Potatopalooza

Ok, this entry is for people who fall into all of the following categories:

-You have 3-4 hours of time to cook
-You want to make LOTS of food to freeze for the weeks ahead
-You LOVE potatoes
-You like perogies and Shepard's Pie

If this sounds like you, read on!

The first part of this cooking spree will be perogies. The second part will be the vegetarian shepard's pie. Here is the LONG list of things you will need for your whole cooking experience:

-5 Pounds of Potatos
-5 cups or so of grated Cheddar Cheese
-500 Grams of Cottage Cheese
-1 large onion, diced
-1 to 2 garlic cloves, put through a garlic press
-6 Cups of Flour
-3 large, free range eggs
-2 teaspoons of salt
-1 teaspoon of baking powder
-2 tablespoons of oil
-1 to 2 stalks of celery
-1/2 a bag of Green Giant mixed vegetables
-1 can of cream of celery soup, or alternately, cream of mushroom soup
-a stick or more of butter
-milk (completely optional)
-1 Packages of Yves Veggie Ground Round (Fake Hamburger)

The MATERIALS you will need are:

-A rolling pin (this is dire)
-A flat sheet for the perogies
-Bags to put the perogies in to freeze them
-A baking pan for the shepard's pie
-Waxed paper (to layer the perogies if you have to)
-A bowl (for water)
-A fork
-SOMETHING to mash potatos with (I used a stand mixer)

Ok so here we go...

"Cheddar and Cottage Cheese Perogies... Homemade!!!"

1.) Peel all five pounds of the potatos.
2.) Chop all five pounds of the potatos into even cubes. Try to make them as even as possible so they all cook at the same rate. My mom was very serious about this!
3.) Boil the potatos until they are soft. Don't let them get disgusting and mushy, though.
4.) In a large mixing bowl, mix together the 6 cups of flour, the baking soda, and the salt.
5.) In a liquid measuring cup, beat together the 3 eggs and the oil. Then fill the measuring cup with lukewarm water to the 2 cup line. Make a little dent in the center of your flour mixture, and pour the liquid mixture in.
6.) Now stick in your hands! Start working the dough. Add LITTLE bits of water if you have to, to get it to a consistency that you can work with. You have to knead it into a pretty stiff dough.
7.) When it looks and feels "doughy," roll it into a ball. Rub oil over the outside, and stick it back in the bowl. Cover it with a clean tea towel and let it sit for 30 MINUTES.
8.) Now mash all the potatos, and split them into two bowls. When you are mashing the potatos, it is up to you if you want to add butter or a bit of milk to make the potatos more creamy or buttery. I always do.
9.) Heat some oil in a pan. When the oil is heated, add garlic and onions. Heat them until they are completely cooked, and put the pan aside. You can also cook the onions and garlic in butter, if you want.

This gives you time to make your filling. Now I am going to give you two kinds of filling options... but you can go crazy with fillings... some ideas for fillings are:
*mushroom*spinach*feta*cabbage*sauerkraut*asparagus*havarti*olive*cream cheese*

Anyway, onto the fillings.

"Cheddar Cheese Filling"

a.) Take one bowl of the potatos (which is half of the potatos) and mash in 4 cups of the grated cheese.
b.) Now take half the onions that you cooked, and mash in those as well. You don't have to put ALL the onions in if you don't want, heck, you don't have to put any onions in at all. I just love onions.
b) Mash until the everything is uniform. This mixture is done.

"Cottage Cheese Filling"

a.) Take one bowl of the potatos (which is half of the potatos) and mash the entire 500 gram container of Cottage Cheese. You may have to drain it if it's really water.
b.) Now take the other half of the onions that you cooked, and mash in those as well. You don't have to put ALL the onions in if you don't want, heck, you don't have to put any onions in at all. I just love onions.
b) Mash until the everything is uniform. This mixture is done.

Now returning to the Perogy recipe...

10.) Cut your dough ball in half and roll each half into a ball.
11.) Take the first ball, and roll it out onto a floured surface. The dough should be about 1/8 of an inch thick. You will 100% need a rolling pin to do this.
12.) Now cut the dough into 2inch by 2inch strips.
13.) To make each perogy, you will have to flatten out these 2x2inch squares, individually, then plot the filling into them. You'll have to do it one by one, because the dough has a tendency to want to shrink back to small sized!
14.) So for each perogy:

• Flatten the 2x2 square with the rolling pin
• Plop a bit of filling into the center of the flattened square
• Rub a bit of water around the inside edges of the perogey
• Roll the perogie into a triangle, making the corners meet.
• Press down, all around the edges, with a fork!

Yes! It is lots of work! One idea is to have one person flatten the squares, and have another person do the plopping of the filling and the sealing of each perogy. An idea is to take a baking sheet, cover it with waxed paper, then sprinkle flour on the waxed paper. Lay the perogies on this, and then when you need more space, just plot another piece of waxed paper on top, and continue. You'll need to freeze some of these unless you have like 15 people in your family wanting to eat that day.

Continuing on, you will find that even when you get through filling all your Cheddar Perogies AND your Cottage Cheese Perogies, you will have a lot of potato left. That is where the next recipe comes in. You can either do the Shepard's Pie right away, or freeze the potatos and come back to it. Either way, here is the recipe! Mashed potatos freeze well as long as you seal them and they don't get freezer burn.

"Monika's Vegetarian Shepard's Pie"

The ingredients to this recipe are the remaining potatos, and the other ingredients listed about that were not used in the perogy recipe.

Preheat your oven to about 350 Degrees Farenheit.

1.) In a pot, add some oil. If you want you can cook up some onion and garlic, but since there is so much onion and garlic in the potatos left over from the perogy recipe, I didn't bother this time around. Anyhow, if you choose to add more garlic and onion, now would be the time.
2.) Add chopped celery to the oil, and sweat it a bit.
3.) Next, add in the Yves Veggie Ground Round. Make sure the heat is around medium so it cooks, but doesn't burn.
4.) When the Ground Round looks cooked, add the half bag of mixed veggies. Stir them in well. Make sure you break them up if they are frozen.
5.) When the Ground Round and veggies are mostly cooked, empty in the can of cream of celery/mushroom soup. MIX WELL. Heat on low for a few more minutes until everything is good and mixed.
6.) Grease a casserole dish.
7.) Remove the Ground Round/Veggie/Cream mixture from the stove, and pour it into the bottom of the greased casserole dish.
8.) Mix the two potato fillings together (cottage cheese and cheddar), and spread them evenly on top of the Ground Round/Veggie/Cream mixture in the casserole dish.
9.) Sprinkle the remaining cup of grated cheese on top.
10.) Bake in the oven for about 30 minutes, or until the cheese on top is golden brown!

PHEWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!

I swear, it's alllllll worth it in the end!!!!