Potato Kugel (2024)

One of my favorite things to do whenever I have to spend time in a waiting room is to look through food magazines that I bring along with me. That’s when I get to catch up on something I enjoy doing but rarely take time to do at home. Mostly what catches my eye are the titles of recipes. I will keep recipes sometimes just to remember the concept, which I may flesh-out later in a new recipe of my own–using my foundation of French techniques and experience. I may use concepts for items in a class or for a special menu or event, or just to try something out.

The best part of magazine “sifting and winnowing” (to borrow a UW term) is that I get to use my Sociology degree from the UW-Madison in observing people’s reactions as I blatantly rip pages loudly and dramatically out of my magazines.

I have recently been going through literally hundreds and hundreds of clipped magazine recipes, food tips and any food-related article or picture that I have accumulated over the last decade or so. It is amazing to look at items I cut out and kept years ago and wonder how I could have thought that looked good or sounded interesting. But then I’ll see things that sound even better than the first time I saw them. It has been fun to cull. It is sort of like taking a refresher course. The best part is that I can actually hold the recipe. It is not on a computer screen.

One of the recipes that I remember finding in some magazine was a recipe for Potato Kugel. The picture was mouth-watering and recipe sounded good to me then, and still sounds delicious, especially at this time of year—with Rosh Hashanah and beautiful fall weather. I must have culled it accidentally, however, as I can’t find it in my new Sides and Starches file. I haven’t looked through all the recipes I kept again to find it, but in thinking about Potato Kugel, I came up with this recipe. So here in honor of Rosh Hashanah I offer my recipe for Potato Kugel. Even though it’s not sweet, it should be yummy and satisfying! Happy New Year!

Chef Joel

Potato Kugel

2 tablespoons vegetable oil
3 eggs
2 pounds potatoes, peeled as desired
1 medium yellow onion, grated
½ cup potato starch
1 teaspoon kosher salt
½ teaspoon white pepper
1 teaspoon garlic powder
2 teaspoons paprika

Method: Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Place the oil in a medium-sized oven-proof skillet and place the pan in the oven. Beat the eggs in a large bowl. Grate the potatoes into the eggs and stir to coat the potatoes with the egg to keep the potatoes from turning brown. Add the grated onion, potato starch, salt, white pepper and garlic powder. Mix well. Remove the pan from the oven and make sure the sides of the pan are coated with oil as well. Add the potato mixture to the pan and spread out evenly. It should sizzle. Sprinkle the paprika on top. Bake 25-30 minutes until golden brown. Serve as desired perhaps with sour cream and apple sauce.