Potato days! Funeral Potatoes and Potato leek soup.

Ever since Easter came and went without a visit to Ma and Pop's I've been craving some of the traditional Jensen Easter dinner side dish of "funeral potatoes"! I assume we kids dubbed them this because they are not only a great accompaniment to that Easter ham, but also often brought as a moral supporting, carb-loaded, comfort food, to neighborhood funerals. So, last time I had my mom on the phone I got the quick and dirty throw together recipe for these creamy, cheesy, yummy-tastic, potatoes.


Funeral Potatoes

20 oz. bag frozen grated hash brown potatoes
16 oz. carton sour cream
10 3/4 oz. can cream of celery soup
1/2 Cup milk or 1/2&1/2
2 Cups grated cheddar cheese
-Optional: 1/4 of a small onion diced and stirred in at beginning or 1 Cup of french fried onions tossed on top instead of second cup of cheese. 

Stir together all ingredients reserving 1 Cup cheese.
Spread in a 4qt (15"X10") glass baking dish.
Bake at 350° F. for 1hour.
Sprinkle with remaining cheese and 1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper 15 min. before cooking time ends.


My second potato recipe is also a leek recipe!
This is so simple and so delicious. Danny and I were in the garden clearing some space so we can plant some summer squash and so we pulled a bunch of turnips, beets, greens, and a whole lot of leeks.

Potato Leek soup

4 Tbs. salted butter
2 medium or 4-5 small leeks -chop white and tender green parts
4 medium potatoes diced in 1" cubes
1 tsp. fresh tyme
3 Cups chicken or veggi. stock
1 Cup 1/2&1/2
Freshly ground black pepper to taste

Saute leeks in butter in pressure cooker or medium soup pot for 2 min. Add the potatoes, thyme, and chicken stock. Lock lid in place and cook on high pressure for 8 min or put soup pot on medium heat or a low boil for 20 min, until potatoes are cooked through. Remove from heat and stir in the 1/2 & 1/2. Add pepper. The butter and stock should have plenty of salt but add more if needed. 

Hot and Sour Soup: Pressure cooker style!

So I was craving something different.
Hmmm.... something brothy... something light... something filled with good veggies.... something with and asian flair? Aha! Hot and Sour soup! This was my first try at this but it turned out soo... well and is so easy. Just throw it in the cooker and let it do it's thing. Nice! I'm getting spoiled and lazy with this machine that does all the work for me.

Fill the pan with all the goodies!

Add a little squeeze of lime and dash more of pepper and yum!

 Hot and Sour Soup

4 C. chicken or vegetable broth
1 small package rice noodles divided in half
1 8oz. can bamboo shoots -drained
1 8oz. can water chestnuts - drained (mmm crunchy!)
4Tbs. rice wine vinegar
1Tbs. soy sauce
1 Tbs. sugar
1 tsp. ground black pepper
1C. diced veggies - carrots, green beans, corn whatever you have on hand
8 oz frozen shrimp
8 oz firm tofu cubed
optional:
Stir in 1 beaten egg slowly pouring in while stirring after soup is done cooking.
Add some chopped dried Shitaki mushrooms.

Combine all in pressure cooker with half of the noodles (These noodles will become very mushy and mostly fall apart. But they give the broth a nice creamy consistency). Pressure cook on high for 10 min. or slow cook on high for 3-4 hours. When time is up add the remaining noodles and let stand for 10 min. Squeeze in a quarter of a lime and a dash of black pepper to each bowl as served. Fresh and spicy!

Quiche!!

Ahhh.... the quiche! How do I love thee...? A lot!

So the best part of the quiche is the crust as we all well know. So see below for my super simple, be brave and you'll be fine, pie crust recipe and "mothership" recipe for the quiche filling.

Lovely! Now what to do with those crust trimmings?

Cookie sheet to catch boil over

Crust trimmings + cinnamon & sugar. Bake 350°F. 10min = heaven.

Nom, nom!!

"Be brave" 2 pie crust recipe

2 C. all purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
3/4C. shortening - chilled
4-8 Tbs. ice water
- Begin in a cold room! Pie crust needs two things to come out flakey and perfect. Be cold and be quick!
-Mix salt and flour. Drop in small chunks of shortening. Cut into flour until chunks are small frosted flake size flakes. I like to use the narrow edge of a rubber scraper. It doesn't stick and doesn't mash the shortening into flat globs.
-Then... the water. Every time I add the water it is different depending on the humidity. So I start with 4 tbs. mash it around with the flat side of the aforementioned spatula. It should start to join together in nice flakey looking layers. Keep it as dry as you can but still get the mixture to combine into a ball. -This is where your WARM hands come into play. Once you think the water level is just about right put your hands in and try balling it up. If it's still to dry at this point add a bit more water. Keep this step short. The more kneeding and touching the less flakey.
-Halve the mixture and put one ball on a plastic wrap sheet placed on the table. Smoosh the ball down flatish then add top covering of another sheet of plastic wrap. Roll out into pie pan sized + 1/2" circle. Quick now! Keep it cold and fast!
- Remove top covering of plastic wrap, place your pie tin upside down onto dough, flip and gently remove bottom layer of plastic wrap. Help crust slide into lay flat on the bottom of pie tin. Trim and crimp edges.
Add quiche filling!

Get the filling prepped before starting the crust so it's still cool and dry!

"Mothership" quiche filling
These instructions are the amount to put in each pie crust. So double if doing two.
1/4C. layer of shredded cheese... swiss, motz, cheddar etc.
1/4C. layer of aromatics... diced sauteed onion or leeks
1/4 C. layer of sauteed veggi.... diced peppers, broccoli, whatever sounds good
1/4 C. layer of shredded cheese
Sprinkle with 1/8 tsp salt and 1/8 tsp pepper and 1/8 tsp herbs. I like the basic Italian herb mix.
 THEN:
3 eggs to 1C 1/2 & 1/2 - I base this mixture on how deep the pie tin is and how much veg etc. I want in. Mix more as you need more. ( 1 egg to 1/3C. cream ratio)

 Bake at 350°F for 45-60 min. Until center bounces back when touched.