Recipe: Irish Potato Casserole

This weekend my husband and I went to a St. Patrick's Day party, and I was asked to bring "Something Irish." Now, while my family is quite Irish, I don't do a lot of Irish cooking so this posed a bit of a challenge to me. I was originally going to try my hand at Boxty but, let's face it, I haven't ever actually had a true Irish potato pancake before, so I wouldn't even know if I messed it up!

Well, as any good computer geek worth her salt would do, I headed over to Google and searched for Irish recipes, with an emphasis on quick and easy because this was three hours before the party started. I found this recipe for Irish Potato Casserole, which looked like a winner. It looked yummy -- who doesn't like potatoes and cheese?? -- and more importantly, I had most of the ingredients on hand already.

(Full disclosure: I'm not sure how actually Irish this dish is but I'm going with it.)

I made quite a few modifications and brought it to the party where it disappeared very quickly to rave reviews!

Here's my recipe:

Irish Potato Casserole

• 5 large, peeled and shredded potatoes
• 1/2 cup melted butter (use butter and not margarine!)
  
• 2 eggs, beaten
• minced onion/onion powder, garlic salt, and paprika to taste. (I just sprinkled some into the dish until it looked good - the recipe called for minced onion but since I didn't have any on hand I used onion powder)
• 1/2 cup 2% milk
  
• 1 8 oz. brick of sharp cheddar cheese, grated
  

1. Preheat oven to 400 F
2. Butter a 2 quart baking dish
   
3. Mix potatoes, butter, egg, spices completely together.
   
4. Pour milk over top and bake for 20 min.
   
5. Stir in half the cheese, add rest of cheese to top of casserole. Sprinkle paprika on top, bake for an additional 15-20 min. or until done and browned on top.

Everyone asked for this recipe last night, and it's definitely a keeper!