Top o’ the spud!
Fellow plant-based foodie Vikki Deedrick launched a potato pondering that turned into a gold mine of ideas. The minute I saw where it was going, I knew I had to get this into your hands. Somehow it only seems fitting as the special guest on this week’s teleclass is none other than spud-lover and starchivore Dr. John McDougall, author of the newly released Starch Solution.
You can never get too many ideas for topping your starchy vegetables. Thanks to everyone who contributed!
Potato PR
First, a little more about the lowly potato. According to Dr. John McDougall:
The Potato: Complete Nutrition in a Spud
If I were given the choice of picking only one food to live on for the rest of my life, I would choose potatoes. After all, potatoes have provided complete nutrition for children and adults throughout history under many
circumstances. For example, rural populations of Poland and Russia at the turn of the 19th century lived in very good health doing extremely hard work with the white potato serving as their primary source of nutrition.In 1925 a landmark experiment was carried out on two healthy adults – a man 25 years old and a woman 28 years old.17 They lived on a diet primarily of white potatoes for 6 months.7 Upon conclusion of the experiment the researchers reported, “They (the man and woman) did not tire of the uniform potato diet and there was no craving for change.” Even though they were both physically active (especially the man) they were described as, “…in good health on a diet in which the nitrogen (protein) was practically solely derived from the potato.”
~ from The McDougall Newsletter, April, 2004.
On to the eats!
Vikki’s original note on facebook :
1) Thought it would be fun to share some of our favorite potato toppings. I like a lot of the standards. Salsa, hummus, veggies. I recently tried creamed corn and it was delicious. That made me think of corn relish which was also very good…
2) Carollynne K: I love my potatoes, plain with a bit of mustard or paprika or cracked pepper.
3) Vikki D: I like sauerkraut on potatoes. I know it sounds weird but if you like sauerkraut, try it. Very good.
Vikki Calvin Deedrick Carollynne Kelly – That’s a recipe I would LOVE to have. I have always loved pierogis. Any chance you could post that?
4) Bj R: Sauerkraut is loaded with sodium, haven’t had it since becoming vegan. Found any “good” brand?
5) Anne J: Pico de gayo. A fresh salsa.
6) Lynda K: I love just a tiny bit of low sodium tamari and nutritional yeast. Yum! I also like to top with beans and then there’s always salsa of course.
7) Chef Aj: Oil free hummus and nutritional yeast
8) Sharon A: I’ve always loved potato tacos… I just stick all the taco fillings right on top of the potato -yum! I also like a little mustard, ‘steak’ sauce and tapatio.
9) Stephen T: I usually dash cumin with some non-dairy cheese sauce.
10) Jill J: A veggie soup potato, “sauteed” or grilled veggie potato, grilled potato, twice baked potato…bet the Lentil taco recipe seaoned for tacos or season for Italian would be amazing topping. Ive had Cuban seasoned lentils over rice.
11) Char N: I dehydrate many veggies in my dehydrator, then use them as toppings…crunchy. Good.
12) Molly D: I had some new potatoes last night and just put a bit of fresh dill on them. I LOVE dill and so it just hit the spot!
13) Bernadette S: Salsa, preferably homemade! Also Parma, commercial or homemade (food process walnuts, nutritional yeast and a pinch of miso). For nut free, I pulse a cup of sliced baby bella mushrooms with 1/4 cup nutritional yeast and about a TBS miso. Be careful – you want mushrooms finely chopped, not mush.
14) Ami M: topped with smashed white kidney beans seasoned with oregano and garlic and steamed kale.
15) Vikki D: I just thought of roasted garlic, that would be good. Note to self – roast some garlic.
16) Beth Ann E.: Cheezy hummus!*(recipe below)
17) Carol C.: Steamed broccoli and a little nutritional yeast.
18) Gloria E: A la vegan Huancaina … w/o the hard boiled egg, and sprinkled with some fresh curly parsley, with a chipotle tofu topping, garlic sauce … with tempeh bakon … so many ideas.
19) Anne J.: Dressed up like a hot dog with relish and mustard.
20) Shirley J.: Melty pizza cheese! **(recipe below)
21) Lani: A personal go-to? Chunky blended steamed veggies. Broccoli is the all-star with a little nutritional yeast blended in along with the garlic.
Have you a spudlicious potato topper idea of your own to add? Please share in replies below.
*Beth Ann’s Cheezy Hummus
1.5 cups garbanzo beans (unsalted)
6 Tbsp nutritional yeast
1/3 cup roasted red pepper (from a jar, skin on/off doesn’t matter)
4 Tbsp rice vinegar
1 Tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp onion powder
2 Tbsp dijon mustard
Place everything in a food processor and mix until blended well. This is my all time favorite potato topper and WOW… is it good. We even have a picture straight from chef Beth Ann herself at right.
**McDougall Melty Pizza Cheese: Makes about 1 and 1/4 c.
1 c. water
1/4 c. nutritional yeast flakes
2 T. cornstarch
1 T. white flour
1 tsp. lemon juice
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. garlic granules
Place the water, yeast, cornstarch, flour, lemon juice, salt, and garlic granules in blender and blend until smooth. Pour the mixture into a small saucepan or medium microwave-proof bowl. Stir over medium heat until it starts to thicken, then let bubble 30 seconds and whisk vigorously, OR microwave on HI 2 minutes, whisk, then microwave at 50% power (MED) for 2 minutes, and whisk again
Oooh, I feel like a celebrity now that my words are in print! Teehee!!! 🙂 Another wonderful blog post Lani! This one’s a keeper!
Hey Molly! Well, the article couldn’t have been written out without my fine potato buds like you! Thanks for your contribution and fine presence!
Hey, why not post your avatar from fb to gravatar.com so that it will show up on your blog posts here? It’s an easy process. Got to gravatar.com and check it out. Would love to see your smiling face here!
What an excellent list of ideas! So simple too. Thank you so much as always Lani – I’m printing this one out!
Sophie
Hey Sophie – glad you likey!
This is perfect. I’m finally (thanks to you) getting over my fear of starches and appreciate the list of ideas.
Excited about the teleclass Wednesday night! I’m also coming to the Success Club call on Tuesday.
Janet
Janet, now that is music to my ears! It’s amazing how pervading and persistent our fear of the starches can be. Thanks for stopping in to share, it means a lot.
Jacket Potatoes are a staple in the UK. My favorite is curry jacket potatoes.
Rob – details! Jacket potatoes? Dish, please!
Hi Lani,
Jacket potatoes are basically baked potatoes. When I visit a pub in the UK, there are often very few vegetarian dishes, so I often get a jacket potato.
In the UK, they put all sorts of things on their potatoes- even tuna fish! A curry jacket potato is a vegetetable curry that covers a baked potato. You can use any type of curry that you would like and include vegetables such as carrots, cauliflower, you could also use lentils. Really any indian curry would do. Instead of using white rice like we are more familiar with using, cut a baked potato in half and use that.
Another option, which is also surprisingly tasty is using beans. In the UK, they use Heinz Baked Beanz. You’d have to check if the Heinz Baked Beanz in the US is the same as that in the UK (I think they may be different different). In the UK, there’s no added oils- it’s basically beans, tomatoes, water, some spices and is delicious covering a baked potato.
Oh! So jacket potatoes are simply baked potatoes. They are whole potatoes in their jackets. I like that! Thanks Rob.
Consider the potato your pizza ‘crust’ then load it up with salsa, veggies, and vegan cheese if you like it…we just pike on the veggies and love, love, LOVE our potato pizzas!
Cathy, is this then whole potatoes just cut up into chunks on your plate and then you add the toppings? Or do you create some kind of pizza shape and grill? Details!
oh yummy what great ideas, sure will be printing all these out Lani for my scrapbook and also to share in my study participants cooking class. I like my potato cooked twith the skin on them cut in half and scoop the middle out and mash the middle flesh with some creamed corn, diced pineapple, nutritional yeast , pepper and spring onion, stuff back into the potato and bake in the overn YUM, cheers Anna
Anna – oh my – your idea is so dang innovative! How do you fit it all back in the potato?
This isn’t really a “topper” – but it’s how we like to eat our potatoes these days. We like to cook them in the microwave with skins on, and chop them up into a bowl of Dr. McDougal’s low sodium pea soup, and add some cooked kale also. It’s a really hearty supper!
TD – works for me! Topper, treatments – they’re all in the same family. Thanks for your contribution!
For a sauerkraut topping alternative (in case you’re watching sodium) – I had a veggie reuben in Lake Tahoe that used braised red cabbage – absolutely delicious!
I love the sauerkraut idea Vikki. Have you a brand you recommend?
hi Lani, been trying to send an email to you but for some reason your email wont come up, can you send me an eamil from your email so i can get back to you please. The potatoe filling fits back in no problem i stuff them high and bake them in the oven on a tray with no problems and sometimes i put beans in as well, stuffing them you can use anything you fancy, chopped peppers and pinepalle work well and belive it or not chopped apple and walnuts taste great to, cheers Anna
Anna – just sent you an email. Let me know if she comes through!
Wow, a potato frenzy! I recently tried my potatoes chopped, boiled and topped with Tasty Bite’s Aloo Palak (potatoes & spinach simmered with onions, tomatoes and spices).
Gary, oooh that Aloo. I’m a sucker for any Indian food. Drool.