Hash

I have a passion for making use of leftovers. Although I live in a palatial house where we consume way more energy than any two people really need to, I some how have this fanaticism that I should not waste food. This manifests itself a number of means of using leftovers.

The first is soup. Soup was the original means of leftover recycling. Over many years I have refined the technique for creating flavor bases for soup until now the results have become extremely consistent...and good!

The second is fried rice. I got started on fried rice kick last year after reading an article in the Wall Street Journal about how a chef made fried rice (the secret is cooking each ingredient separately and season each as you go). As I cook a lot of Asian flavored foods and usually have rice leftover and Wife loves leftover fried rice for lunch, it became another major user of leftovers.

Introduce now hash. I had mad a pot roast as one of many dishes for our friend Agent W for after her surgery and over did the potatoes. I decided to try the same process I used with the fried rice of cooking components separately (I had some Napa cabbage and onion left over). I took some pulled pork from last summer out of the freezer. The potatoes were already fully cooked. I mixed everything together in a bowl and then let them sit for 30 minutes to combine flavors.

Getting the hash to brown properly took a bit of experimentation. I tried a long, low cooking with now turning but that wasn't working so I just cranked the heat up. Now I got good browning. The hash didn't stay together but it didn't matter because the brown, crusty parts were substantial and delicious.

With our moving back to more potatoes and rice in our diet (more on that later), I see hash in the future as another of the leftover using team.