Irish Cooking Night: Haggerty

WHHHAAAT? That's right, hag-er-tea. Its an Irish dish made of potatoes, onions, and cheese. Sounding better already, isn't it?

Selection: Irish love potatoes. Potatoes have kept them alive. They also love cabbage. Apparently like they like cabbage in potatoes, cabbage in with their meat and potatoes, or just plain potatoes. There are lots of ways to prep a potato but I was looking for something a little different. This dish is a combo of potatoes, onions, and cheese. One of my favorite parts of this recipe was that it called for bacon grease. That's awesome. I keep my leftover bacon grease in a jar in the fridge. Well actually its more of a cup, but you get the idea. As the adage goes, save all manner of bacon grease. Consequently, you could fry up a piece or two of bacon and toss it in the dish. Alternately, you could use butter but bacon grease will give you the maximum flavor.

Haggerty



Haggerty (adapted from Mastercook) (Printer Friendly Version)

Prep time: 15 min.
Cook time: 10 min.
Total time: 25 min.

Ingredients:

6 small or 3 medium potatoes (washed and thinly sliced)
1 large onion, thinly sliced
3 Tbsp bacon grease
1 c. grated sharp cheddar cheese
salt and pepper to taste (1 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp pepper works well)

How To:

Wash the potatoes ans slice as thinly as possible. Peel the skin off the onion and slice as thinly as possible.

Heat 1 1/2 Tbsp of bacon grease in a large skillet.

Layer potatoes, half of salt and pepper, onions, and cheese. Repeat. Scatter the remaining bacon grease over the top layer.

Cook on medium low for 3-5 minutes. Watch carefully or the potatoes will get overdone.

Using a plate, flip the layers out of the skillet onto the plate. Invert the potatoes into the skillet and cook again on medium low for 3-5 minutes. (This allows you to cook the potato mixture from both sides of the layers.

When lightly browned, turn to low to maintain warmth until ready to serve.

Response:

I modified this recipe to help future preparations. I thought it could've really had more cheese and so this is accommodated for above. Also, I filled in gaps on important cooking info to prevent a Trogdor effect on your potatoes. (Trogdor is a cartoon dragon. If you haven't heard of him, please go here. Trogdor is a funny character from the Strongbad cartoons. We used to watch them every week when they were posted when I was in undergrad. Fun times.) Anyway, I just don't want you to have burned potatoes. Ours were good but maybe a little more done in spots than I intended. (It was my mistake too. Oops.) Either way, it was still devoured. The modifications above will make it even more enjoyable for the future.

Hungry for more? The rest of the Irish menu is coming in future posts.

Our Irish Night Menu:


Bread: Cranberry Tangelo Irish Soda Bread 
Entree: Corned Beef 
Vegetable Side #1: Haggerty (Potatoes with onions and cheese) (today's post)
Vegetable Side #2: Baby Carrots and Onions in Cream
Dessert: Chocolate Stout Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Whipped Cream Icing

Comments

  1. At the moment I do not have a plate large enough to acomodate my skillet. I see disaster on the floor. Do you think baking it would work?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yes. Bake it for 30 min at 375 F and then raise the temp to 425 F and bake 10-15 minutes. It will take longer than the pan on stove top method but it should also eliminate the possibility of over heating the pan.

    ReplyDelete
  3. After a little more checking, the style of cooking in the pan and flipping it appears to be Irish. The baked in the oven method is apparently British. Either way you enjoy a pretty similar dish but it seemed like it might be important to make the distinction.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment