In Dutch cuisine, stamppot is a class of dish consisting of mashed potato with other vegetables mashed in. It is true winter comfort food. There are a few classic combinations such as hutspot (carrot, onion and sometimes bacon) but a stamppot is just as commonly made of vegetables that are in season or that are leftover. This is my own special recipe, developed over time, that would probably make a Dutch purist bellow with rage. In Australia, though, my stamppots are always crowd pleasers. This recipe is not suitable for dieters.

Ingredients

1kg potatoes, washed
100g butter
4-6 rashers bacon (with fat)
I bunch chives
Some kind of leaf e.g. baby spinach, endive, kale
Milk
Salt + Pepper to taste

Method

Chop the potatoes roughly and add them to a large pot with lots of boiling water. I like to leave the skin on to preserve the nutrients and add an extra bit of texture, this is a personal choice. Chop the bacon into small pieces about the size of your pinky nail. Chop the chives finely. If necessary, break your leaves into a smaller size – this is not necessary with baby spinach. When the potatoes are nearly cooked, heat all of the butter in a frypan and gently cook the bacon. Be careful as the bacon is likely to spit and jump and may burn you. Once the bacon is cooked to almost-crunchy, take it off the heat but leave it in the pan. We want to use the delicious bacon butter to flavour the stamppot.

When the potatoes are well cooked, drain them and roughly mash them. We don’t want a smooth paste, this is a robust peasant dish. Add the bacon and butter to the potatoes, then put some mashed potato into the frypan and swirl it around to recover as much delicious butter as possible. Put the butterised potato back in the pot. Add the chives and give it all a good stir. Add a bit of milk, but not so much that the mash gets too thin. Add salt and pepper to taste. Now add the uncooked leaves and stir it around. The idea is to wilt the leaves in the heat of the mash, you might want to cover the pot to help achieve this. The stamppot should be ready in a minute or so.

Serving

Give everyone a big dollop. If you are serving with a sauce, stew, gravy or casserole then make a well in the top of the mash large enough to accomodate. It is also traditional to serve a stamppot with smoked sausage called rookworst. Be prepared to come back for seconds. It is impossible to serve a stamppot and finish eating before you are as full as you can possibly be.

Eet smaakelijk!

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