UNDER ROAST POTATOES

UNDER ROAST POTATOES

A true Cornish, simple recipe, used by our forebears for many generations. These days, we would call this a side dish, but long ago, for many, it would be the whole meal. When re creating this I decided to go the whole hog and use dripping, as they would have.

This recipe belonged to Hettie Merrick and was given to me by her daughter Ann, who you will know as the famous pasty maker from The Lizard. Ann’s Pasties are almost world famous and the best ‘bought pasties” in our County, I reckon. If you have never tried them, get down to The Lizard!

Notes:

Hettie states a hot oven. I guessed at fan 220C

I saved the hot water the potatoes were boiled in and used that to pour into the pie dish.

In the photo you can see [on my Blog] I used one onion, cut into 8ths and about a quarter of a small turnip [swede] cut into pieces about double the size I would chip for pasties.

Peel some even ish sized potatoes [not too big] and bring them to the boil, then drain. [I cut larger ones in half] Grease a pie dish with butter or dripping and fill with the potatoes. Add a couple of small onions and a few pieces of turnip if liked. Season the potatoes with salt and a good shake of pepper, then half fill the dish with hot water. Brush some more dripping over the potatoes and cover with a few bacon rinds. [hard to come by these days, I used some fatty streaky bacon, cut into thin slices longways, then twisted. see my Blog for more pics]. Place another dish over the top as a lid [I used foil] and put in a hot oven for half an hour. Take off the lid and bake for another hour or so until the tops of the potatoes are nice and brown and the water almost gone.  The result should be crispy brown topped potatoes with mushy bottoms.

Hettie added that sometimes a piece of meat would be placed in the middle and her granny baked a roll of pastry for a topping.

Great flavours. I need not add any more comments. The photo says it all. Traditional Cornish food at its best.

My husband thought he had gone to heaven when I served these for supper with pork chops.

I loved the mushy bottoms of the potatoes!!!