Pilgrim's Pie

I made a few modifications to an online recipe to find yet ANOTHER use for our vat of instant potatoes. Pilgrims ate turkey, right? Apologies for the half-eaten photo, I just wasn't fast enough! BTW, my 9-month-old loved picking this up and eating it.

Ingredients

• 3 tablespoons cooking oil
  
• 1 pound ground turkey
  
• 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
  
• 1 medium onion, diced
  
• 3 medium carrots, diced
  
• 1 small butternut squash, diced
  
• 1.5 tablespoons tomato paste (AKA ketchup)
  
• 1.5 cup chicken stock, divided
  
• 1.5 teaspoon dried thyme
  
• 1.5 teaspoon dried rosemary
  
• 1.5 teaspoon dried parsley
  
• 1 cup shredded cheddar
• 4 servings of your favorite instant potatoes (may involve butter and milk)
  

Instructions

Chop all those pesky veggies and set them aside for later. Shred your cheese. Don't worry, this is the most time-consuming part.
Place a large skillet over high heat and with 3 turns of the pan, cooking oil, about 3 tablespoons. Once the oil starts to ripple, add the ground turkey and break it up into small pieces as it cooks, using the back of a wooden spoon or a potato masher. Cook until the turkey is nice and brown, about 8-10 minutes.
While the meat is cooking, prepare your mashed potatoes. Make them just a little more watery than the instructions say.
Add the veggies to the meat and cook until tender, about 5 minutes. Add the tomato paste, chicken stock, spices (be sure to rub them to release flavor before you add them), salt and pepper. Continue to cook for 10 more minutes, stirring every now and then.
Pre-heat oven to 400°F.
While the veggies are cooking, stir about half of the cheese into the mashed potatoes until it's all melted.
Once the veggies and meat are finished, use them to cover the bottom of a large, oven-safe baking dish. Spread the cheesy potatoes to cover the turkey mixture evenly.
Sprinkle the remaining cheese over the potatoes.
Place in the oven and bake until the top is golden brown, about 10 minutes.

Spinach Meatloaf

Get your picky eater to eat his vegetables by hiding them in meat! Another exciting use for instant potatoes.

Ingredients

• 1 lb ground meat (I prefer turkey)
• 1/4 cup instant potatoes
• 1/4 cup milk
• 2 tablespoons ketchup
• 1/4 cup parmesean cheese
• 1 egg
• 1 clove garlic minced
• 1/2 onion chopped fine
• salt and pepper to taste
• flavoring (choose an option, both are tasty!)
• option A: 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce & 1 teaspoon cumin
• option B: 1 teaspoon each of sage, rosemary, thyme
• 5oz frozen spinach, thawed and chopped

Directions

1. Pre-heat oven to 350F or 175C. Thaw out your spinach by putting it in a colander and running water over it.
2. Mix first nine (9) ingredients and choose the kind of flavoring you'd prefer. Worcestershire goes better with beef, while herbs go better with ground chicken or turkey. Both flavors are tasty and merit trying.
3. Lay out a piece of aluminum foil, wax paper or other disposable flexible surface. Spread the meat mix over the foil to make a 1/2 inch-thick rectangle that should fit into your baking pan.
4. On top of the meat, make a uniform layer of spinach. Ideally, leave a 1/2 inch border of meat not covered by spinach.
5. Use your flexible surface to lift one side of the meat and gently form a roll. You'll likely have to work slowly and peel the meat off the foil a bit as you go. When you get to the end, press the end meat into the roll so in blends into a solid roll. You can also smoosh together the ends a bit to obscure the spinach there. The spinach should now be nicely hidden, visible only in cross-section.
6. If you're really careful with aluminum foil, you can now enclose your lovely meat roll in the same piece of foil, then place in your baking pan. This helps minimize cleanup. Definitely still use a pan, though, to keep the meat juices from oozing out into your oven.
7. Bake the meatloaf in the middle rack for 45 minutes or so (took me about twice that here, but I have no idea how hot my oven is with the goofy tank). This should serve 4-5 people and freezes easily either before or after baking.

Instant Potato Crusted Fish/Chicken

I know you've been on pins and needles waiting for another way to utilize those instant potatoes. Who needs breadcrumbs!!

• 1 lb white fish filet or chicken
• 1/2 cup instant potatoes
• 1/4 cup grated parmesean/romano cheese
• 1/2 teaspoon of minced garlic
• salt & black pepper to taste
• optional: 1 egg or a few tbsp mayonnaise
  
• plastic baggie or shallow bowl
  

1. Preheat oven to 400F (205C).
2. Grease a glass baking dish or use a non-stick baking dish.
3. Mix all the ingredients together in the baggie or shallow bowl.
4. Wet your fish or chicken. You can use a gluing agent such as a beaten egg or mayonnaise to help the batter stick to the meat. Then put one piece at a time into the crust mix and coat thoroughly.
5. Put the meat into your baking dish.
6. Bake the fish or chicken until it is cooked thoroughly (20 min for boneless chicken, 40min for bone-in chicken, 30-40 min for thick fish filet)

If you're more of a skillet person than baker, just put a little cooking oil in the skillet and go to town. Heats up the house a little less and your food is finished faster. There's also the grilling option.

Turkey Burgers -- with Instant Potatoes

Yet another use for instant potatoes: a way to stretch hamburger meat a bit further. My picky eater prefers anything with onions and garlic, so you can adjust those ingredients down to your preference. He often doesn't notice that it's turkey burgers, though, because the flavor is sufficiently good. I usually eyeball quantities, but paid close attention today to give a good estimate of quantities. Fresh herbs are always preferable (this group comes in a pack together called "poultry herbs" back home), but dried works nicely too (just rub the dried leaves a bit before tossing them in to release their flavors).

1 lb ground turkey
1 egg
1/2 onion diced fine
3 cloves garlic minced/diced fine
1/2 cup instant potatoes
1/4 cup milk
2 tbsp ketchup
1 tbsp dried rosemary (3 sprigs fresh chopped fine)
1 tbsp dried sage (2 sprigs fresh chopped fine)
1 tbsp dried thyme (1 handful fresh leaves pulled off stalks)
black pepper/salt to taste

1. In a medium mixing bowl, mix all the ingredients really well.
2. Separate the meat into burgers. You should be able to get five (5) respectable sized burgers out of this mixture.
3. I usually store individual burgers in resealable bags in the freezer to offer meal flexibility, however in Grenada the freezer is so humid that the bags quickly freeze to the walls and are difficult to remove. So here I put them in leftover containers, with burgers separated by foil or plastic wrap.

Instant Potatoes Transformed

As we get close to break, we're trying to empty our cupboards so the ants don't have a field day in our absence. Number one thing to eliminate: the GIANT tub of instant potatoes. After the second week of having mashed potatoes with every meal, Dan requested that I get a bit more creative. So this is perhaps the first in a series of "what to do with instant potatoes when you can't stand potatoes anymore."

Salmon Croquettes

• 15 oz can salmon
• 1 cup instant potatoes (or breadcrumbs)
• 1 beaten egg
• 1 tablespoons dried parsley (I use cilantro/coriander)
  
• 1 medium size onion finely chopped
• salt & pepper to taste
• 1 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 1 teaspoon dried cumin
  
• 1/4 cup of milk
• 2 tablespoons oil for frying
  

Instructions

1. Open your can of salmon, probably out of sight of any picky eaters in your household. You'll need to pick bones out. Most would prefer to drain and rinse the fish. I saw my omega 3 fatty acids floating on top and decided to keep it. Place salmon in a medium bowl.
   
2. Mix all ingredients together. I added milk because the original recipe was pretty dry and the patties fell apart upon cooking. Add just enough milk to make the patties not crumbly. You can make 4-5 cakes from a can of salmon.
   
3. Fry the patties in small amt. of 100% pure virgin olive oil, or a good corn oil, till golden on one side, then flip over & brown on second side. Drain on paper towels.