I can't eat potatoes anymore, but one thing that I absolutely loved when I could was real potatoes and ham au gratin. My mom would make these from scratch.

I don't have the recipe, but I know it involved finely-sliced potatoes (she used her food processor), homemade bechamel (white) sauce, the sharpest cheddar cheese she could find, good aged Gruyere, and good blue cheese, as well as minced onion, black pepper and a little dried sage and thyme. And excellent country ham, usually hickory-smoked (but always cured in some way and ready to eat).

To reconstruct what she did: she'd slice up the potatoes and chunk up the ham. Then she'd make the bechamel sauce, and then melt in the cheeses and then add the spices. She'd then stir in the potatoes and ham and dump it all in the Dutch oven to slowly cook for a couple of hours, finishing it under the broiler so a crispy, brown crust developed on the top.

The stuff was just luscious, melt-in-your-mouth goodness.

Asker's Rating:

Permalink | Report