I bought some new potatoes at the farmers’ market a few days ago, and they are the best. The small, round potatoes were freshly harvested, and the skins scraped off easily. (They are different from the small potatoes typically sold in supermarkets, which are not freshly harvested and do not have skins that can be easily scraped off.) I love the delicate, moist firmness of new potatoes, so I was thrilled to find a hundred-year-old recipe for a classic recipe for creamed new potatoes.
The New Potatoes in Cream were wonderful. The potatoes were coated with a lovely cream sauce and flecked with bits of colorful red potato skin and parsley. I thoroughly enjoyed the new potatoes. I definitely will make this recipe again. New potatoes are such a fleeting summer food. In just a few weeks, I will only be able to buy mature potatoes, and I will need to wait until next year to again get new potatoes
Here is the original recipe for New Potatoes in Cream.
Source: The New Winston Cook Book of Guaranteed Recipes (1926)
I used red potatoes when making this recipe. The bits of red skin clinging to the potatoes look nice when the potatoes are creamed.
Step 1. Scrape the new potatoes with a knife, then put them in a saucepan and cover with water and add a little salt; boil until the potatoes are tender (about 20-25 minutes), then drain potatoes.
Step 2. In the meantime, melt the butter in another saucepan using medium heat, then stir in the flour. Slowly add the milk, while stirring constantly. Continue stirring and cook until the mixture thickens. Stir in the salt, pepper, and parsley.
Step 3. Add the boiled potatoes to the cream sauce and gently roll the potatoes to coat them with the sauce. Place the potatoes and sauce in the serving dish.
Delmonico Potatoes have been around for a long time. They were first served in the 1800s at the Delmonico Restaurant in New York City. Rumor has it that Abraham Lincoln enjoyed eating them at that restaurant. The Delmonico Restaurant has a long history of developing recipes that have stood the test of time. Eggs Benedict, Chicken a la King, and Lobster Newberg were also purportedly first served there.
Delmonico Potatoes are a creamy, cheesy potato dish. As might be anticipated, given its long history, there are lots of variations. Some Delmonico Potato recipes call for shredded potatoes, others for cubed potatoes, and still other recipes call for sliced potatoes. I found a recipe in a hundred-year-old cookbook that called for cubed potatoes and a little onion in a rich cheesy sauce, and decided to give it a try. That recipe also called for topping the dish with buttered cracker crumbs.
The recipe was a winner. The cheesy sauce was the perfect consistency – not too juicy and not too thick – and it nicely complemented the potatoes. I had few multi-grain table crackers that that I crushed to make the topping (though I recognize that basic round butter crackers or saltines probably were the type of crackers that were actually used a hundred years ago). I really liked the way they looked and tasted. They added a bit of crunchiness to the dish. I definitely plan on making it again – maybe as soon as next week when my daughter will be visiting.
Here’s the original recipe:
Source: Pennsylvania State Grange Cook Book (1926)
I think that the name of this recipe is misspelled in the 1926 cookbook, and that it should be “Delmonico Potatoes” rather than “Delmonica Potatoes,” so that is the spelling I used when updating the recipe.
Since I didn’t have 2 cups of left-over potatoes, I peeled and diced 4 medium potatoes. I then covered the potatoes with water and cooked them. After the diced potatoes had softened (about 10-12 minutes), I removed the potatoes from the heat and drained them. I then proceeded with assembling the recipe using the warm potatoes.
This recipe’s directions are a little difficult to understand. One place it calls for 1/4 cup melted butter (and the same sentence also refers to white sauce which would contain butter). Two sentences later, the recipe explains how to make the white sauce, indicating that 2 tablespoons butter should be used. Near the end of the recipe, it indicates that the cracker crumbs are “buttered crumbs.” I interpreted all of this to mean that the white sauce should be made using 2 tablespoons of butter, and that the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter should be melted and the cracker crumbs should then be stirred into the butter.
Over my years of doing this blog, I’ve seen many vague measurement terms (dash, pinch, etc.), but a “shaving” of onion was new for me. I decided to finely chop 3 tablespoons of onion and layer it with the potatoes and cheese – though that may not be exactly the intent of the recipe author.
2 cups potatoes (about 4 medium potatoes), peeled and diced into 1/2 inch pieces
1/3 cup grated cheddar cheese
3 tablespoons finely chopped onions
2 tablespoons butter + 2 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper
1 1/4 cups milk
paprika
1/2 cup cracker crumbs (I crushed 5 multi-grain table crackers. Classic round butter crackers would also work well.)
Step 1. Preheat oven to 400° F.
Step 2. Put the diced potatoes in a saucepan. Cover with water; bring to a boil using high heat, then reduce heat and simmer until the potatoes are soft (about 10-12 minutes). Remove from heat and drain.
Step 3. In the meantime, put 2 tablespoons of melted butter and the cracker crumbs in a small bowl. Stir to coat the cracker crumbs with the butter. Set aside.
Step 4. Additionally, in the meantime, make a white sauce. Using medium heat, melt 2 tablespoons of butter in another saucepan. Stir in the flour, salt, and pepper. Slowly add the milk while stirring continuously. Continue stirring until the liquid thickens.
Step 5. Assemble this dish by putting one-third of the cooked diced potatoes in a 1-quart baking dish. Put one-third of the chopped onions on top of the potatoes, then spread one-third of the grated cheese on top of the potatoes and onions. Repeat until all the potatoes, onions, and cheese are layered in the baking dish.
Step 6. Pour the white sauce over the layers in the baking dish, then sprinkle with paprika. Top by spreading the buttered crackers on top.
Step 7. Put in the oven and bake until the dish is hot and bubbly (about 25 – 30 minutes if warm diced potatoes were used; longer if they were cold.)
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:
Source: Cook Book (Compiled by Women of the Country Club Christian Church, Kansas City, Missouri)
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.
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).
Now that the weather’s getting cold and wintery, potatoes hit the spot. I recently made a hundred-year-old recipe for Alphonso Potatoes which are diced potatoes and green pepper are in a milk sauce, and topped with Parmesan cheese. This dish is very attractive and makes a nice presentation. The green of the pepper and the white of the potatoes made a visually appealing combination. The Parmesan cheese topping added flavor to the dish, and it was very nice.
Here’s the original recipe:
Source: The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book (1923)
When I made the recipe, I cut the potatoes into 1/4 inch cubes prior to cooking. Perhaps cooks a hundred-years-ago often had left-over boiled potatoes that could be diced and used in this recipe, but since I didn’t have any left-over potatoes it seemed easier to just dice them into small pieces prior to cooking. I boiled the diced potatoes for a few minutes and then added the green pepper pieces to the simmering potatoes. It didn’t seem like a separate pan was needed. After the cubed potatoes were soft, I drained them, and then added the milk. I salted the water when cooking the potatoes, but did not add additional salt when I added the milk. I cooked for a few minutes more minutes, while occasionally gently stirring (but it was substantively less than 15 minutes). Some of the milk evaporated, and it began to thicken. I then removed from the heat and put into the casserole dish.
5 medium potatoes, peeled and diced into 1/4 inch cubes
water
1 teaspoon salt + 1/2 teaspoon salt (if desired)
1 medium green pepper, diced into 1/8 inch pieces
3/4 cup milk
1 1/2 tablespoons Parmesan cheese
Preheat oven to 375° F. Put the diced potatoes into a saucepan; cover with water and add 1 teaspoon salt. Bring to a boil using high heat, then reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Add the diced green pepper and simmer for an additional 6 minutes. Remove from the heat, and drain. Pour milk and 1/2 teaspoon salt (if desired) on the drained potatoes and green pepper in the saucepan. Heat using medium heat while stirring gently occasionally (do not cover). Simmer for a few minutes until some of the milk evaporates and the liquid thickens a little. (Use care that the milk and potatoes don’t burn.) Remove from the heat and put into a casserole dish. Sprinkle with the Parmesan cheese. Put in the oven and bake for 10 minutes or until the Parmesan cheese is lightly browned.
I love to browse through old community cookbooks. Sometimes the recipes have unusual names that intrigue me. This is one of those times. A 1923 cookbook published by the General Welfare Guild of the Beaver Valley General Hospital in New Brighton, Pennsylvania had a recipe for “A Homely Way to Cook Potatoes.” Can potatoes be “homely?”
The recipe called for putting potatoes, onion, parsley and seasonings in a saucepan with water, and then boiling the mixture. The recipe was easy to make. The potatoes reminded me of old-fashioned parsley potatoes. And, the homely potatoes (dare I say it?) were attractive.
Here’s the original recipe:
Source: General Welfare Guild Cook Book (Published by the General Welfare Guild, Beaver Valley General Hospital, New Brighton, PA, 1923)
I’m not exactly sure how much “4 large tablespoon butter” is, so I used four tablespoons of butter. It also did not seem like boiling water needed to be used in this recipe. I just used cold water. I’m sure that it took a little longer to heat, but that was okay with me.
Put all ingredients in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil using high heat; then reduce heat and simmer until the potatoes are tender (approximately 15-20 minutes). Remove from heat and drain. Serve immediately.
Creamed Potatoes are a delightful comfort food, so I was pleased to find a hundred-year-old recipe for Quick Creamed Potatoes.
Here’s the original recipe:
Source: Mrs. DeGraf’s Cook Book (1922)
I am unclear whether this recipe calls for raw potato slices or previously cooked potato slices. When I made this recipe, I used raw potato slices and had issues with the milk scorching on the bottom of the pan. I tried to gently stir the potato mixture while it was cooking, but it took about 15 minutes for the potatoes to soften and it was really difficult to stir well enough to prevent scorching.
Put potato slices in a bowl; dredge with flour and toss until the potato slices are partially coated with flour. Put in a saucepan and add milk. Gently cook using medium heat until the milk is hot; reduce heat to medium low and continue cook until the potato slices are soft while frequently gently lifting the potato slices and stirring. (Be sure to stir to the very bottom of the pan, since the milk will easily scorch). Remove from heat. Add butter, salt, and pepper; gentry stir to combine. Put in serving dish and sprinkle with parsley.
Au Gratin potatoes are a nice comfort food, but they can get boring, so I was intrigued by a hundred-year-old recipe for Potato Tarts a la Gratin. A muffin tin is lined with pastry dough, then filled with diced au gratin potatoes. The resulting tarts were tasty, visually appealing, and a nice change of pace. They reminded me a bit of the savory hors d’oeuvres served by hotels at events – though they were tastier than many of those hors d’oeuvres.
Here’s the original recipe:
Source: American Cookery (November, 1921)
I substituted butter for the lard when I made this recipe. Rather than using left-over cold potatoes, I made boiled diced potatoes which I immediately used in the recipe.
When I made the sauce, it seemed rather thin for a tart filling, so I coarsely mashed a few of the diced potatoes and stirred them into the sauce to make it thicker before adding the remainder of the diced potatoes. This worked well.
3 – 4 medium potatoes, diced into 3/4 inch pieces (about 2 cups diced potatoes)
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
1/2 cup shredded cheese + additional cheese to sprinkle on the top (I used cheddar cheese.)
pastry dough (enough for 1 2-crust pie, or use approximately 4 pre-rolled sheets)
Preheat oven to 425° F. Roll pastry dough and cut into circles. Line the space for each muffin in a muffin pan with the circles of pastry dough. Fit each circle, trim, and flute edges.
Put the diced potatoes in a sauce pan and cover with water. Put on the stove and bring to a boil using high heat; then reduce heat and simmer until the potatoes are tender (about 10 minutes). Drain potatoes. Remove about 1/3 cup of the potatoes from the sauce pan; put in a bowl and coarsely mash using a fork. Set aside both the mashed and diced potatoes
Melt the butter in another sauce pan, then stir the flour and salt into the butter. While stirring constantly, slowly pour in the milk and bring to a boil over medium heat. Stir in the mashed potatoes and 1/2 cup shredded cheese, continue heating until the cheese melts. Add the diced potatoes. Stir to combine.
Spoon into the pastry shells, and sprinkle additional shredded cheese on top. Bake until hot and bubbly, and the top begins to brown (about 30 minutes).
