T-Minus 10 Pounds of Potatoes

I’ve been dying to go to Costco and Matthew’s mother generously gave us an extra card on her account. (Illegally, apparently, as the cashier nicely let us off with a warning).

We went with a couple of friends yesterday so we could split some of the insane portions, and we totally scored…One of the major deals of the day was 10 pounds of red potatoes, $6.79. Alas, potatoes will be featured heavily in the days to come.

The seeds for tonight’s recipe came from Mark Bittman, who had the crazy idea of braising potatoes. He includes many variations of this idea in his How To Cook Everything Vegetarian. So, having all these potatoes, and due to the fact that the oven was being used for bread, I needed to figure out a way to cook potatoes, on the range, for dinner. STAT.

Rosemary Potato Stew

• 10 red potatoes, cut into quarters
• 1 onion, sliced
• 5 carrots, sliced
• 6 leaves of kale, stemmed and chopped
• 1.5 cup organic chicken broth ($9.99 for 6 1-quart containers of Organic Chicken Broth—I would usually have used veggie broth or water)
• 1-2 T Dried rosemary
• 1 can black beans, rinsed
• Olive oil, salt and pepper (and red pepper flakes)

Saute the sliced onion (with salt/pepper) in a large sauce pan over high heat until browned. Add the potatoes and carrots, salt and pepper, and saute until the potatoes have color, about 5-10 minutes. When the potatoes are browned, add the chicken broth, rosemary, and red pepper flakes. When the broth boils, turn the heat to low and cover for about 5 minutes. Uncover, add the kale and the beans, stir and cook another 3-5 minutes. The dish is done when the potatoes and carrots are just tender. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

The math: 10 lbs for $6.79 = $0.69 per pound, so $1.04 for the potatoes that we ate today. BUT it was 5 servings total (with the 3 we wrapped up for eating later in the week)…Grand total (for the potatoes, AKA the bulk of tonight’s meal): $0.20 per portion. We used a can ($0.63) of black beans, 1.5 cups chicken broth ($0.62) and I’d guess, $0.60 of carrots, onion, kale, etc. Total: $1.85, so each portion is: $0.37 + $0.20 (potato)…Grand total: $0.57 per portion of our delicious potato stew.

We put the B back in budget!