Original White House Cookbook

Take eight or ten good-sized cold boiled potatoes, slice them endwise, then crosswise, making them like dice in small squares. When you are ready to cook them, heat some butter or good drippings in a frying pan ; fry in it one small onion (chopped fine) until it begins to change color and look yellow. Now put in your potatoes, sprinkle well with salt and pepper, stir well and cook about five minutes, taking care that you do not break them. They must not brown. Just before taking up stir in a tablespoonful of minced parsley. Drain dry by shaking in a heated colander. Serve very hot. Delmonico. POTATO FILLETS. Pare and slice the potatoes thin ; cut them if you like in small fillets about a quarter of an inch square, and as long as the potato will admit ; keep them in cold water until wanted, then drop them into boiling lard ; when nearly done, take them out with a skimmer and drain them, boil up the lard again, drop the potatoes back and fry till done ; this operation causes the fillets to swell up and puff. POTATO CROQUETTES. No. 1. Wash, peel and put four large potatoes in cold water, with a pinch of salt, and set them over a brisk fire ; when they are done pour off all the water and mash them. Take another saucepan, and put in it ten tablespoonfuls of milk and a lump of butter half the size of an egg ; put it over a brisk fire ; as soon as the milk comes to a boil, pour the potatoes into it, and stir them very fast with a wooden spcon ; when thoroughly mixed, take them from the fire and put them on a dish. Take a tablespoonful and roll it in a clean towel, making it oval in shape ; dip it in a well-beaten egg, and then in bread crumbs, and drop it in hot drippings or lard. Proceed in this manner till all the potato is used, four potatoes making six croquettes. Fry them a light brown all over, turning them gently as may be necessary. When they are done, lay them on brown paper or a hair sieve, to drain off all fat ; then serve on a napkin. POTATO CROQUETTES. No. 2. Take two cups of cold mashed potatoes, season with a pinch of salt, pepper and a tablespoonful of butter. Beat up the whites of two eggs, and work all together thoroughly ; make it into small balls slightly fiattened, dip them in the beaten yolks of the eggs, then roll either in flour or cracker crumbs ; fry the same as fish-balls. Delmonico’s. POTATOES A LA DELMONICO. Cut the potatoes with a vegetable cutter into small balls about the size of a marble; put them into a stewpan with plenty of butter and a good sprinkling of salt; keep the saucepan covered, and shake occasionally until they are quite done, which will be in about an hour. FRIED POTATOES WITH EGGS. Slice cold boiled potatoes and fry in good butter until brown; beat up one or two eggs, and stir into them just as you dish them for the table; do not leave them a moment on the fire after the eggs are in, for if they harden they are not half so nice; one egg is enough for three or four persons, unless they are very fond of potatoes ; if they are, have plenty and put in two. BAKED POTATOES.