Ma What's For Dinner?

We love love love our potatoes in this house.  We like ‘em baked, roasted, grilled and especially mashed!  I threw a bunch of stuff from the fridge together for these babies and all anyone could say was MMMMMMM.  So here they are, MMMMMMahsed Potatoes!

Serves 6  Prep Time: 5 minutes  Cook time: 20 minutes

1 1/2 lbs baby red potatoes

3 cloves garlic, peeled

S&P

splash of cream

1/4 cup chicken stock

1/4 cup parmesan cheese

2 T butter

Cut your potatoes into quarters and toss them in a medium sized pot with the garlic cloves.  Fill with cold water.  Set over high heat and bring to a boil.  Once the water is boiling season the water with salt.  Cook until fork tender about 8-10 minutes.  Drain well and transfer to a bowl.  Toss in remaining ingredients and mix with hand mixer or smash with a potato smasher.  Serve with a bit of sauce from chicken marsala.

Oh oh oh, guess what? I’m guest posting today over at my girl Katie’s at Sassy Silly Spunky Momma She is just awesome and you should go on over and check her out.

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In college I used to LOVE Pizzeria Uno’s mashed potato pizza. This is an ode to the days of old….

Serves:  Up to 8  Prep time:  20 minutes  Cook time:  25 minutes

1 store bought pizza crust

1 bag frozen Ore-Ida potatoes

1/2 cup milk

2 T butter

2 T parmesan cheese

S&P

1 pound bacon, chopped

1 onion, diced

8 oz mushrooms, sliced

2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

chopped parsley, for garnish

chopped scallions, for garnish

sour cream

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Unroll your pizza dough and stretch it out over a large baking pan, or you can roll it out into a ball and make a round pizza if you like.  Poke a couple of holes into the dough with a fork and bake the uncovered dough for 10 minutes.  While your dough cooks place your potatoes in the microwave and cook on high for 10 minutes.  Pour potatoes into a bowl and add milk, butter, parmesan cheese, and season with S&P.  Mash well and set aside.

Heat a large skillet over medium high heat and brown your bacon until just crispy.  Remove with a slotted spoon and set aside.  In the bacon drippings saute onion, mushrooms and garlic until soft, about 7 minutes.

Remove crust from oven and spread out your potato mixture to cover leaving a one inch border for your crust.  Top potatoes with mushrooms onion and garlic mixture.  Then sprinkle on cheese to cover well.  Top with bacon.

Return pizza to oven and cook for an additional 10 minutes.  Slice it up and top with sour cream and parsley or chopped scallions.  Serve as an appetizer or with a salad for a main meal.

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Serves: 4 Prep time: 15 minutes Cook time: 35 minutes FOR THE MEATLOAF CUPCAKES: 1 ½ lbs    Ground beef 1                Egg, bean 1 clove     Garlic, chopped ½ cup      Bread crumbs 2 T            Worcestershire sauce ¾ cup      Chili sauce (you can use ketchup too) ½ cup      Onions, finely chopped ½ cup      Carrots, finely chopped ½ cup      Mushrooms, finely chopped ½ cup      Red pepper, finely chopped ½ cup      Canned fried onion strips FOR THE MASHED POTATO FROSTING 1 lb            Russet potatoes peeled and cubed ½ cup       Milk 3 T.           Sour cream 2 T            Butter Cooking Instructions Preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Place your peeled cubed potatoes in large pot of cold water over high heat. Bring to a boil and cook until fork tender (about 8-10 minutes after water boils depending on the size of your cubes). In a large bowl combine ground beef, egg, bread crumbs, garlic, Worcestershire sauce, chili sauce, onions, carrots, mushrooms, red pepper, fried onions and S&P. Mix together with your hands until combined. Spray a muffin pan with cooking spray. Mold your meatloaf mixture into cupcake sized balls and place in muffin pan. You’ll get about 8-10 cupcakes. Place in oven and cook at 375 for about 25-30 minutes. Drain your potatoes and return to pan. Pour in your milk, sour cream and butter, and season with S&P. Using a hand mixer whip your potatoes until smooth and set aside to cool a bit. Take a large plastic Ziploc bag (or a pastry bag if you have one) and cut a small hole in the bottom corner. Spoon your mashed potatoes into the bag then pipe out the potato on top of the meatloaves to look like frosting on a cupcake. Serve ‘em up hot, who doesn’t love cupcakes? Especially for dinner! Meaty Morsel: Decorate the tops of your cupcakes with BBQ sauce, ketchup, mustard, cheese, shredded lettuce, chopped tomato, anything you or your kids can think of. Let them have fun with this, they’ll have more fun eating it!

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