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Lyonnaise Potatoes
Cold boiled potatoes; chopped onion; butter; chopped parsley; drippings or lard; seasoning.
Cut the potatoes in dice. Put 2 tablespoonfuls of butter and one of drippings or lard, for each quart of potatoes used, in a frying-pan and melt over the fire. As soon as the butter is melted, add 1 tablespoonful of chopped onion for each quart of potato, and fry only until it turns yellow. Then add the potato, and season. Stir constantly with a fork so as not to break the potato. After five minutes add the chopped parsley, and cook two minutes longer. Warm the dish before serving.
A simple sauté that depends almost entirely on the state of the potatoes before they hit the pan. The recipe scales by the quart of diced potato, which is roughly 1.5 lb, or three or four medium potatoes.
- Start with cold, dry potatoesBoil the potatoes the day before, or at least several hours ahead, and refrigerate them uncovered. Warm or damp potatoes shed starch and collapse into mash the moment you stir them.
- Quart measureA quart of diced potato is roughly 1.5 lb, enough for three to four servings. The fat quantities given — 2 tablespoons butter plus 1 of drippings — are per quart and are on the lean side for a wide pan; a 10-inch skillet takes the full amount comfortably.
- DrippingsThe lard or drippings are there for a higher smoke point than butter alone. Bacon fat, beef dripping or a neutral oil all work; butter on its own will brown and speck before the potatoes colour.
- Onion first, and only just"Fry only until it turns yellow" means softened and barely coloured, a minute or two over medium heat. Onion taken further at this stage risks scorching, since it spends another seven minutes in the pan with the potato.
- Stirring with a forkThe instruction is deliberate — a fork lifts and turns dice without shearing them the way a spoon or spatula does. That said, constant stirring prevents browning; for crusted edges, let the potatoes sit undisturbed for a minute or two between turns.
- Total cooking timeSeven minutes is enough only to heat cooked potato through and take on a little colour. If you want a proper golden crust, allow 12 to 15 minutes over medium-high heat and add the parsley in the last two.
- Warming the dishWorth doing. Diced potato in a thin film of fat loses heat very fast on a cold plate, and the fat congeals visibly.
The name simply marks the dish as being in the style of Lyon, the French city whose cooking is closely identified with onions — à la lyonnaise on a menu has long signalled onions in butter, whether applied to potatoes, tripe, or sautéed liver. The dish appears in American cookbooks from the later nineteenth century as part of a broad wave of French-labelled preparations, and it earned its place in a general household compendium like this one for practical reasons as much as fashionable ones: it turns yesterday's boiled potatoes into something worth serving again.