Chateau Potatoes
Wash, pare and cook (almost soft) one-half dozen medium-size potatoes. Drain perfectly dry, cool and cut them in quarters, trim them in the shape of small gherkins. Wash them in cold water, then put them in a frying pan, reheat in boiling water. Drain and add four tablespoons butter; shake the pan until potatoes are well buttered and a golden brown color. Remove carefully with a skimmer to hot serving dish, and sprinkle with finely chopped parsley.
A classic French garnish potato under an American name: parboiled, trimmed to small barrel shapes, then finished in butter until golden. The whole thing hinges on the potatoes being bone dry before they meet the butter.
- The hinge: dry potatoes"Drain perfectly dry" is the instruction that decides whether this works. Surface moisture steams the pieces instead of browning them; spread them on a towel or in the empty hot pan for a minute before adding butter.
- Trimming "in the shape of small gherkins"This is the cut now called tourné — seven-sided barrels about two inches long, tapered at both ends. Quartered medium potatoes give roughly the right blank; a small paring knife works better than a peeler.
- "Almost soft"Boil until a knife meets slight resistance at the centre. Note that the recipe cooks the potatoes whole and only quarters them afterwards, so allow longer than you would for cut pieces. Fully cooked potatoes will not survive trimming or the shaking pan.
- The repeated washing and reheatingThe cold rinse removes surface starch loosened by trimming; the reheat in boiling water brings the pieces back up to temperature so the butter stage is short. Both steps can be collapsed if you trim before parboiling and go straight to the pan.
- Butter that will brown, not burnFour tablespoons of butter over a moderate heat will darken past golden if left alone; the shaking is what keeps it moving. Clarified butter, or butter with a spoonful of neutral oil, holds up better if your pan runs hot.
- Pan and techniqueUse a heavy skillet wide enough that the pieces sit in one layer with room to roll. Crowding traps steam and you get pale, soft potatoes.
- SkimmerA slotted spoon or spider; the point is to leave the browned butter behind rather than pour it over the dish.
- YieldSix medium potatoes, trimmed, serve four as a side — trimming loses a third or more of the weight. Save the trimmings for soup or mash.
The name points to the French kitchen rather than to any particular château: pommes château are one of a family of garnish potatoes, generally traced to the classical French repertoire, distinguished chiefly by size and shape — cocotte the smallest, château next, fondante larger and finished in stock. All depend on the turned cut, which exists so that every piece is identical and cooks at the same rate, and which survives in professional training largely as a knife exercise. Its appearance in a book of American Sunday dinners is characteristic of the period around 1900, when middle-class cookbooks borrowed French garnishes and their names to lift a roast into something more formal. The cut is a wasteful one, paring away a substantial part of each potato for the sake of a uniform shape.