Mozarella and Potato Cakes

These little balls of goodness are made from mashed potatoes and cheese, along with a flavorful mixture of herbs and spices. They make excellent appetizers.

I found this recipe on the blog Enriching Your Kid, my assigned blog for this month's Secret Recipe Club. Secret Recipe Club is a group of bloggers who, each month, are assigned (secretly of course) a blog from which to choose and make a recipe. Currently, the group is about 150 bloggers strong.

My assigned blogger is Shirley, a child psychologist who is now a homemaker. She has lots of recipes for healthy foods for children, including baby food. Her focus is making food that is both healthy and appetizing to kids.

On Shirley's blog, these are called Mozarella Cheese Cutlets. While Shirley has success in frying these, I decided to bake them after the breadcrumbs from the first three cutlets peeled off and fried separately in the oil. Frying failure is something I'm pretty familiar with. Don't ask me about the time I tried to make spring rolls and all of the contents burst out and fried separately in the pan.

I kind of fiddled with the potato to cheese ratio with these as well. I used russet potatoes, which are pretty large, so I upped the cheese. Cheeeeese.

The cakes can be prepared in advance up to the point of baking them, and then refrigerated. Perfect for a party. Delicious and easy!!

Mozarella and Potato Cakes

Makes about 48 potato cakes

Ingredients

3 russet potatoes

1/2 C grated mozarella cheese

2 T Parmesan cheese

generous 1/2 tsp freshly ground pepper

1/2 tsp oregano

1 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp chili powder

2 T chopped fresh cilantro

salt to taste

Breadcrumbs to coat the potato balls

Vegetable oil and spray oil

Instructions

1. Wash and quarter the potatoes. Boil them until tender, about 20 to 30 minutes. Drain and remove the peel as soon as they are cool enough to handle.
2. Mash the potatoes and stir in the cheeses, spices, and herbs. 
3. With a tablespoon scoop, portion the potatoes into balls. Coat the balls in the breadcrumbs. 
4. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.
5. Pour about 3 T of oil onto the bottom of a sheet pan. Place the potato cake balls on the pan, and spray them with spray oil.
6. Bake until golden brown, about 30 minutes. Don't worry about the exact timing, it will depend on how quickly they brown. If you have a convection oven, this will help brown the potato cakes. 
7. Serve hot. 

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