Potato pancakes with vegetable sauce is a vegetarian and easy to make mid-week dinner recipe. You can swap all the dairy ingredients for plant-based alternatives to have a vegan dish.
To be honest, I could name this recipe ‘the dish which wasn’t planned’! In my mind, I had a completely different recipe but… I was daydreaming and completely forgot what I was doing. I peeled the potatoes, started boiling them (as per usual), but this was my first mistake! The plan was to boil them with the skin on, which would give a completely different texture.
My failures didn’t end there however… While I was boiling the potatoes, I was also taking photos for another recipe. I was jumping from one thing to another and ended up making mashed potatoes which was not my intention (I’m telling you, this was a proper daydreaming!). Long story short – I screwed up my recipe, finished with 1kg of mashed potatoes and no dinner plan. Whoops.
After an adventurous cooking process, I got the idea to make potato pancakes with my mountains of mash. I thought, OK – it might be risky and there’s a big chance that everything will end up in the bin, however it’s worth trying out.
So, a little bit of plain flour and a little bit of cornflour later, I had very sticky little potatoey-doughy balls. To my biggest surprise, the result was amazing! My fussy eater kept going back to the pan and getting more of these little pancakes. Apparently, this is his new favourite vegetarian dish.
So, here’s how I did it… no daydreaming this time, I promise!
Potato Pancakes Recipe
Pancakes:
1kg potatoes
50g butter
50ml milk
150g flour
1 tablespoon of homemade pesto (recipe here)
100g cornflour
Salt and pepper
Olive oil
Sauce:
2 carrots
100g frozen peas
¼ leek
1 chili pepper
20g butter
1 tablespoon of flour
100ml milk
Salt and pepper
- Prepare the dough for the pancakes: peel the potatoes, cut them into small chunks and boil them until they are soft and start falling apart. Drain the potatoes.
- Return the potatoes to the saucepan. Add the butter, milk, pesto and a pinch of salt. Mash the potatoes until no lumps remain.
- Add the flour to your mashed potatoes and mix well. You will end up with quite a loose texture. If the dough is too wet, add an additional tablespoon of flour.
- Dust cornflour on your work surface. Wet your hands and make the small potato balls. Roll them in the cornflour to cover the edges.
- Preheat the pan with a splash of olive oil. Fry the pancakes for a couple of minutes on each side until they are golden and crispy.
- Make the sauce: finely chop the carrots, leek and chili pepper. Preheat the pan with a knob of butter. Add the veggies and cook them for a couple of minutes on a medium heat until they get soft. Add the frozen peas and flour. Mix everything together.
- Pour the milk in. Mix everything together until the sauce starts thickening up (if the sauce is too firm – add more milk). Finish the sauce with some salt and pepper (you can also add some cheddar or mozzarella cheese).
- Serve everything together with a side salad.
