Fried Potatoes (How to make them and when to eat them!)
There aren’t many cultures who haven’t, at one time or another, relied upon potatoes as a staple in their diet due to their availability, adaptability, taste, and tendency to be very filling. Southerners, of course, are no different. I remember my great grandmother, Lela, telling about how she used to be picking cotton in the fields with her kids (when you were a sharecropper, the entire family had to work the fields) and they would walk back to the house at lunchtime and dig up some potatoes to go in and fry for their lunch. Its hard to hear things like that and not look at this bowl of potatoes as a connection to your ancestors, you know?
~Sigh~ I miss Lela.
Alright, moving on to the food part…
Now y’all know that when a Southerner gets a hold of a something, there’s generally gonna be some frying involved if we can help it. There is a great misconception about frying in the south though. Folks seem to think Southern Food = deep frying. That’s not the case at all. In face, much of our “frying” doesn’t even include oil. How can it be frying then? Well, its just a matter of what we call “frying” differing from what those outside of the south define frying as.
You see, to us, a skillet has always been called a “frying pan”. Therefore, when a person in the south tells you to fry something, sometimes they are just telling you what type of pan to use. A great many of our dishes such as “fried corn” have nothing to do with oil, but are just cooked in a skillet! I actually seldom use oil in my cooking, I am much more likely to use it in my baked goods, instead.
Fried potatoes are not so very different. You are really just barely coating the bottom of your pan with oil as potatoes do have a tendency to stick. Myself and absolutely everyone I know loves fried potatoes. There is no meal they can’t pop up at, either. They are just as likely to be served at breakfast in the south as they are lunch or dinner. Despite what you may think, they do NOT taste like a baked potato or even mashed potatoes. Fried potatoes are a treat unto themselves. This is the potato flavor at its finest, better than any other, honest!
Still, they do tend to be a regional thing. You’ve either heard of them and love them or are entirely confused by the very concept. Once, when Granny Jordan was visiting us (who was the epitome of everything a Southern Lady should be), we had prepared a large breakfast at my mother’s house.
Mama put a big old bowl of fried potatoes on the table and Granny Jordan leaned in and asked in her deep drawl “Well now, those look interesting! What are they?” Mama and I hid our surprise as Mama responded that they were just fried potatoes. To which Granny Jordan replied “Well now, isn’t that neat. I bet those sure will be good!”.
Born and raised in Atlanta and had never had fried potatoes?
Lets get some on y’alls table as soon as we can, alright?
Ingredients
- Potatoes
- Vegetable Oil
- Salt
- Pepper
Instructions
- Peel and dice potatoes into small cubes. Coat bottom of large skillet with oil, turn on medium heat and allow oil to get hot. Add potatoes. Salt and pepper to taste. Cover and continue cooking over medium heat for about ten minutes, until potatoes start to brown on the bottom. Remove lid and stir, continuing to cook until potatoes are all tender and mostly browned.
Nutrition
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Y’all have a wonderful day!
Gratefully,
Christy
I’ve never heard of anybody who hasn’t had fried potatoes! Wow! I grew up in the South (Florida Gulf Coast), spent a few years in Central Texas, and have lived in WV for the last 23 years. Never saw a recipe for fried potatoes, either. 🙂 However, I have noticed differences in the way different regions make them…..sliced vs. diced vs. just plain cut up potatoes, onions vs. no onions, etc. However, one thing I have found in common is that they are definitely liable to pop up at any meal (or snack) of the day. I personally cook chopped onions in them and use lots of pepper and a bit of salt. I also add some bacon grease to the oil (you know, gotta have that little bit of “extra flavor” and everything’s better with bacon!). Sometimes the bacon itself pops up in my fried potatoes, and if you add some beaten egg during the last 5 minutes or so off cooking, why, you’ve got yourself a skillet breakfast ready to serve with some buttermilk biscuits!
I think during these times of rising prices and all that folks need to be getting back to learning how to fix potatoes, rice, beans, etc. for more frugal meals. A few potatoes can make a meal–like the skillet breakfast I mentioned, or made into potato soup…and don’t forget to throw an extra tater in the pot when an unexpected chair is going to be filled with a warm body around the dinner table!
fried potatoes, gravy and biscuits 🙂 Yum, yum, yum!
Can ya’ll believe my Buckeye husband had never had gravy and biscuits till he met me?? Now he loves it as much as I do!
My mom cooked these alot when I was growing up. One difference is she dusted hers with just a little flour before she put them in the skillet. The menu usually included dried beans, cole slaw, and cornbread along with the potatoes.
At least once a week growing up, we had pinto beans with a ham hock and fried potatoes for dinner. Yumm
My Mom was a Southern lady, my Dad is German, so we grew up eating fried potatoes and German sausage, with dill pickles on the side. So good! My Dad had a connection to someone who made sausage “the right way”, and unfortunately that person passed. I’ve never found sausage like it again 🙁
this is one of my favorite things to eat and prepare! i have to be careful as to how often, considering that when given a free rein with them, as i am want to do, they can be fattttttening. 😉
they’ve become a tradition when we go camping and are the thing my family reminds me of the ingredients of before i ever start gathering our camping gear. the only difference is that i like to do what i call “preparing my pan” by making sure it is “well seasoned” by frying some bacon in it. ok, i confess, it’s just an excuse to use bacon in the potatoes, so shoot me. lol. i also throw in some onions. even my kids (now grown with families of their own) who don’t like onions have decided they are a must.
oh, my gosh, now i’ve got to go to the store. i hear the menu for dinner tapping out in my head. scrambled eggs, biscuits, bacon, fried potatoes, tea . . .
Only one thing wrong with this recipe. The vitamins and minerals in potatoes are just under the skin. Leaving the skin on and washing the potatoes in plain water or scrubbing if needed, cut any still dirty looking spots out and then fry. It tastes better,t oo little bit more crunch and flavor.
Just a note from a Texas research dietitian. Oh and try to get non-GMO potatoes. People and animals are getting sick from eating the genetically altered ones. Any leftover eyes can be put in rich soil and might give you more potatoes in the future! Even if they are in a big bucket.