No. 2796

Potatoes, Marshal

Pommes de Terre Marechal

Mince some raw potatoes; wash and wipe well on a cloth; put them in a flat saucepan with butter; season and cook very slowly while covered, tossing them frequently; when soft beat them up and dress in layers in a vegetable dish; bestrew each of these with grated parmesan, pour melted butter over and bake for half an hour in a slack oven.

← No. 2795 Potatoes, Maitre d'Hotel Potatoes & Sweet Potatoes No. 2797 Potatoes, Marchioness →

For the Modern Kitchen

A two-stage potato dish: raw potato cooked gently in butter under a lid, then crushed, layered with parmesan and baked. Nothing here is difficult, but the language hides a few specifics.

"Mince some raw potatoes"This means cut small — a fine dice or coarse shred, not ground to a paste. The recipe gives no quantity; roughly 2 lb of a starchy or all-purpose potato (russet, Yukon Gold) would fill a shallow vegetable dish.
Wash and wipe wellRinsing the cut potato removes surface starch so the pieces stew in butter rather than gluing together, and drying them on a cloth keeps the butter from spitting. Do not skip the drying; wet potato steams instead of softening in fat.
"Flat saucepan"A wide, shallow pan — a sauté pan or skillet with a lid. The point is a single shallow layer so everything softens at the same rate.
Cook very slowly, coveredThis is the hinge. Low heat with the lid on, tossing often, so the potato softens in butter without browning — the recipe gives no time, but 20 to 30 minutes is a reasonable estimate. If it colours, the heat is too high.
Butter and seasoningFigure 3 to 4 tablespoons for 2 lb of potato, plus salt and pepper; The Epicurean's "season" assumes both. Add a little more melted butter over the top layer as directed.
"Beat them up"Crush with a fork or masher in the pan, keeping some texture. This is not a purée and takes no cream or milk — the butter is the only enrichment.
Slack oven275–300F. The half hour is only to melt the cheese and set the layers, and a hotter oven would dry the surface before the inside warms through. If you want colour, finish briefly under the broiler.
YieldServes 4 to 6 as a side. Best straight from the dish; reheated, the crushed potato tightens.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894) records the kitchen of Delmonico's in New York, and its potato chapter runs to dozens of numbered variations distinguished by little more than a garnish or a title — Maitre d'Hotel, Marechal, Marchioness in sequence here. Names like à la maréchale came out of French professional cookery, where dishes were routinely dedicated to ranks and titles rather than described by their contents, though the term itself carries a fairly conventional sense: egg-and-breadcrumbed, often with truffle or asparagus. What the recipe does show is a technique older than the restaurant: raw potato cooked slowly in butter in a covered pan. The parmesan-and-butter gratin finish turns a plain vegetable into something that could be sent to a table expecting several courses.