The Cookbook Experiment: Cheese Potato Puff

Tonight's cookbook experiment is a recipe from another amazing woman at church: Sally Dowdy. She is one of my heroes of faith, someone who you know if she says she will pray for you, she will.  She is a beautiful, courageous woman and I am grateful to know her.

The recipe is called "Cheese Potato Puff". This recipe is wonderful because I had all the ingredients on hand. It is also wonderful because it will satisfy not only my meat-eaters in the house but my vegetarians as well.

Cheese Potato Puff

(12) medium potatoes, peeled
(1) teaspoon salt, divided
(3/4) cup butter
(2) cups shredded cheddar cheese
(1) cup of milk
(2) eggs, beaten
fresh or dried chives

Place potatoes in a large kettle; cover with water. Add 1/2 teaspoon salt; cook until tender.  Drain; mash potatoes until smooth. In a saucepan cook and stir butter, cheese, milk and remaining salt until smooth. Stir in potatoes; fold in eggs. Pour into a greased baking dish. Bake uncovered at 350 degrees for 40 minutes or until puffy and golden brown. Sprinkle with chives if desired.

Here are my take-a-ways from making this recipe:

• I was not exactly sure what size "medium" potatoes are. I made my best guess as you can see from the picture above.
• I chopped my potatoes before boiling them. I am not sure if that was correct or not but I was in a hurry to get dinner done and knew that chopped potatoes would soften faster while boiling.
• Because I am a cheese snob (I can't help it, I love cheese) I would encourage you to use really good cheese. I used some Murray's sharp cheddar.
• My eggs are so bright yellow because I now only buy cage-free brown eggs. Don't look up the differences in grades/types of eggs unless you want to be disturbed. I looked it up when I was trying to figure out egg safety and because of what I read, I now only use cage-free.
• You will need to temper the eggs when you go to fold them in if you potato/cheese/butter mixture is still hot. Don't scramble your eggs in the potatoes or you will have to start over.
• This recipe is DELICIOUS!!  I encourage you to try it. My whole family loved it. Thanks Mrs. Dowdy!!!