Hey there Honey's and New-Bees!

Scalloped potatoes are probably one of my favorite potato dishes, I could seriously eat a whole pan in one sitting no questions asked. Growing up scalloped potatoes came from a Lipton Side-Kicks bag of dehydrated potatoes, and I absolutely loved them. But as I developed my cooking skills over the years and started moving away from processed foods, I realized it was also time to upgrade my “potatoes game” by moving away from dehydrated, processed, mixes, to homemade, non-processed potatoes.

My first attempt at making them was abysmal, they were just potatoes with a bunch of cheese melted in-between layers, needless to say they were bland and boring. But I didn’t give up and tried again, this time sprinkling some flour and cream in between the layers of potato – still didn’t get what I aiming for :(.

As a last resort I layered the potatoes with béchamel sauce AND “some” cheese! The result was magnificent! The potatoes were creamy, flavorful and an instant hit. Sure, they took a little more time to make because of the béchamel sauce, but those extra 5 minutes made a gigantic difference.

Try it out for yourself and share your results below!

You want to start of by making sure that your potatoes and onions are sliced thinly and evenly so they cook evenly. Although I slice mine by hand, you can always use a mandolin to get a really even and super thin slice – just be very careful when using the mandolin as they are very sharp, and if you do use one please make sure to always use a guard.
Once you all your potatoes are sliced, salt them generously (potatoes LOVE salt) and set them aside.

In large sauce pan, melt butter over medium heat, whisk in flour, add bay-leaf and cook until you smell the flour giving off a “toasted” aroma (about 2-3 minutes), then gradually add in cream, whisking continuously to make sure flour mixture and cream do not clump. Turn heat down to low, stirring occasionally until it is a thick soup-like mixture, then add a pinch of nutmeg and melt in a handful of Emmental. Once cheese has melted into the béchamel sauce remove sauce from heat and discard bay leaf.

In a 8″ x 8″ baking dish, layer your potatoes, béchamel, onions, then cheddar. Repeat layering until you no longer have any potatoes, and top with a final layer of béchamel and sprinkle with remaining cheese.

Cover with foil and bake at 350ºF for an hour and 10 minutes, removing the foil during the last minutes of cook time so that cheese can brown.

Once cheese had browned, remove potatoes from oven and let sit at room temperature for about 15 minutes 😊.