Here’s one I’ve been meaning to make for a while. As I mentioned in 9-12: Shepherd’s Pie and 6-30: Scottish Chicken Casserole, I had too many potatoes after a Costco shopping trip, so I’ve been burning off potato recipes.
Potato pancakes have been done before, along with a zucchini version as well. So what’s different about this one? For one, this one features an umlaut. 😉
Can we talk about the random parsley/cilantro-looking leaf on the wooden spatula in the 3rd picture? What an odd choice–I get that there’s not a lot of color in this recipe which makes it boring to photograph, but putting it on the spatula is just silly.
Ingredients. Not too much going on in the color or variety department. My potatoes were massive, so I went with 5 (which was still a lot).
Potatoes peeled. I had to take a lot of pictures of potatoes being peeled between this recipe, 9-12: Shepherd’s Pie, and 6-30: Scottish Chicken Casserole, so I tried to find ways to mix it up. Same advice as before, if you peel into the sink, line it with a paper towel first for easy clean-up/a happy disposal.
Squeeze as much moisture out of shredded potatoes as you can–the more water you get out, the crispier they’ll be when they fry. Work quickly, otherwise your potatoes will start to go a pinkish-reddish-brown as they oxidize–you can see mine already were turning a bit in this picture.
I had some extra potatoes I peeled but didn’t shred (like I said, these things were massive), so I submerged them in a bowl of water while I figured out what to do with them. The water will keep them from browning.
Got my two 10″ cast-iron skillets ready, but unfortunately I have a terrible and janky electric stove, which means one is on the only big burner (the right one) and the other is on one of the small burners (the left one). This will probably lead to some uneven cooking problems, but it’s all I’ve got.
Potatoes loaded–let’s see what happens when you use the same pans/potatoes, but two differently sized burners. For science!
Cheese applied, and so far it’s not clear what the results of the two different burners will be–both are obviously hot, given the rising steam.
This was the bottom of the right side (the large burner), even thought you see it on the left side of the stove. Obviously I waited a bit too long to flip it, and the middle got way overcooked. Good thing there’s two–let’s see what happened with the small burner pan.
Here’s the results from the small burner/left pan. Since it was a smaller burner, it burned a smaller circle on the pancake. Why did these burn? My guess is using cast-iron got them too hot, but they were my only only two pans that were exactly identical. If I tried it again, I’d use my two non-stick 10″ skillets, even though they’re technically two different pans. We’ll chalk this one up to trying to control as many variables as possible.
Final plating of the relatively-more-successful one. With a drizzle of sriracha and a sprinkling of parsley, it’s passable. It wasn’t bad, but I’d stick with 4-17: Crispy Potato Pancakes for a better potato pancake overall. However, if you’re trying to avoid wheat/gluten, Rösti is a decent substitute–as long as you don’t burn it. 🙄
Grade: B
