Mashed Potato Blini マシュポテトのビリニ

Since my wife was on a roll coming up with roasted pepper blini, pesto blini and corn blini, she looked at the bowl of mashed potatoes in the fridge and was hit with a brilliant flash—potato blini. These were mashed potatoes she prepared when we cooked a whole chicken in the Weber grill. Usually, we place two aluminum wrapped Russet potatoes in the Weber with the chicken. She removes the skin of the potatoes. mashes them and adds butter, cream cheese with onions and chives (sold in a tub), seasoning it with salt. Then she pours in the juice accumulated while the chicken was resting. These potatoes are very nice and flavorful. We like them but we generally cannot finish them. From the leftover potatoes, my wife makes gnocchi (of which we have a backlog in the freezer). I often make “potato croquettes” (but again we have a backlog in our freezer). “Mashed potato blini” seemed like a perfect use of the left over potatoes particularly since there was no backlog in the freezer—yet. This turned out very well. The crust is crunchy but the inside is quite tender with mashed potato flavor and a hint of barbecue chicken. With this dish we found another way to use up leftover mashed potatoes.

Ingredients(X3): makes 14 blini
2 cups of mashed potatoes
6 tbs melted butter
3/4 cup sour cream
6 large eggs, beaten
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup + 2 tbs. cake flour 
1 Tbs + 1 1/2 tsp. Baking powder
1 1/2 tsp salt
enough additional cream or buttermilk to make it the texture of pancake batter 

Directions:
Run the mashed potatoes through a ricer to work out any lumps. Put the riced potatoes in a bowl.  Add the egg, the melted butter and sour cream, then add the flour, baking powder and salt and whisk until well blended. (You may need to add more cream so the batter is the consistency of pancake batter.)

In a cast iron platar, melt 1 tablespoon of butter. Use the melted butter to grease each of the platar cups before adding the batter. Pour the batter into the cups until they are mostly full. Cook over moderately low heat, turning once, until set, about 5 minutes per side. Repeat with the remaining butter and batter.

This is a great way to use the left over mashed potatoes. The outside is crispy and the inside has a nice smooth moist texture. The overall flavor of the potatoes really comes through. These would be really good slathered in the butter for breakfast or as a side for lunch or dinner.