HAPPY EASTER!
If your household is like mine, you have hard-boiled Easter eggs sitting in the refrigerator and are looking for ways to use them. I came across a recipe in a hundred-year-old cookbook for Walnut Grove Potatoes, which is a fancy name for Scalloped Potatoes with Hard-Boiled Eggs. It was delightful, and is a great way to use those hard-boiled eggs.
Here’s the original recipe:
When I made this recipe, I interpreted “cream dressing” to mean white sauce. It did not work very well to put all of the white sauce on the top of the top layer of breadcrumbs, so I changed the recipe to indicate the white sauce should be one of the layers so that it is more evenly distributed.
Here’s the recipe updated for modern cooks:
Walnut Grove Potatoes
3 cups sliced, peeled potatoes (1/4-inch slices)
1 teaspoon salt + 1/2 teaspoon salt
3 hard-boiled eggs, sliced
1 cup coarsely-torn breadcrumbs (tear bread into 1-inch pieces) + 1/8 cup finely-torn breadcrumbs
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons flour
1 1/2 cups milk
approximately 1/3 green pepper, thinly sliced
Preheat oven to 400° F. Put the sliced potatoes in a saucepan and cover with water; add 1 teaspoon salt. Bring to a boil using high heat; reduce and simmer until the potatoes are just barely tender (about 10-12 minutes). Remove from heat and drain.
In the meantime, in another pan, using medium heat, melt butter, then stir in the flour and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Gradually, add the milk while stirring constantly. Continue stirring until the white sauce begins to thicken. Remove from heat.
To assemble: Put 1/3 of the white sauce in the bottom of a casserole dish, add 1/2 of the cooked sliced potatoes, then add a layer composed of 1/2 of the hard-boiled egg slices, and a layer of 1/2 of the coarsely-torn breadcrumbs. Pour a third of the white sauce over the layers. Repeat the layers with the remaining sliced potatoes, hard-boiled egg slices, and coarsely-torn breadcrumbs. Pour the remaining white sauce over the top. Garnish with the green pepper slices and finely torn breadcrumbs. Put in oven and bake until hot and bubbly (about 30 minutes).
That looks nice, if a little bland. Would some strong cheese help it along I wonder?
Cheese might be a nice addition.
I am thinking that some cheese and a bit of mustard might be a good call on this…
Cheese and mustard might work well with this.
Yummy! Happy Easter 🐰✨
I think it sounds quite tasty!
It was yummy.
That is a combination I would not think about putting together, but I haven’t tasted it yet.
I never thought of combining potatoes and hard boiled eggs until I saw this old recipe, but now that I think about it, restaurants often serve hash brown potatoes with scrambled eggs – so maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise that the combination works.
We put hard boiled eggs in potato salad, but cooked with potatoes are a bit different.
I can believe it would be good!
It’s tasty.