Stuffed Potato Croquettes

Stuffed Potato Croquettes

from A Month in Marrakesh, Andy Harris, Hardie Grant Books, 2011.

I’ve been going through a bit of a Moroccan food binge so finding this particular recipe book set me off to try something from it. It’s not a vegetarian book but there are quite a few meatless meals in it. 

The author has been going to Marrakesh each year for ten years and claims to do nothing very much except explore the food markets and shops and cook for friends. There appears to be a great collection of items to try in the book and I hope I have time to make them all.

Potatoes are my favourite vegetable. I love to eat them any way they are cooked. When I found this recipe I was really keen to try it out. But, of course, it was a meat dish so I decided to try and modify it and turn it into a vegetarian variation.

I chose a mock mince instead of the minced beef for the filling. The mixture of spices and other ingredients helped make it a reasonably tasty alternative—perhaps even better than the original.

The potatoes were mashed and mixed with spices, so tasty that I could have eaten the mash right away instead of continuing with the remainder of the recipe.

I tried to make the croquettes following the instructions (rolling out the potato dough and using biscuit cutters to make rounds onto which the filling is placed and then the dough is folded over) but found that it was too difficult to do this way. Instead I took a quantity of the dough and flattened it into the palm of my hand. I then cupped my palm and placed the filling in the middle of the cup shape. It was then reasonably easy to fold  the dough over and shape the croquette.

The croquettes were served with slow-cooked curried chick peas with fresh ginger and coriander.

For me it was a delicious meal. All of the croquettes were not eaten but on the following day I got into them cold. Great.

Taste: ✔✔✔✔

Ease of cooking: ✔✔