Funeral Potatoes

It was recently (July 24) Pioneer Day. It's an official state holiday in Utah. Every 24th of July we have parades, picnics, and fireworks to celebrate* the day that the first Mormon pioneers entered the Salt Lake valley and established a community that would later become the state of Utah.

Although it's primarily a Utah holiday (you can understand why), Mormons everywhere like to think about Pioneer Day on July 24 to reflect on the immense sacrifices of those pioneers (and be grateful that we didn't have to walk from Illinois to Utah pulling handcarts), as well as to think about "modern pioneers" who also make sacrifices to join the Church.

So anyway, this year Pioneer Day was on a Sunday, and my ward (congregation) normally has a potluck meal after church on the fourth Sunday. So this month the theme was to bring "Pioneer Foods," or just cliche Mormon foods in general. I decided to bring one of my favorite dishes, funeral potatoes.

For those of you not familiar with the dish, funeral potatoes are a type of a casserole that combines shredded potatoes with creamy things like sour cream, cream of chicken soup, and cheese, and tops it with crunched up corn flakes. They're amazing. The name is a bit tongue-in-cheek, and refers to the idea that they are nearly always served at the luncheon that follows a Mormon funeral.

I woke up early that morning to make them before church. They were super easy, and I got them right in the oven. When I pulled them out, I thought, "I should take a picture. This might be the most beautiful pan of funeral potatoes mankind has ever seen." I don't doubt that's true. But I didn't have time. I was running a bit late.

So I loaded the hot dish and my other things into the back seat of my car and headed to church. As I was driving, I approached an intersection. (It was 33rd and St Paul, for any Baltimoreans out there.) I had a green light, so went to cruise through it. But then the oncoming driver decided it'd be a good idea to try and turn left before I got there. They severely misjudged the situation, and I had to slam on my brakes and swerve to avoid hitting them. But, the good (actually great) news is, we avoided colliding and both drove on our way.

However, there was some bad news. Remember that beautiful pan of (hot) funeral potatoes I had sitting in the back seat? Unfortunately, the pan responded as predicted by the laws of physics (curse you Newton!), and slid forward to the edge of the seat, and dumped right into my church bag (which was sitting on the floor). I pulled over as soon as I could (about a block) to rescue the pan and perhaps salvage the contents of my bag. (Mostly my spiffy new heels that I had put in my bag, as 5-inch heels aren't very easy to drive in.) I was in a hurry (oh yeah, I was conducting Relief Society today, and already going to be late), so I couldn't do much besides put the pan back on the seat and rescue my shoes as well as the items I needed for the Sunday School lesson I was teaching. (Oh yeah, that's my other calling.) At red lights I cleaned my shoes out with napkins in my glove box. (I had plenty, thanks to my addiction to McDonalds ice cream cones.)

So what's the point of this story? The point is, despite the mishap, half of them remained in the pan and still salvageable, so I decided to serve that half anyway. People liked them. Except that most of what dumped out was the crispy corn flake topping, which we all know is the best part! I had a couple requests for the recipe, so here's the recipe I used:

Funeral Potatoes

Ingredients:

• 1 bag shredded hash browns (thawed)
• 2 cans cream of chicken soup
• 2 cups sour cream
• 1 1/2 cups cheese
• 1/3 cups diced green onions
• 2 cups corn flakes crumbs
• 3 Tbsp melted butter
  

Directions:

1. Mix together soup, sour cream, green onions and cheese.
2. Grease a 9x13 pan. Put the potatoes in the pan.
   
3. Pour the soup mixture over the potatoes.
4. Combine corn flake crumbs with butter. Sprinkle evenly over entire top.
5. Bake uncovered at 350* for 45 minutes, or until bubbly.
   

Notes:

• I substituted plain yogurt for sour cream because I'm like that. You can't tell the difference, I promise.
• If you want, you can mix the potatoes with the soup mixture before putting them in the pan. Either way is fine.
  
• Honestly, this recipe is extremely forgiving, just make sure you have the basic ingredients; you can fudge most the rest of it.

Well, I didn't take any before pictures, like I said, so you have to just imagine what the most beautiful pan of funeral potatoes known to mankind look like. (Sadly, I'm the only one that saw them.) But here are some pictures of the aftermath. Sorry, no pictures of the car pre-cleaning. (And seriously, my friend/visiting teacher Emily K is a saint, she really did most of the cleaning of the backseat. Ashlee also helped clean my front seat, where I had (perhaps stupidly) put my bag at some point.)

Post-accident, pre-serving. Trust me, they were more beautiful.

My bag is in a sad state. I threw it away. After continuing to bake in my car for a couple hours, I decided it was unsalvageable/not worth salvaging. Sad, I know.

I should have taken a picture of my new shoes because they are seriously amazing.


* One of my favorite commentaries on Pioneer Day festivities is by Eric Snider, who used to write a Dave Barry-esque column in the BYU paper when I was there. In his column, "Born on the 24th of July," he says: "My beef is with Pioneer Day festivities -- fireworks, parades, flag-waving -- all of which were ripped off from the Fourth of July, just because they're close to each other on the calendar. If the pioneers had gotten here in December, we'd celebrate it by giving gifts and decorating trees. If they'd arrived in October, we'd all dress up like pioneers and go door-to-door asking for rations of flour. Frankly, when it comes to thinking up original holiday-celebrating ideas, we suck." For the complete column, go here.