my rice seems to come out about the same whether i make it on the stovetop or the rice cooker, the rice cooker is just easier to clean up (ie no rice stuck to the bottom of the pot).

Does anyone else face the yam/sweet potato conundrum in the grocery store? I can never decide which to get.

POTATOS MASSIVE FUCKING CLASSIC especially b/c I made potato salad for the first time ever today and either it is the perfect recipe or I am a kitchen goddess because it tastes like life. (Actually I got it out of Cooks' Illustrated so you know it's just the perfect recipe.) Also, rep for Russets b/c they develop miniscule little cracks between the groups of starch molecules as they cook, so that your seasoned cooking water/sauce can get inside. This transports your salt during cooking, and later your vinegar, into the INSIDE of each piece of potato.

I got my parents a rice cooker with a microchip inside. The sticker on the machine proudly trumpets the fact that it has "Fuzzy Logic."

Potatoes are indeed classic. I would not be unhappy if somebody told me I could only eat potatoes for the rest of my life.

The best potatoes I have ever had were in Peru, which claims to be the birthplace of the potato. Some of them were purple, and slightly larger than an average finger, which makes them a fingerling, I believe.

did you guys know there's people who think the potato is totally not meant to be eaten by humans & is the cause of many health woes & that the noble potato should be avoided by all

I met one and he seemed like a nice guy but regarding his opinion on potatoes I would have to say "fuck that"

my girlfriend made kick ass potato pancakes last night with some spicy curry ketchup

i was like, aw hell yeah.

The best potatoes I have ever had were in Peru, which claims to be the birthplace of the potato. Some of them were purple, and slightly larger than an average finger, which makes them a fingerling, I believe.

Hi dere we are growing these in our garden, they are almost ready. We have 3 separate potato beds with seven varieties.

My current favorite potato dish is Dum Aloo.

Abbott thinks you are making dum aloo if you use yukon golds

potato blight is running rampant through the northeast and made it as far west as ohio. apparently spreading through box store tomato plants.

I'm going to tell you something you can do with mashed potatoes

take some black or yellow mustard seeds, 1-2 tsp worth, and pulverize them in a coffee grinder, spice mill, or mortar & pestle

place the powdered mustard seeds in about 1 tbsp of olive oil

when you have mashed your potatoes, stir in the olive oil/powdered mustard seed infusion

you will not believe how good this is

hoping u used russetts yes

YUMMMMMMMMMM

Will try.

that does sound incredible & I can eat my weight in mashed potatoes, it is always nice to try a new thing with them

That does sound good.

The United States Potato Board brings you: Understanding Millennials—How do Potatoes Fit into Their Lives?

DENVER (December 6, 2013)— The United States Potato Board (USPB) is committed to designing and conducting consumer research that enables the industry to identify opportunities and make informed decisions to increase demand for potatoes. In order to identify new opportunities and promote a proactive and forward-looking approach, the USPB is taking a closer look at a younger audience. The up-and-coming generation (18–30-year-olds), just now forming new households and starting families of their own, is big! In fact, the Millennial generation is about 80 million people, about the same size as the Baby Boomer generation. To stay relevant and increase demand for potatoes, it will be critical to understand Millennials and how potatoes fit into their lives—now and in the future.

With this in mind, the USPB is conducting research to…

Better understand the Millennial audience, especially attitudes and behaviors related to potatoes
Explore opportunities to increase potato consumption among Millennials
Identify sub-segment(s) within the Millennial audience with the greatest potential for growth in potato consumption

today we roasted potatoes finished with parm and truffle oil. just recently started getting into the truffle. they were so freaking good. potassium rich, culinarily versatile Spudz!

http://i.imgur.com/KevxDsc.jpg?1

http://classicmarilynmonroe.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Marilyn-Monroe-potato-sack-05-280x400.jpg

get a load of them spuds