Potatoes (Pommes Duchesse)

      I was online looking for an interesting potato recipe that was more than just “taters,” when I came across a picture of an entrée with a side that resembled spiraling Russian minarets. The caption named the featured side dish as “pommes duchesse.”

     The recipe looked busy and complicated, but I found it was only mashed potatoes piped onto parchment paper. It was then brushed with an egg wash (for color and crunch), and browned in an oven. It appeared intriguing, so I thought I would try it.

     What makes this side look so elegant is the piping. The finished product should resemble a cone having a diameter of about 2” and a height of about 2”.  You can artistically create the dish to resemble a chocolate kiss, a soft serve ice cream cone, or if you are really creative, you might experiment with different piping tips and nozzles to get that spiraling Russian minaret effect. This will take some practice. The potato mixture should also be a bit on the dry side so it has some body, or your cone might collapse when piping or during the cooking process.  

     If you think your featured dish might appear a bit boring on the plate, then the addition of pommes duchesse will liven it up. The result is definitely worth the trouble. Not only have you created an elegant side, but it’s crunchy on the outside while being soft and flavorful on the inside. The downside to this is it can’t be done the day before like a good ol’ potato casserole.

     So who is the mysterious duchess this unique dish was named after? From what I could gather, no one knows for sure. Efforts to find the aristocrat who lent her title have not been successful. It’s thought that perhaps there was none, and the dish was named as such because it was simply worthy of a royal, but really, as William Shakespeare said, “What’s in a name?” So, to my way of thinking, you can get fancy and fussy, gussy it all up and name it after nobility, but a tater is still a tater.