Potato Rösti

Potato Rösti

I don’t know how it happened, but I married the one man in South Africa who is not THAT into food. He likes good food and appreciates my cooking, but I could just as easily prepare the same thing every night and he won’t complain. But there are a few things he will give his two front teeth for. Cauliflower Cheese, good creamy pasta, bacon and potato rösti are some of those things.

When I made these to accompany the Indian-Spiced Lamb chops a few nights ago, my husband said that he could eat them all day, everyday and he would never get sick of them. It has something to do with the fact that his mother made REALLY good Rösti when he was younger so I knew the bar was set high for me to make these really delicious. So you can understand the amount of relief I felt when he kept saying how delicious they were.

Potato Rösti

I understand that grating a kg of potatoes and 4 onions is not something that can be classified as easy or quick but that’s where my handy food processor comes in. I have to be honest and admit that I wouldn’t be making these often if I had to hand-grate everything. But my food processor has a grater attachment and it makes my life a lot easier. In many of the recipes I read through, the authors stated that you shouldn’t rinse the grated potato to get rid of the starch and in other recipes the author is adamant that you absolutely must rinse the potato. I honestly don’t know which one is better, after all, you’re adding starch back in when you add the flour but I was taught to rinse, so I rinse.

There is also a bit of a debate going on about which flour is the right one to add to the rinsed potatoes. If you can find it, I believe potato flour is the best and I’m sure I don’t have to explain to you why it’s the best, but there are loads of people who use cornflour instead. I actually prefer using regular flour instead of cornflour as it can go quite gloopy if you don’t fry the potatoes straight away and seeing as I never just make a few, the mixture almost always goes stodgy and sticky if I use cornflour.

These are perfect as an accompaniment to almost anything but I love them best when they are served with sour cream and smoked salmon for breakfast. Guess what we’ll be having for breakfast this weekend…

Makes between 15 and 20 Rösti’s, depending on size

1kg potatoes, peeled and grated
4 medium onions (about 300g), grated
4-6tbsn plain flour / potato flour
1.5tsp salt
black pepper to taste
oil for frying

  • Rinse the grated potatoes in cold water and squeeze dry. I left them in a colander to drain and then used a salad spinner to dry them but many people prefer putting the potato in a tea-towel and squeezing them dry like that.
  • Mix the potatoes and onions with the flour and seasoning. You really should not need more then 6tbsn of flour. When you’ve mixed the flour in (make sure it’s very well incorporated) it won’t look like the rosti will stick together when you fry them but believe me, they will.
  • Heat the oil in a large frying pan and fry tablespoon fulls of the mixture. Don’t crowd the pan too much. I always press down on them just slightly when I pop them into the frying pan. They need about 1-2 minutes per side. I always drain them on some kitchen paper and then put them on a roasting rack in a roasting tray and then I place them in the oven to keep warm while the rest are frying.