Potato Bake - Two Ways!

So last night OH and I both wanted potato bake....but we face that age old dilemma....I love a cheesy delicious potato bake as much as the next person, but I try and be a touch restrained whereas OH likes all these cheesy goodness he can get!
So, just like we do with lasagne, we decided to make two! And in the process we ended up having a three course potato inspired meal!

Course 1 - Potato Soup
Course 2 - Oven Roasted Potato and Kumara Chips


Course 3 - Potato Bake!


Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!

Ok so the Potato Soup, really not that hard...but half way through the potato bakes being cooked, we took mine out and skimmed the stock off the top, put it in a bowl and OH MY GOD....OH and I argued over who got to eat it! It wasn't like a thick soup, but just a nice stock infused with all the potato flavours, oh it was delicious, it just needed some nice crusty fresh bread to go with it!

The Oven Roasted Potato and Kumara Chips were also easy, we thinly sliced about 300g potato and 1 small kumara, layered them in a small baking dish, gave them a light spray with some oil and seasoned them with some Season All - Garlic and chucked them in the oven with the potato bake. Keep giving them a good toss around the dish and I would say they roasted for about an hour alongside the potato bakes. Absolutely delicious!

And last but not least the Potato Bakes!

Preheat the oven to 180C and thinly slice about 1kg of potatoes.

Then we layered thinly sliced potatoes, grated cheese and some diced onion in two small baking dishes.

For the Cheese Lovers Potato Bake - On the stove top we melted 1 tbsnp butter then added 1 tbspn plain flour and cooked for 2mins. Keep it on a low heat just so you don't burn anything. Then add 1 cup of milk and stir through 1-1/2 cup grated pizza cheese (I use the pizza cheese because it incorporates mozarella, parmesan, cheddar and romano and has a great flavour). I also stirred in about 1/2 tspn of crushed garlic. Keep stirring until nice and thick and all ingredients incorporated. Pour over your sliced potatoes and season with cracked pepper. Cover with foil and bake for around an hour. Then remove foil and if your really keen, sprinkle with grated cheese and bake for another 15 mins or until golden.

I will admit that OH's was awesome, but after one occasion where he put a whole 1kg pkt of cheese in the potato bake he made for our dinner one night, he has been banned from making mine!

And for the Health Conscious Potato Bake - I combined one vegetable stock cube, 1/2 tspn crushed garlic, 1 1/2 cups of water and 1/4 cup of milk in a saucepan over low heat. Once everything is well combined pour over the sliced potatoes. Cover with foil and bake for about 45 mins, then remove from oven and use a ladel to remove any excess stock that is sitting on the surface (mmmmm potato soup!). Sprinkle with some light grated pizza cheese and place back in the oven for another 30-45 mins. I just stick a knife into mine to see if the potatoes are cooked. I found this was really delicious despite not having the creamy cheesy sauce but I pinched a forkful of OH's to make up for it!!

So there you have it - how we set out to make potato bake and ended up having a three course potato feast!

Em xx