Looking back - A Favorite Guest Post

 Mindy gave me a wonderful idea with her post yesterday. I went back to see what some of my first posts here were. This is one of my favorites. I made it as a guest post before I was a regular. 

British Cheese and Onion Potato Pie

I know it’s January and we’re supposed to be being good and eating low-carb and all, but potatoes are good for you. Really. They’re a good source of potassium, so think of this recipe as good for your blood pressure. Besides, it’s the perfect warm up your insides food for a cold January day.

Whew! Now that I’ve gotten the rationalizing out of the way, let me tell you about this recipe.

My youngest daughter is a vegetarian which is fine most of the year but it makes holiday meals difficult for her. This year I was trying to find a recipe to entice her while everyone else was savoring the Christmas ham.

2021 update - she later became a vegan so no more eating this. :(

I stumbled across a recipe on BBC for a Cheese and Onion Pie. Since my daughter spent a wonderful month in London this summer and was still longing to go back, I figured this would be a hit.

This is the basic BBC recipe:

Ingredients

For the pastry

·       450g/1lb plain flour, plus extra for dusting

·       2 tsp baking powder

·       ½ tsp salt

·       120g/4½oz unsalted butter, plus extra for greasing

·       1 free-range egg yolk

·       50g/2oz parmesan cheese, grated

·       120ml/4fl oz water

·       1 free-range egg, beaten, for glazing

For the filling

·       1 medium potato, peeled and cut into cubes

·       2 onions, finely sliced

·       1 tbsp plain flour

·       50ml/2oz whole milk

·       50ml/2oz double cream

·       150g/5½oz mature cheddar cheese, grated

·       ½ tsp English mustard

·       ½ tsp cayenne pepper

·       salt and freshly ground black pepper

I’m going to be honest with you – I didn’t follow the recipe much at all.

First, I didn’t make the pastry crust. I used the Oronoco Farms frozen crust I had in the freezer. My daughter loves that crust so why mess with it?

Second, I basically used the ingredient list and then adapted it to what I had on hand. I used about 8 large potatoes, peeled them and set them to boil.

  

While the potatoes boiled, I diced 1 sweet onion and 1 red onion and sautéed them in Irish butter until they were translucent.

Then I mixed the potatoes, the onion mix, some milk and lots of cheese and layered it into the pre-baked pie crust, topped it with an extra layer of cheese, and set it to bake about half an hour at about 350 degrees.

The result was delicious. Both my daughter and I ate way too much of it and then we enjoyed leftovers for a few days. It was that good!

The BBC pie had a top crust, but I didn’t put the top crust on mine because I liked the bubbling cheese on top. I’m sure either way is delicious. (And the BBC one looks a whole lot prettier.)

I did a variation another night with artichoke hearts but that wasn’t as delicious as I’d imagined it would be. The artichokes just got mushy. I’d like to try it with salmon baked in but I’ll have to do that separate from my daughter’s portion.  NOTE: I did and it was fabulous.

Have you ever made something like this? Do you have any suggestions of things to add in for variety?

And here’s a link to the original recipe. http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/cheeseandonionpie_89625