Politics. Religion. Funeral potatoes. All topics that are not fit for polite company. But nobody can resist a good potato. Like beloved children’s author A.A. Milne said, “What I say is that, if a fellow really likes potatoes, he must be a pretty decent sort of fellow.”
With Pioneer Day just around the corner, I want to offer you a bit of homemade wisdom: the most correct recipe for funeral potatoes.
Determining this recipe required extensive research. After searching through stacks of cookbooks scouring every starch section for this beloved recipe, the right way to make funeral potatoes became increasingly clear.
I’ve eaten alternative forms of funeral potatoes that you wouldn’t believe. Everything from funeral potato skins to funeral potatoes with crushed up potato chips on top (the audacity!), but it turns out that this recipe is an exact science.
And this recipe is a secret just between me and you, dear Deseret News reader.
Recipe for funeral potatoes casserole
This casserole will give you 12 heaping servings of Utah’s most classic dish.
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. If we were more dedicated to making the most authentic funeral potatoes (and not worried about fire safety!), we would use an outdoor oven. But live the “Utah way” and respect the environment.
- Select 8 delectable russet spuds freshly grown in Idaho, rinse them and parboil them in a pot of water seasoned with coarse salt and a touch of garlic powder for immaculate flavor. After parboiling them, use a box grater to shred them. Set your hash browns aside in a large mixing bowl.
- Finely chop 1 yellow onion. I follow Bon Appetit’s guide to chopping onions without crying — it’ll help you cook more. Mince 3 cloves of garlic.
- Shake a Mason jar full of heavy cream until you have butter. No seriously, it tastes so much better. But I guess you may use store bought butter. Drop 21⁄2 heaping tablespoons of butter into a cast-iron skillet on medium heat. Saute the onions with the butter until fragrant and then add the minced garlic.
- Add potatoes into the skillet for 3 to 5 minutes and then remove from heat.
- Take a large mixing bowl. Put your hash brown and onion potato mixture into the bowl. Using a spatula, begin to add in 1 can of condensed cream of chicken soup (of course, if you would like to make the very best funeral potatoes ever, make your own condensed soup). Add in 1 cup of sour cream. Fold in 2 cups of sharp cheddar cheese. Season with pepper and salt. Mix gently until well combined.
- Scrap the contents of this large mixing bowl into your favorite casserole dish. Then, take 2 cups of cornflake cereal and crush it into fine pieces. Shred another 1⁄2 cup of sharp cheddar cheese. Spread evenly on top of potato mixture.
- Bake for 55-60 minutes. Serve with other delicacies like Lion House rolls.
So there you have it: the most correct funeral potato recipe there is. Tried and tested, faithful and true, these spuds will save the day if you are at a loss for cooking this year.
But that’s not all.
What are funeral potatoes?
Potatoes with sour cream, cheddar cheese and cornflakes doesn’t sound like a delectable meal when you think of the components separately, but together, you have the classic dish known as funeral potatoes.
Think of the dish as “essential fast food for hard times,” as Ash Sanders put it for NPR.
Who invented funeral potatoes?
It’s difficult to know, but it’s believed the dish gained its current status because members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints made the dish, per Deseret News.
The Relief Society, a women’s organization, is often credited with making the dish for luncheons, according to Deseret News.