Grandma Bertha's Latkes

I remember sitting at my Grandma Bertha's kitchen table and watching her grate the potatoes, onions and carrots by hand. I love the simplicity of this recipe - no flour, no baking soda or fancy seasonings - just simple basic ingredients.

[Rating – easy]

[Serves – This makes about 12-16 Latkes depending on the size]

You will need a food processor or a hand vegetable grater.

Preparation time: 

15 minutes – to peel the potatoes (place them in a bowl of cold water so they don’t turn brown), carrots and onion.

15-25 minutes to fry the Latkes, depending the how many you make

Ingredients:  

3 medium sized potatoes (peeled)

2 carrots (peeled)

1 large onion

3 eggs

Salt and pepper to taste

¼ to ½ cup Canola Oil for frying

 Eggs, onion, carrots and potatoes

Preparation: 

• Use the small grating blade on your food processor
• Add the carrots, potatoes and onion until everything is grated (processed)

Onion, carrots and potatoes - processed

• As you take the mix out of the processor – give a squeeze to remove any liquid - also check for large pieces of carrot, onion or potato that were not processed 
• Place the squeezed mixture into a medium size mixing bowl
• Add the eggs
• Add salt and black pepper to taste

Onion, carrots and potatoes - with eggs, salt and black pepper

• Mix everything together

Onion, carrots, potatoes, and egg - mixed together

• In a large frying pan – add about half the oil – heat the pan
• Drop a small tendril into the oil to see if it is hot enough - it should sizzle
• Drop 4 spoonfuls into the hot oil
• [There will be little tendrils of potato escaping from your Latkes they will NOT be perfectly shaped]

Latkes frying

• Fry about 4 to 6 minutes on each side.
• Remove and drain on paper towels
• Continue until all the mix is fried.
• Latkes can be kept warm in the oven.

Latkes 

Serve with:

Cold applesauce; Sugar and cinnamon; Sour cream or yogurt.

[Add chopped chives to the sour cream or yogurt]

Additional Options:

You could substitute sweet potato for white potato - but is that really a "Latke"?

You could add grated nutmeg or chopped garlic or chopped parsley or chopped mint - but is that really a "Latke"?

Send me your favorite Latke recipe and your comments to: capricorncooks@gmail.com.

Happly holiday!!!

Quick Left-Over Dinner #1 - Trout and Mushrooms with Pasta in Cream Sauce

I was not planning on blogging this meal but it was too easy to prepare and it tasted too good not to share – so here goes. I used what I had at home. As you can see - everything came out of a container or the freezer.

Left-Over Trout 

[Rating – very easy]

[Serves – 4 ]

Preparation time: 

15 minutes if you heat everything up [this includes the 5 minutes you need to pull things out of the frig]

[20 minutes if you need to cook the pasta]

Ingredients:  

About 150 grams of curly pasta or any left over pasta (2 to 3 cups cooked pasta)

4 pieces of left-over trout or any cooked fish – broken into pieces

7 cherry tomatoes cut in half (that's all I had in the house!! you can use more)

A handful of frozen green beans

A handful of frozen peas

1 cup left-over braised mushrooms (½ can of sliced mushrooms or more)

1 generous tablespoon chopped garlic 

2 teaspoons black pepper

1 cup (250 mil) cooking cream (10% fat)

¼ to ½ cup of grated Pecorino or Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese (depends on what you have around)

Optional – pesto sauce 

Frozen pesto

Pesto (30 seconds in the microwave)

Preparation: 

·        Cook the pasta as directed – drain and set aside

In a large frying pan:

·        Add peas

·        Add green beans

·        Add mushrooms

·        Tablespoon of garlic

·        Gently stirring together just until they heat up and thaw out

Mushrooms, frozen peas and green beans

·        Add the fish (broken into bite-sized bits)

Trout fillets crumbled

·        Add the cherry tomatoes

Cherry tomatoes cut in half

·        Stir together

·        Add the pasta into the mixture – mix well

·        Pour the cream over everything

·        Add the black pepper

·        Stir everything together until the cream begins to bubble

·        Add grated cheese and sprinkle with kosher salt to taste

The Transformation of the Left-Over ingredients!!!

From the frying pan onto the table.

Trout and Mushrooms with Pasta in a Cream Sauce

Of course you could bump this up by serving a green salad, garlic bread and a glass of red wine!!! We added a bit of pesto sauce from the freezer (see Sept 16 2011 blog) - which gave this left-over meal an added kick. 

Needless to say there were no left-overs!!!

Next week – Grandma Bertha’s Latkahs - Enjoy!!!