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Potato Drops
2 cups mashed potatoes (with- 2 eggs out any milk)
Salt and pepper
Mix the potato and the beaten eggs. Drop the mixture from a spoon into the hot fat and fry until a golden brown, then drain on brown paper and serve with a garnish of parsley. If the spoon is dipped in boiling water after every using, each drop will retain the shape of the spoon.
A two-ingredient fritter that lives or dies on the dryness of the potato. The parenthetical "without any milk" is the whole recipe in miniature.
- Dry potato onlyUse floury baking potatoes, boiled or baked and mashed with no milk or cream; the recipe specifies only that milk be left out. Any liquid loosens the mixture and it will slump and spatter instead of holding a shape in the fat. Let the mash cool to warm before adding the eggs.
- Deep-fat temperatureThe original just says "hot fat." Aim for 365-375F. Below that the drops absorb grease; above it the egg sets and browns before the interior heats through. Fry in batches so the temperature does not crash.
- Eggs are the binderTwo whole eggs to two cups of potato gives a soft, pipeable batter rather than a dough. If it spreads in the pan, work in a tablespoon or two of flour; if it is stiff enough to roll, you have used dry, floury mash and can proceed as written.
- The spoon trick worksDipping the spoon in boiling water between drops keeps the starch from sticking, so the mixture releases cleanly and holds the bowl shape. Two spoons, one to scoop and one to push off, is faster than one.
- Brown paperPeriod kitchens drained fried food on unprinted butcher's or grocer's paper. Paper towels or a wire rack over a sheet pan do the same job; a rack keeps the undersides crisper.
- TimingRoughly 2 to 3 minutes for walnut-sized drops, turning once if they do not roll themselves. They are cooked ingredients already, so brown is done.
- YieldAbout 18 to 24 drops, serving four as a side. They fall quickly as they cool, so fry them last and serve straight from the drainer.
Fried potato batters of this kind circulated widely in American and English cookery of the period under names like potato puffs, potato balls and pommes dauphine, the French version adding choux paste to the potato. The instruction to leave milk out reflects a practical understanding of starch and moisture that these books usually state as a rule rather than an explanation, and the parsley garnish was a common finish for fried and drained dishes in the first decades of the twentieth century.