German Potato Egg and Onion creamy bake

I've cooked this many many times over the years, since I first ate and learned it from my Aunt in Germany when I lived with her and my Uncle during my university year abroad.

It's good solid, tasty, traditional food, and I love it, but for a couple of reasons I hadn't made it in a while.

1) the kids only recently really got into actual eggs, like the kind of eggs that LOOK like eggs.

2) Maggi is owned by Nestle, and we don't buy from baby-killers.

Anyway, I was really craving this, and I thought I'd give it a go.

Ingredients needed:

• about a kilo of white potatoes 
• 6 eggs
• 2 - 3 onions
• 300ml cream
• an indecent amount of butter
• something to replace Maggi seasoning - Kikkoman soy sauce along with a splash of worcestershire or hendersons will work, and since you probably don't know what it's supposed to taste like, it won't matter too much!

Method:

Start off by hard boiling the eggs (put in pan, cover with water, boil for 8 - 10 minutes.)

Slice the potatoes into half thick centimetre rounds.  I like to microwave them for around 10 minutes, but you can also boil them in a pan until just done.

Slice the onion into rings and fry slowly in a mix of butter and ghee or oil until soft and a little browned.  Add a little salt near the end.

Now you are ready to assemble.

Butter a dish that will go in the oven, I have a shallow cast iron round pan from Aldi which is a dupe of a popular Le Creuset casserole but honestly, anything will do!

Make a layer of the cooked potato circles using around a half of them.  Salt and pepper the layer.

Now add the cooked, buttery slightly salted onions and spread them over the potatoes.

Now add the hard boiled eggs, sliced into discs also. Spread out in a layer and salt and pepper this layer too.

Finally add the remaining potatoes, season with salt and pepper and dot with more butter.

Now, open the cream, and carefully add 2 - 3 tablespoons of the not-Maggi seasoning, until the cream looks an odd grey/brown and tastes decidedly SAVOURY.

Pour the whole tub gently over the layers, making sure you cover every bit.

Now pop it in an oven for about 40 mins.  You can put a lid on for the first 10-15 minutes, but then uncover it so it dries slightly and goes wonderfully brown.

Serve with green beans or a salad or any other green vegetable you feel like.

another courgette disguising trick - cheesy green sludge

Friday afternoon and I couldn't think what to make.  The veg drawer contained mainly carrots, courgettes and mushrooms.  Deciding not to take too many risks, I avoided the mushrooms and decided to see if I could do something new with the courgettes.

First I wanted something different with the carbs also, and we've had a lot of pasta and rice, and we don't often have a lot of bread in the house, so I got out the bag of red potatoes and using my Bamix SliceSy I made thin slices of potato.  I steamed them in the microwave for 5 mins and then tipped them into a baking dish.  I got not-so Littl'Un to spread them out, season with salt and pepper, cover with milk and cream and dot with butter.  We then put them in a preheated oven and let them cook while we got on with the courgette transformation.

Now I chopped up half a pack of streaky bacon and got that frying in a pan.  I finely chopped a couple of shallots (because I had them from earlier than the onions - one onion would have been fine also!) and added those to the bacon once it had started browning.

Swapping cutters, I got Big'Un to grate the courgettes in the SliceSy and once the bacon and shallots were cooked the way I like (brown and almost crispy bacon, soft and translucent shallot) we tipped in the grated courgettes, seasoned it all with black pepper, and stirred well.  I lowered the flame and allowed it to simmer with the lid on until it eventually turned to almost mush.  At this point, I added the thicker cream which was still stuck to the pot after adding the liquid double cream to the potatoes, and a good dollop of butter.  Finally, just before serving, I chucked in a good handful of grated cheese and waited for it to melt completely, after stirring it through.

The whole meal was a masterpiece!! Everyone wanted more, and even Tiny didn't patronise me when I called it "cheesy bacon vegetables" - he didn't seem to clock that it was courgettes this time!!!