Ingredients:
A big disposable and oven safe pan
2 lbs frozen hash browns, thawed
1 stick melted butter
2 cans of Campbell’s potato soup (or cream of mushroom or a mix)
1 pt sour cream
1 small onion, finely chopped
About 1 cup of milk
1 tsp salt, 1 tsp pepper
1/2 cup parmesan cheese (preferably the kind that’s in a green can)
1/2 cup breadcrumbs (pre-packaged, of course)
A couple of weeks ago, my son (now a PhD student studying cellular-molecular biology, and no I don’t really understand what he does) was going to a properly socially distanced potluck of some sort. He’s in Connecticut, which has a pretty good handle on the whole Covid thing, and he had some kind of event to go to with people in his lab. So he asked for this recipe, which is really from my mom and probably also on the side of a package of frozen hash browns, a can of potato soup, or maybe all of the above.
This is also one of things I often bring to things like potlucks or whatever. It’s an unapologetically unhealthy and kind of trashy “dish” It is just barely in the category of cooking. But it does taste good. Oh sure, you could probably make this better with real and hand-grated parmesan cheese and a roux-based sauce instead of canned soup, and maybe some chopped herbs (I am sure chives would be very nice), some bacon, etc., etc. But the cheap shit is fine for this.
I include a “big disposable and oven safe pan” here mainly because my son doesn’t own a properly large casserole dish, but I don’t know, somehow I think this tastes that much better out of an aluminum foil pan that (hopefully) gets rinsed out and properly recycled when your done.
Instructions:
- Get one of those cheap and disposable casserole pans, the kind of thing that is usually aluminum but sometimes made out of some kind of plastic too. Doesn’t matter, though one that you can recycle when you’re done is obviously best. Bonus points if you have a lid for it.
- Preheat the oven to 350.
- Mix together the thawed potatoes, the melted butter, sour cream, chopped onion, salt, pepper, and milk all together. If you’ve got a big bowl, great; if not, mix it in the disposable pan.
- Mix together the breadcrumbs and parmesan cheese together in a separate bowl.
- Put the potato mixture in the pan (if you didn’t mix it in a bowl, of course) and put in the oven uncovered and bake them for 45 minutes.
- Take them out and carefully sprinkle the breadcrumbs and cheese mixture on top of the potatoes. Bake for another 15 minutes until golden brown and bubbly.