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Potato Cakes
Shape left-over mashed potato into small round cakes, dip in egg and fine bread crumbs, and fry in hot fat in frying pan. Turn with pancake turner to prevent breaking. Brown well on both sides.
A leftovers dish with no measurements, which means the variables that decide success are all in the handling. Cold, dry, well-seasoned potato is the whole game.
- Start with cold potatoMashed potato straight from the pot is too loose to hold a shape and will absorb fat. Chill it thoroughly, ideally overnight, so the starch sets and the cakes stay together in the pan.
- Dry mash, not creamyMash made with a lot of milk or cream slumps. If yours is soft, work in a beaten egg yolk or a spoonful of flour per cup of potato to firm it before shaping.
- Size and thicknessThe recipe says only 'small round cakes'; something around 2 1/2 inches across and 3/4 inch thick will brown before the centre overheats. Press them flat rather than leaving them domed.
- The breadingBeat the egg with a teaspoon of water so it coats thinly. Dry breadcrumbs give a firmer crust than fresh; let the coated cakes rest 10 minutes so the crumbs adhere before they meet the fat.
- "Hot fat" means about 350-360F"Hot fat" -- The recipe gives no temperature. For shallow-frying in a quarter-inch of oil, lard or clarified butter, somewhere around 350-360F works: below that the crumbs soak, much above and they colour before the inside is hot. Two to three minutes a side.
- Don't crowd the panFour or five cakes at a time in a 10-inch skillet. Adding more drops the fat temperature and the coating goes soft, which is exactly when they break on turning.
- SeasoningLeftover mash is usually underseasoned for a fried cake. Taste and correct with salt, pepper and a little grated onion or chopped parsley before shaping.
- YieldTwo cups of mashed potato makes roughly six cakes, enough for three as a side dish. Hold cooked ones on a rack in a 250F oven rather than stacking them on paper.
Fried cakes of yesterday's potato appear in English and American household books through the nineteenth century under names like potato cakes, potato croquettes and potato balls, the distinction often being shape and whether the mixture was bound with egg. The habit belongs to a kitchen where the previous day's mash was a resource rather than waste. The egg-and-crumb coating is the standard croquette method borrowed from French practice, simplified here to pan-frying rather than the deep fat a formal croquette would demand. The instruction to use a pancake turner rather than a fork or spoon is the practical heart of the entry, and it is the detail a cook remembers after the first batch collapses.