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Broiled Potatoes
Take some cold or raw potatoes; cut them lengthwise into slices half an inch thick, dredge a little flour lightly over these, and lay them on a hot gridiron over a clear but not very fierce fire. Turn them about that they may be equally colored on both sides, and serve very hot. The slices must not be allowed to get hard, or they will be spoilt. Time, till browned. Allow 2 or 3 potatoes for each person.
A gridiron recipe for using up boiled potatoes, and it works well on a ridged grill pan, an outdoor grill or under a broiler. The one thing to get right is that raw slices half an inch thick will not cook through over a live fire before the outside blackens.
- Start with cooked potatoesThe original allows either cold cooked or raw potatoes. Cold boiled potatoes are the easier option; if starting from raw, simmering the whole potatoes until barely tender, cooling them and then slicing reduces the risk of the slices coloring outside before they are tender within.
- Gridiron equivalentA gridiron was a grate of iron bars set over coals. A cast-iron ridged grill pan over medium heat, a charcoal grill once the flames have died to glowing coals, or a broiler rack about 4 inches from the element all reproduce it.
- "Clear but not very fierce fire"Clear means burned down to embers with no smoke or flame; not very fierce means moderate, roughly medium heat on a grill pan.
- The flour dredgeA very light dusting only, patted off, which dries the surface and helps it brown. Too much flour turns pasty on contact with hot metal. Brushing the slices with oil or clarified butter first stops them sticking to the bars.
- Timing"Till browned" is about 3 to 5 minutes a side for cooked slices, less if the fire is lively. Turn once or twice for even color and stop while they are still tender; the caution about hardness is real, as a slice held too long dries into leather.
- SeasoningThe original gives none. Salt and pepper the slices before they go on, and a little chopped parsley or a scrape of butter as they come off suits them.
- YieldTwo or three potatoes per person, as the original allows. Serve straight from the fire; they lose their edge within minutes.
Broiling over a gridiron was one of the standard ways of reheating cooked food in a nineteenth-century kitchen, where the fire was already lit and a gridiron cost little. Recipes of this type belong to the large body of Victorian and Edwardian household instruction devoted to leftovers: potatoes boiled for one dinner reappeared the next day broiled, fried, baked into cakes or dressed with cream, and cookery writers of the period often treated waste as a moral as much as a domestic failing. The light flour dredge is the same trick used for broiled fish and cutlets, giving the surface something dry to color against.