Here’s something I wrote five years ago:
We had a surfeit of potatoes and I suddenly was inspired to make potato farls. I took out my faithful Be-Ro recipe book, and there it was, a pound of mashed potatoes to 4 oz of self-raising flour to 2 oz of butter, a little milk – plus seasoning, and before I knew it, I had a batch of lovely potato farls! They tasted so good that they didn’t last long – and cooking them made me realise where I had gone wrong a little while ago with making Welsh cakes which are cooked on a griddle the same as farls are. I was advised i might not have had the griddle hot enough and the advice was correct!
I have my 1930’s Modern Practical Cookery beside me and I just wondered if it had potato farls or something similar. It didn’t exactly – they had potato scones but they were made with potato flour not actual potato. They did have a nice recipe for making potato balls stuffed with leftover cooked meat – I can imagine my mum might have made them if she had seen the recipe. Then I found another recipe for potato scones which are similar to the falrs but with different proportions, and when they are baked they are split while warm and eaten with butter… which sounds very tasty!
Potato scones
- ½ lb hot mashed potato (I made my mash for my farls in a blender so it was really finely mashed – well, not mashed, but blended!!)
- 4 oz butter or dipping
- ½ lb flour
- ½ tsp baking powder (or use self-raising flour)
- salt
- 2½ fl oz warm milk
- mix everything together until very smooth, quickly while the mash is still hot
- roll out on a floured board and cut into triangles
- bake in a moderate oven on a well greased tray for about 12 mins, turning over once
- eat immediately, split open and spread with lots of butter
Lois Elsden 