Potato and Egg Rösti

Crispy threads with egg, soft heart juicy onion sweet, delight warm or cold

All of my girls love potatoes, with or without eggs, in any form or cultural denomination. Painting by Vincent Van Gogh - The Potato Eaters 1885.

A classic Potato Rösti, Tortilla de huevo, Frittata or Bacalhau à Brás or new potatoes sautéed with garden peas and garlic, to name a few, encapsulated the elemental comfort of potatoes . Potato rosti is a regular feature in our breakfast on Tuesday mornings to ready the girls for school either with baked beans, scrambled eggs or a rasher of crispy bacon.

In my Hong Kong childhood, we didn’t have potatoes and eggs combined together as a dish in our meal. My Mother’s go to potato dish is cooked with Lap Yuk or chopped pork ribs, flavoured with red fermented soy bean curd ( Nam Yue), which was enjoyed by the family. Writing this post, is a reminder that I should cook my Mother’s potato dish more often in our Paw Paw’s Dinner !

Rösti or rööschti (Alemannic German: [ˈrøːʃti]) is a Swiss dish consisting mainly of potatoes, sautéed or shallow-fried in a pan with butter. This recipe will capture the buttery crispy potato and provide a textural contrast to the crust with the soft, sweet onion and creamy eggy centre.

Lets call this dish Potato and Egg Rösti for now. First skin and wash about 1.5kg of potatoes, King Edward or Maris Piper type is good for this dish. Use a stainless steel box grater to shred the potatoes into large strips into a large bowl. When finish grating, gently gather and firmly squeeze the starchy liquid out of the shredded potatoes and drain away. This will take a few goes to get rid of as much liquid as possible. Squeezing out the liquid will help the potatoes to be more crispy and cook better during Sautéing.

I then finely slice 1 medium red and white onion and add to the shredded potatoes, sprinkle about 20 - 25g of salt and 5g of black pepper. Mix the onions and potatoes well and set aside. Also, whisk 5 large eggs and add a small pinch of salt and chopped parsley, then set aside.

Heat up a 325mm diameter non-stick pan, add 50ml of olive oil and then 20g of salted butter and bring the mixture to soft bubbling. Then add the shredded potato mixture to the pan by gently placing handfuls of mixture and evenly distribute, try not to compact the mixture . Keep an ear on the cooking at this stage, if the sizzling sounds a bit quick and slightly smoky , turn the heat down a little to a good rhythmic sizzle, on my cooker it’s about 50-60% of heat. Once the edges of potatoes in the pan is crispy and light brown and the Rösti is sliding freely within the pan, it is almost time to flip!

If the Rösti looks slightly compacted during cooking, use a pair of chopstick to lift and create voids within the potato threads, then evenly pour in the whisked eggs and make sure the eggs are distributed nicely across and into the potato voids created and then gently heat to soft set the egg mixture.

To flip the Rösti I use a 325mm diameter flat lid from a cooking pot, have used a 350mm diameter flat plate, but the plate can be a bit slippery during the critical moment of turning. The pot lid is a lot easier as it has a lid handle to aid the flipping process.

When the egg mixture is set slightly on top, but not too runny, place the lid onto the Rösti, one hand holding onto the lid handle and the other on the pan handle, in one smooth motion rotate the pan onto the lid with the pan bottom facing up. Remove the pan and reveal a beautifully turned out Rösti on the lid, of course, feeling smug for a few seconds in front of the gathering crowd.

The next step is to gently slide the Rösti from the lid back onto the pan, and back onto the gentle heat. The degree of cooking at this stage is entirely to personal choosing, my girls prefer the egg emulsion slightly firm as shown on photos, I prefer the eggs a bit runnier.

Last act is to slide out the Rösti onto a serving plate and leave to cool a little and enjoy!

This potato dish is very versatile and can be eaten warm or cool as main or paired with one of my favourites; slow roasted warm Beef Feather Steak with a large dollop of Smokey and garlicky Romesco Sauce.