What is it that can take you back to your childhood? Maybe it is a particular smell, a song, or perhaps seeing someone who resembles a person from your past. For me there are a handful of things, but some of my Dad’s favorite dishes take the cake (no pun intended). October 1^st was Dad’s birthday, so in honor of him I tried my hand at one of his most famous concoctions- one loved by all of the Robinet kids, and one with no existing written recipe: Scalloped Potatoes with Ham.

Trial and Error. Mostly Error.

Dad was amazing. He worked for himself performing hard labor tasks all day every day, and then came home to do all of the cooking at our house. Yes, ALL of it. He had a large family, few resources, and a knack for making things up in the kitchen with a great deal of success. I have tried many times over the years to re-create his famous scalloped potato dish with varying degrees of success, but until now I’ve been unable to capture the glorious combination of taste, texture, and smell. I have tried slicing the potatoes at varying thicknesses, attempted the creamy consistency by using varieties of broth, milk and/or cheese, and used a mixture of spices that I thought we may have had around the house way back when. Nothing ever worked. This time, I nailed it. What’s different? I added one of my most prized possessions to the recipe.

The Pan

After my father’s funeral, I found myself at his home looking for keepsakes – anything that would remind me of him. Among the special items I collected was a decades old deep-sided pan with a broken handle. My family knows it as the “scalloped potato pan”. I grabbed it, clutched it to my chest and had a good cry. I think my sister was jealous that I found it first. In any case, my latest and most successful attempt at recreating my Dad’s recipe included the use of this sacred pan. Realistically the favorable outcome is likely due to the depth of the pan or the thickness of the metal, but I prefer to believe that this beat up, broken old pan leaked a little love into his birthday dinner.

Now for the Good Stuff

It’s that time of year when the weather cools off and warm comfort foods replace lighter summer fare. Try this recipe and I promise that you will have to re-rank your favorite comfort foods, allowing space for this one in your top three at minimum. Side note: we normally ate this as a single-item dinner, but I recommend pairing it with some roughage!

Directions and Ingredients:

First, adjust the oven rack to the middle position and pre-heat at 350 degrees. Put one foot up on the counter (my siblings will get why that’s funny) , peel the potatoes and place them into a big bowl of water until you’re ready to slice them. A heavy metal pan will work best – the one I used is round and maybe 3 inches deep. The depth is important as the liquid will evaporate and thicken. Too deep and it will stay milky, too shallow and it will burn.

• 2 cloves of garlic, smashed
• 2 lbs of potatoes, sliced at 1/8 inch thick (This matters. You can find a slicer, also called a mandoline at Target or the like which will make the slicing easy and the slices uniform. A half-decent one will run you about 20 bucks.)
• 1 lb smoked ham, diced
• 1 large onion, diced
• 2 ½ cups of half-and-half (This also matters…don’t use regular milk. You’ll screw it up. Work out tomorrow).
• 1 ½ tsp salt (Sea salt works best)
• 1 tsp black pepper (Freshly ground if you can. Back off a bit if you aren’t a pepper fan, but Dad loved himself some black pepper. I say go for it).
• A dash of nutmeg…seriously.
• A dash or more to taste of cayenne pepper
• 6 or 7 slices of thick cut bacon. Splurge for the good stuff so it’s not all fatty. Cut into half-inch pieces or so.
• 1 tbsp butter, softened

Place all ingredients except the butter and bacon into a large saucepan and bring to a boil, making sure that the liquid covers the potatoes. Stir frequently to avoid burning and reduce the heat to medium. Simmer for two or three minutes until the sauce thickens a bit. Pour all of this into your baking pan and use a fork to distribute the potatoes evenly.

Press the contents into the pan gently to make sure that the potatoes are covered with liquid. Scatter the butter over the top and bake for 1 hour; check to make sure that the top is not burning – if you feel it looks dry, add a few tablespoons of half-and-half over the top to baste. Scatter the bacon over the top and continue baking another 30 minutes. The top should be all brown and bubbly…Mmmmmmm!

Let the pan sit for at least 10 minutes before you try to serve it. The first bite of this dish vaulted me back to my happy place in rural Michigan in the early 70’s…I hope you enjoy it!