Browsing the archives for the side dish tag.

Twice Baked Potatoes

Domestic

As I collect ideas for Thanksgiving and try them out on my (thankfully willing) family, I am also collecting ideas for Christmas and I may or may not be knitting at a break-neck pace to try to knit up and otherwise craft all these fun projects! Second year here and it’s still pretty weird to be knitting up Christmas gifts and trying out Thanksgiving recipes when the weather is so wonderful but I know, poor me, right?

The kids have been learning more differences between Canadian Thanksgiving and American Thanksgiving. Canadian Thanksgiving is all about the fall harvest and of course, American Thanksgiving is a celebration of the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians sharing a harvest feast. Similar, but not quite the same. So we’ve been learning some American history. Here’s a little trivia that’s new to me, this first breaking of bread between the colonists and the Native Indians took place in 1621, but it wasn’t an official holiday until Lincoln declared it one in the middle of the Civil War in 1863. I wonder if it was a tradition for some people during those 242 years it wasn’t an ‘official’ holiday?

These potatoes have an extra dose of Vitamin C, Vitamin B-6 and Magnesium by adding pureed cauliflower to the mixture before it’s spooned back into the potato skins. This is yet another winner from Deceptively Delicious, my go-to collection of recipes for hiding pureed veggies in everyday meals.

Deceptively Delicious Twice Baked Potatoes

4 large potatoes
1 cup cauliflower puree
1/2 cup sour cream
2 tablespoons butter
1 garlic clove
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
2 slices turkey bacon (cooked, drained, dried and chopped)

Preheat your oven to 400, and wash the potatoes. Poke vents in them in a fork, wrap in aluminum foil and bake for about an hour.

Once potatoes are cooked and cooled, cut each in half and remove the flesh. Don’t scoop too close to the skin or you may tear it, better to leave some extra flesh than lose a whole potato skin bowl! Mash the potato flesh with the cauliflower puree, sour cream, butter, garlic, salt, and pepper.

Spoon this mixture back into the potato skins and bake for another 15 minutes. Now sprinkle with bacon and voila!

Twice Baked Potatoes Twice Baked Potatoes
Twice Baked Potatoes Twice Baked Potatoes
Twice Baked Potatoes
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Broccoli Gratin

Domestic

I absolutely hate broccoli. I know, I know. But I do. I usually make soup out of it and add either potato until it’s crazy creamy or I add cauliflower to mask the taste. Otherwise, I steam and puree it so I can add it to sauces and stews and still get a decent amount of it but I’m not about to just, eat a piece of broccoli. I hope one day I will, but I’m just not there. This recipe helped though! I can conceive of myself eating broccoli now!

I’ve seen recipes for broccoli gratin all over the place for years and years but it never really crossed my mind to try it – you know, on account of my hating broccoli. The kids love broccoli though and so does my husband and we all love cheese (it’s recipes like this that throw me off my vegan intentions – whoops) so I gave it a go. Holy moly. Super, super, crazy amazing good.

I had seconds happily (mostly because I wanted to eat the cheese sauce with a spoon), which I think is also how I learned that I’d eat broccoli if it was slathered in something delicious. Like this!

Broccoli Gratin

Cheesy Broccoli Gratin via Kitchen Comments

1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup flour
2 cups milk
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon thyme
8 oz cheddar cheese
24 oz broccoli
1/3 cup bread crumbs
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Broccoli Gratin
Broccoli Gratin
Preheat your oven to 400, then melt butter in a saucepan. Whisk in the flour and cook for about a minute. Add the milk and whisk till smooth, now add the nutmeg and thyme – and have your cheese and broccoli at the ready!
Broccoli Gratin
Broccoli Gratin
Remove your saucepan from the heat and stir in the cheese until it’s melted. Arrange the broccoli in a casserole dish (or whatever).
Broccoli Gratin
Just LOOK AT THIS. Ugh. It was so good.
Broccoli Gratin
Broccoli Gratin
Pour the cheese sauce over the broccoli. Slooooooowly to make sure it’s all coated.
Broccoli Gratin
Broccoli Gratin
Broccoli Gratin
Now toss the bread crumbs and Parm on top and bake for 20-30 minutes. Cool just enough to avoid burning your family/guests but serve it gooey!
Broccoli Gratin
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Scalloped Potato Gratin

Domestic

When I was a kid, scalloped potatoes was my hands down favorite side and maybe to keep the magic of it alive for me, my Daddy would only make it once in a while. I absolutely loved everything about it, like most kids I counted potatoes as my favorite vegetable and also like most kids, I had a real serious love of cheese. Now that I’m older though I understand that wasn’t just the marriage of cheese and potatoes that won my heart with this side, but the creamy, slightly gooey sauce that keeps it all from melting into a big unappetizing clump and the tiny hint of nutmeg. So many of my childhood favorites had a pinch of nutmeg in them. Thanks for setting the bar so high, Daddy! <3 This recipe is not his original. The only irritating thing about my father's kitchen habits is his refusal to use an actual recipe. He calls them a 'springboard' for his kitchen creativity. No controlling this guy with measurements or doing anything the same way twice! So his recipe for the scalloped potatoes I grew up with is a pinch of this and a dash of that and 'it's done when it smells done'. This recipe though, is pretty close!! One of these days, I will try to veganize it! Personally, I wouldn't attempt to make any kind of scalloped potatoes unless I had a serious mandolin, but if you're good with a knife - by all means slice them thin! Scalloped Potato Gratin

cooking spray
about 5 or 6 medium potaotes, I used red
3 pieces bacon, fried and patted dry
2 tablespoons melted butter
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
3/4 cup cheddar cheese
1/4 cup mozzarella cheese
1 cup fat free milk
1 teaspoon nutmeg
2 teaspoons thyme

Scalloped Potato Gratin
Scalloped Potato Gratin
Scalloped Potato Gratin
Scalloped Potato Gratin
Scalloped Potato Gratin
Scalloped Potato Gratin
After you slice your potatoes as thin as possible (or slightly thicker, if you prefer), fry up and then dry your bacon. Now make a gooey mixture with the melted butter, salt, pepper and garlic powder. Toss the potato slices in it and make sure they’re all evenly coated. Most recipes will tell you to grate your cheese but I slice mine into smallish chunks for this. Spray whatever dish you’re using and arrange about 1/2 of the coated potatoes on the bottom, then cover with about half the sliced cheddar.
Scalloped Potato Gratin
Scalloped Potato Gratin
Now scald your milk, nutmeg and thyme. Just bring it to a boil and shut it off. Give it another mix to be sure the spices are incorporated. Now add the rest of the coated potatoes, pour the milk mixture over them and top with the rest of the cheddar and the mozzarella and bacon. Cook at 425 for about 45 minutes.
Scalloped Potato Gratin
Scalloped Potato Gratin
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Bacon Mashed Potatoes

Domestic

Don’t forget about our giveaway with Keeley Behling Studios! Like the Keeley Behling Studios Facebook page and leave a comment there about something in her Etsy shop to enter. It wouldn’t hurt if you liked the So Very Domestic Facebook page too. 😉

Everything is better with bacon. Right?! The addition of bacon to pretty much anything I can add bacon to has been mounting. Perogies, check. Breakfast pie, check. Cookies, check. I will post about all these bad boys eventually. The bacon wrapped tater tots are a personal favorite, and have won me over in the hearts of both strangers, neighbors and randos everywhere. This? Is the ‘impress my family’ version, and it totally works.

Bacon Mashed Potatoes

Bacon Mashed Potatoes

4 baking potatoes
1/4 cup butter
6 strips bacon
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese

Bacon Mashed Potatoes
Bacon Mashed Potatoes
Bake your potatoes however you like, (I took a shortcut and stuck them in the microwave), then mash them with butter.
Bacon Mashed Potatoes
Bacon Mashed Potatoes
I used my hand blender to make sure there were no chunks and then I added in the bacon.
Bacon Mashed Potatoes
Bacon Mashed Potatoes
Spread the mashed potatoes in a casserole dish and sprinkle the cheese over top. Bake at 375F for about 20 minutes.
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