Quick! What happens when you freeze russet potatoes? They freeze, of course...but does it affect the texture? The flavor?
I realized I was going to find out when I went for a couple of handsful from this bucket of potatoes given me last October. It's very cold outside. It's very cold in the garage. Water in the garage refrigerator still isn't freezing, but water bottles in the car are. And, it turns out, the potatoes are frozen.
I was too busy scrubbing to take photos of the washing and cutting process, but it was interesting to have a glaze of ice form on the exterior of each spud as I washed and rinsed. I could see ice crystals in the interior of the cut potatoes. On some, the skin started to loosen as I scrubbed and the outer layer began to thaw.
I was doing this because I'd unearthed from the freezer a bone-in pork butt roast from April 2024, purchased as a Good Deal while my darling was still alive. Pork was his favorite protein, and pork butt roast was one of his favorite ways to eat pork. I used to chafe at his opinion that there is One True Way to cook pork butts, or pork steaks, but it's been long enough that I decided to cook a roast in his honor, as he liked it. Besides, I could see whether I want to keep our 6-quart slow cooker or donate it.
The procedure: dice the potatoes, load them into the crock of the slow cooker, and microwave for 10 minutes to give the potatoes a head start. Season the butt roast with a package of Lipton Recipe Secrets (in this case, Golden Onion Soup Mix). Pack the roast into the potatoes, making sure that they protect the meat from the ceramic crock, and sprinkle the remainder of the soup mix atop the potatoes. Put the cover on. Turn the heat on High, and walk away. I did all that, and went out to shovel snow.
Some hours later, the meat was done to perfection and so were the potatoes. Dinner was served.
As for the potatoes: if they suffered from having been frozen, I couldn't tell. They mashed beautifully and soaked up the juices from the pork. In The Good Old Days I might have added butter to them, but these didn't need it.
The only problem is that this is a huge amount of food. This dinner was more than I usually eat, and I still have at least 4 dinners' worth to go. I've loaded the meat and potatoes into separate containers for now. Maybe I'll invite company over. Maybe I'll parcel these out and freeze some dinners.
But the potatoes - well, this form of cold storage doesn't seem to hurt them!
