Potatoes with Sausage and Veggies
I started by just gathering a few veggies together and the meal ended with my husband not only cleaning his plate, but actually praising me throughout. And the plays-with-food and eats-nothing boys ate enough to deserve ice cream afterwards.
I started by just gathering a few veggies together and the meal ended with my husband not only cleaning his plate, but actually praising me throughout. And the plays-with-food and eats-nothing boys ate enough to deserve ice cream afterwards.
- Carbohydrate 76.40085 g
- Cholesterol 40.32 mg
- Fat 22.6101 g
- Fiber 10.6650001937151 g
- Protein 17.72655 g
- Saturated Fat 5.558185 g
- Serving Size 1 1 Serving (620g)
- Sodium 395.93 mg
- Sugar 65.7358498062849 g
- Trans Fat 1.84196 g
- Calories 571 calories
Step-by-step
- Par-boil the potatoes and run them under cold water to cool them down.
- When cool enough to handle, grate them and soak for a few minutes in cold water (to remove the starch), drain and leave to dry on paper towel.
- Fry the onions in the oil until soft.
- Add in the garlic and red pepper and continue frying for about another 5 minutes, stirring regularly.
- Clear a spot in the middle of the frying pan and add a handful of the shredded potatoes, allow them to fry up a little, then stir into the rest of the mixture and create another little hole.
- Continue this until all the potatoes have been added.
- Add the sausage.
- Continue frying until the sausage is cooked through.
- Pour in the half can of tomato soup (more or less to preferance) and when everything is covered, serve with warm crusty bread.
Managing Starch and Moisture
Why do grated potatoes require a cold water soak after par-boiling? Tubers contain surface starches that release amylose when cut, which gelatinize in the pan and cause the shreds to glue together into a dense mass rather than crisping. Soaking dissolves these excess starches away. Blotting the drained shreds on paper towels removes external moisture before frying, ensuring that oil contacts dry potato surfaces for rapid steam evacuation and browning.
Building Layered Aromatics
Frying onions before adding garlic and red peppers exploits the Maillard reaction and caramelization at different heat thresholds. Onions take longer to soften because their sugars break down slowly in oil, whereas minced garlic burns easily under direct heat. Introducing the garlic five minutes into the process prevents bitter sulfur compounds from forming. Clearing spaces in the pan for incremental potato additions maintains high pan temperature so the oil does not drop below 350 degrees Fahrenheit, which would cause the vegetables to absorb grease instead of frying.
Integrating Acid and Fat
Sausage fat renders during the skillet stage, coating the vegetables in saturated lipids that carry fat-soluble flavor molecules. Tomato soup introduces water, glutamates, and citric acid. The acidity cuts through the heavy animal fat while free amino acids from the tomatoes bind with meaty flavor compounds from the sausage to create savory depth. Visual doneness relies on observing when the liquid reduces enough to cling to the grated potatoes without pooling at the bottom of the pan.
