Where does Hachis Parmentier come from?

This dish comes from France and is composed by a basement of other dishes, but it has turned out into one of the most traditional dishes in the “Cuisine Française”. It is eaten all around the year and is usually served as second plate.

As I was saying before, the Hachis Parmentier is a French gastronomic specialty, and is a gratin made of layers of potatoes puree and minced meat. The meat is usually beef or ox meat, and either raw or cooked, you can also find variants of this dish made with minced chicken meat. The name “hachis” itself means minced, which is the principal characteristic of the dish.

What is the origin of Hachis Parmentier?

The name comes from the nutritionist Antoine-Augustin Parmentier, that started promoting the consumption of the potatoes imported from América which, in that time, didn’t had a great acceptance. However, he was totally convinced of its nutritional value to fight the lack of food in a time of hunger. He even made the king Louis XVI try the dish.

Ingredients:

• 1 kg of potatoes.
• ½ kg of minced meat of your likings.
• 2 onions.
• 4 garlic gloves.
• 50 ml of white wine.
• Salt
• Black pepper.
• Nutmeg
• 1 glass of warm milk.
• ButterTime of preparation: 1,5 hours.

How to cook Hachis Parmentier:

First step: Ingredients preparation.

Clean the potatoes very well and cook them in a pot with water and salt. When the potatoes are completely cooked, take them out of the pot and let them cold down and preserve.

Finally, dice the onion and the garlic and preserve.

Top Tip: to avoid the potatoes to melt is better to cook them with the skin, but be pretty sure you wash them properly.

Second step: Prepare the meat.

Take the dices onion and garlic and put them inside a hot pan with olive oil to fry them.

When the onion and the garlic take a golden colour, is time to add the meat. Fry the meat until it is almost cooked, and then add the white wine.

Cook all the ingredients together until the liquids has been reduced.

Top Tip: fry the ingredients with a cover and without the cover once you have added the wine. It will help to provide the meat a more intense taste.

Third step: Prepare the potatoes.

Once the potatoes has cold down, peel them and smash them with a fork. Mix the mashed potatoes with the warmed milk and a nut sized piece of butter.

Add salt, nutmeg and the black pepper and stir everything until you have a homogenous puree.

Top Tip: be careful with the amount of milk you add, if you add too much the consistency of the puree will be so liquid and the Hachis Parmentier will not keep the shape.

Final Step.

Take a rounded and small recipient for ovens and put some butter in the interior surfaces, to avoid the final dish to adhere to the walls.

Now is time to add the ingredients, start with a basement of meat, cover with a layer of puree and small pieces of butter.

Put the recipient inside the oven and grill until the potatoes take a golden colour.

When you have your pie ready, let it to cold down a little and serve with the meat on the top.

Top Tip: you can add some grated cheese to the pie, the flavour will be fantastic.

Top tip: if you don’t want so much fat in your pie (like me), you can add butter only to the puree and to the walls of the oven recipient.

Top Tip: if you don’t have a mould for the oven (like me), you can use a glass or a ceramic to obtain the shape and cook in a microwave instead of an oven.

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