Kitchen Queen Contest Entry #8 - Mr. Peenee's Potatoes Dauphinoise

Kitchen Queen Contest Entry #8 - Mr. Peenee's Potatoes Dauphinoise



Potatoes Dauphinoise

This recipe has a lot going for it. Mainly, it's completely delicious, but also, it's foolproof, forgiving of meager talent and attention spans and it's from Julia Child, so you can casually mention "Yes, it's one of my favorites of Julia's recipes" implying you have knocked out her pâte brisée by the handsful. Also, it's ingredients are so basic you can count on scoring them anywhere, even a 7-11, if it comes down to that.



3 pounds potatoes (Yukon Gold are way the best, but anything will do)
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1/2 tablespoon salt
1 quart half-and-half

Wash your hands.

Heat the oven to 400

Peel the potatoes and slice as thin as possible. This is where having a food processor comes in handy. Don't have one? Suck it up and slice them by hand. THIN. Quit whining, I've done it, so can you, lazy cow. Do not rinse the potatoes or store them in water. They may turn a little brown. Big deal. You are such a whiny cow.



Put the garlic on a cutting board and pour the salt over it. Using the back of fork mash them together to make a paste. Oddly enough, when I was making this batch for these photos, I went to look up the recipe, the first time in like a decade of cranking it out and I found Julia calls for a TEASPOON of each. She was probably drunk when she wrote that, so just ignore her and go with a Tablespoon of garlic and a HALF Tablespoon of salt.



Get a big pot, like a dutch kettle, put the garlic/salt paste in the bottom, pour in enough half-and-half to cover it and stir it up vigorously to combine.

Dump in the potatoes, then the rest of the half and half and stir gently. Wash your hands. Your dinner guests might not know where you've had them, but mrpeenee has a pretty good guess. Since the potato slices all stick together, you have to reach in the pot and gently separate them so the half-and-half can get in there.

Bring to a gentle boil over pretty high heat and then turn down to medium to simmer for 2 -3 minutes. Stir occasionally to scrape up the deliciousness from the bottom of the pot. Try not to wander off and start looking at porn while waiting for this, but if you do, it's no big deal.

Julia says to then pop the whole thing in the oven, but my experience is if you use the same pot to both boil and bake, cleaning is a torture. Instead transfer it all to a large, shallow casserole that you've coated liberally with a nonstick spray. Put the casserole on a cookie sheet cause when the milk infused with potato starch cooks over, it is a mother fucking beast to clean. Bake at 400 for 45 - 50 minutes.

I have friends who really like the slightly scorched, black crusty bits the best. Freaks.

This is one of those blessed recipes which is actually better the next day. Heat it up in a low-ish oven, covered with foil for 20 - 30 minutes. Wash you hands before you stick your finger in to see if it's hot.