It is that time of year again where I have lots of leftover ham. So I decided to make one of my winter favorites Scalloped Potatoes with Ham. I posted about making this recipe last year. This year’s version was a modified recipe with slightly different results. If you look at the photo you can see my sauce was thicker, more plentiful and I have some nice color on the top of the pan. However what you can’t see is the potatoes didn’t cook evenly, even though I convection baked the dish. The top potatoes were underdone. I discovered this when I pulled it out and poked the potatoes.
When I cooked longer I ended up with super soft bottom potatoes. Why??? I suspect this was because I didn’t bake it covered in foil the whole time. The recipe I was following said bake half the time covered and the other half uncovered. While this does result in nice color on the top of the dish from the white sauce browning, all the potatoes don’t cook. I also cut the potatoes a little thicker than I should have which likely messed things up as well. 10 additional minutes back in the oven did the trick though. So here is the revised recipe
- Cooking spray
- 2 cups diced cooked ham
- 2 large russet potatoes, peeled and sliced 1/8 – 1/4 inch thick
- 1 medium onion diced
- 2 cloves minced garlic
- 4 tablespoons butter
- 1/4 cup tablespoons flour
- 2 1/2 cups milk, room temperature not cold
- 1 tsp ground black pepper
Preparation
- Preheat oven at 350
- Spray 9×11 pan with cooking spray
- Layer potatoes and ham until all is used up
- Melt butter in saucepan
- Add onions and garlic to saute until translucent
- Add flour and create a roux (make sure you brown all your flour!)
- Add milk and black pepper
- Cook until sauce thickens and is bubbly
- Spread white sauce over 9×11 pan of potatoes and ham
- Cover with foil and convection bake at 350 for 30 minutes
- Remove foil and convection bake 20 minutes more