Roasted Parmesan Potatoes

At heart, I'm a meat and 'taters kind of gal. What's "'taters" you ask? "Po-ta-toes, ya know, boil 'em, mash 'em, stick 'em in a stew." (extra points if you can name the movie quote.)*  I just like, er, love potatoes. In all their configurations: mashed, roasted, baked, boiled, hash browned, O'Brianed, tater totted, French fried, scalloped. And any variety, baby new, russet, fingerling, Yukon Gold. The list goes on and on. Whenever I discover a new way to make potatoes I'm game. Seriously, the more ways I have to serve potatoes, the more meals I can serve them at and still have variety. 

When I saw a recipe for Roasted Parmesan Potatoes on Pinterest, I couldn't try it fast enough. It looked super easy and super yummy so I gave it a whirl. . .

Colcannon

I haven't had too much luck with this blog in baking/cooking ahead for holidays. Meaning, cooking a holiday dish a week or two ahead of the actual holiday. I'm always cooking holiday dishes on the holiday in question. Then by the time I post the recipe its too late. The holiday has passed us by.

But not this year. . .

Not with St. Patrick's Day just a week away. . .

This time I planned ahead. . .

It's the dawn of a new era at Becky Bakes and Cooks. . .

Er, too dramatic? Ok, I'll dial it back a bit. Point is, here is an Irish dish that you can make for St. Patrick's Day. I'm giving you a whole week to check it out, get your ingredients together and get cookin'. 

You might have expected a post for Corned Beef and Cabbage. But, truth be told, I don't really like corned beef. Too salty. And cabbage, too bland. I've tried a couple of times to make Corned Beef and Cabbage, and while it sounds fun and festive, it just never seems to be that exciting, or tasty, when it hits the table. An Irish dish I do like is Colcannon. Never heard of it? Come on! It's probably more authentically Irish than Corned Beef. It don't really know for sure 'cause I ain't Irish. What I do know is, we all like it and that's good enough for me on St. Pat's Day. See for yourself. . .

Loaded Baked Potato Casserole

I think I like, no, I think I love, loaded baked potatoes. I must as I just noticed last week that I've pinned 3 different recipes for Loaded Baked Potato Soup on Pinterest. (Please follow me if you are a fellow pinner. Yikes, does that sound right? I went to high school in the 80's and "pinner" had a much different meaning. Hmmmm? What do you call one who pins stuff on Pinterest?) Anywho, back to baked potatoes. The last soup recipe I pinned come from the Tasty Kitchen Blog. Boy it looks yummy, I am totes going to make this soon. As I was poking around on the Tasty Kitchen Blog, I came across this recipe for Potatoes Romanoff. Looked delish, but I still had fully loaded baked potatoes on my mind: visions of sour cream, cheese, onions, cream cheese and of course, bacon dancing in my head. Then it hit me, Baked Potato Casserole. Just a few tweaks* of the Potatoes Romanoff recipe and "Loaded Baked Potato Casserole" became a reality. It's the perfect marriage of Baked and Mashed Potatoes. I hope you agree. . .

*One of the major tweaks I made was to reduce the amount of shallots by quite a bit. This is mostly due to my husbands grand aversion to onion. As written the recipe has a mild onion presence. If you like onion you could certainly up the shallots to 3 or 4 for a bolder onion flavor. You could also sprinkle the top with sliced green onion after it's baked. Please do and know that I'll be envious of you for it.