As you may have guessed from previous posts, my family loves potatoes. When my three kids were young, I purchased a 50-pound bag of potatoes (it was actually a box) as I made them so often. None went to waste.
Our favorite recipe was baked (remember I can’t make mashed).
Nowadays, I buy 5-pound bags and keep them cool so they don’t spoil as have fewer people at home.
Requests have come in from my family for hash brown casseroles which are super easy because you can purchase the spuds pre-made at the store.
Another favorite was scalloped potatoes. Mom made them for us when my sisters and I were young from a box mix and they were yummy.
I prefer to serve the homemade variety. Usually the recipes called for cheddar cheese and this was always a really delicious addition.
However, in looking through ‘The Cheese Book’ by Vivienne Marquis and Patricia Haskell (1964, Simon and Schuster) I found a delicious recipe for scalloped potatoes made with Swiss cheese.
Now my husband loves Swiss cheese as a snack (probably because our name is Swiss). We usually have a hunk of Swiss cheese in our frig.
So on a recent wintry night, seeing as we had no Cheddar but lots of Swiss, I experimented.
Wow, what a jolt of pure pleasure!
There has already been a request to make this recipe again which I will do.
About the cookbook– it is really more of an educational guide than a pure cookbook. The first half tells everything you’d want to know about cheese and more – did you know there is something called buffalo cheese?
That’s all I’ll say about that.
If you want to study the information about cheese from this era, this is a good reference.
Here is the recipe as in the cookbook with my notes at the end.
Scalloped Potatoes
3-4 medium potatoes, sliced thin
4 medium onions, sliced thin
3 or 4 T. butter
5 slices Swiss cheese, cut in strips
½ c. Parmesan, grated
1 ½ c. milk
Salt and pepper
Butter well a 1-quart heatproof dish and arrange in it a layer of potatoes, lightly salted and peppered, a layer of onions, dots of butter, layer of Swiss cheese strips and a light sprinkling of Parmesan.
Repeat layers in this order until casserole is almost filled.
Add cold milk, making sure that it runs through to the bottom of the dish and around the sides and coming to the level of the mixture.
Add the rest of the Swiss cheese strips and a good sprinkling of Parmesan and bake in preheated 350 degree oven until potatoes are soft (about 50 minutes).
Reduce temperature if necessary (and compensate by allowing a little longer cooking time) so the potatoes do not get darker than a rich golden brown.
Serves 4.
My notes:
- Place pastry paper in the dish prior to baking – I use this step for almost everything I bake.
- More milk may be needed to make sure it runs around the sides.
- As this was a side dish, I divided the potatoes between 2 dishes to freeze one for later.
- Cooked broccoli would be a good addition without having to change the ingredients.
Degree of Difficulty based on the following scale:
1– Easy (5 ingredients or less; little prep time)
2– Somewhat easy (10 ingredients or less; less than 1 hour of prep)
3— Not for a weeknight (between 1-2 hours of prep)
4—Challenging (you’ve got to be kidding; who thought up this recipe?)
My vote is Difficulty #2 as other than cutting up the potatoes and onions, there is quick assembly.
**
Vintage Find of the Week
This cute yellow Pyrex dish is just the right size for halving a recipe such as this week’s. It measure 6-x-8-1 ½ -inches and still holds up for what must be its fifth or sixth decade.
I’m collecting Pyrex, as are apparently, thousands of other people because prices are high. I found this gem in a thrift shop and have used it many times.
Bon Appetit!
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Vintage Eats of Kayleen Reusser 