Passover Feast: P1 Potato Latkes

I see it now...my family lined up in the GE kitchen, palms sweaty with anticipation. Padma Lakshmi enters the kitchen and greets us "Hello Chefs!" She then continues to tell our challenge: "Your challenge today is to work with your family unit to create a traditional Passover meal for eight people. What's the catch? You must buy all your ingredients and cook everything in 4 1/2 hours! And your time starts...NOW!"

Now I know that you see challenges much more intense on Food Network, but for me and my family, creating our passover meal this past Thursday felt like our very own episode of Top Chef!...except we didn't have the full GE kitchen. Our tiny little kitchen would have to do to fit all of us.

A Passover meal truly is a labour of love. Most Passover dinners tend to take several days of cooking to get everything ready in time, but it is possible to do it in under 5 hours on the day of. There were certainly a few mistakes along the way (everything from buying the wrong cut of meat to making enough potato latkas to feed an army) but in the end, my family and I made a delicious meal that already has me thinking about next years Seder!

The next several following entires are recipes from our Passover dinner. The menu included:

• Veal Brisket
  
• Potato Latkes
  
• Gefilte Fish
  
• Barbecued Chicken
  
• Green Salad
  
• Roasted Carrots
  
• The various items on the Seder plate including homemade charoset
  

Potato Latkes

This recipe makes a LOT of potato latkes, so if you are feeding a small group, I suggest you just make half. I got this recipe from what I like to call "the mother of all cookbooks," but is actually entitled The Pleasures of Your Food Processor. Most of our Passover recipes came from this book because, like I stated in my entry on the book, it has recipes that never fail!

Note: For a passover dinner, I suggest you make this recipe ahead of time and re-heat the latkes in the oven before serving.

Note: I made my potato latkes lacy because I like the texture, but you can simply process the ingredients till they are coarsely chopped if you prefer.

Note: I used a Cuisinart processor to make these

Ingredients:

6 large potatoes, peeled

1 onion (or 2 depending on how large your potatoes are)

5 eggs

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

oil for frying

Directions:

1. Insert shredding disk attachment into processor. Cut potatoes to fit feed tube. Grate, using light pressure. Empty bowl and place potatoes in a colander. Rinse under cold water to remove starch. Empty into a large bowl while squeezing out excess moisture.

2. Grate onion using medium pressure. Add to potatoes and add eggs, salt, and pepper. Mix well. It's best to use clean hands rather than a spoon to mix this.

3. Pour oil to about a 1/8" depth into a large skillet. When hot, drop in potato mixture by small spoonfuls to form pancakes. Brown well on both sides. Drain well on paper towels.

Photography Ruzan Orekstar

*See a new potato latke recipe here!