Plated Potato and Sweet Potato Hash with Fried Egg Over Easy

A CSA box dropped into my lap yesterday. I’ve never had one before, so I got busy thinking about how I’m going to hustle through my surprise bounty of green beans, cherry tomatoes, baby beets, new potatoes, watermelons (2!) and a handful of little banana peppers. I already had some beets and baby sweet potatoes from my visit to the produce stand en route to the shore last week (see “Of Shore Food, Which is Good Fun, And Hermit Crabs”), so a green bean/roasted beet/cherry tomato salad with sun-dried tomatoes, feta and pine nuts was a given, but what to do with some of the other goodness? Someone suggested Sweet Potato Hash. This sounded suspect to me, so I looked it up on the internet (wait, I get my legitimacy from the internet?) and, indeed, there it was: scads of recipes for sweet potato hash. When I saw the second ingredient was bacon, I jumped in.

I happen to love hash of all sorts and got busy with some Red Flannel Hash when I was in a beet phase last Spring (remember Beet Carpaccio? From Easter?). What I didn’t know until today is that it is common for Red Flannel Hash to include sweet potatoes. Ahhh. Full circle.  Let’s do them all!

First, the bacon, then the onions, then some yellow peppers that have been waiting to make themselves useful. It was lacking some green color, so I threw in a jalapeno. Next, the sweet potatoes and the new potatoes, and 1/4 red onion I found in the fridge.

Cooked bacon, and onions cooking in bacon fat

Add the white potatoes, sweet potatoes, peppers, etc.

You could stop there and plate it up for a regular hash, but…

Potato and sweet potato hash with bacon, jalapeno, crushed thyme and chives.

Then I added some of the beets I roasted last night. Oh, and a few yellow squash currently lacking a purpose. You could stop there, but…

Add the beets for a Red Flannel Hash

Then the piece de resistance, the jewel, the kapow: yes, of course I mean a fried egg! And some chives since it’s still lacking some color but I suppose people who cook kitchen-sink style can’t be too picky.

Plated Red Flannel Hash, sans egg

Red Flannel Hash with Fried Egg Sunny Side Up

Needless to say, it was grub.

In looking all this up afterwards, I found a recipe for Red Flannel Hash on epicurious.com which happens to be from Rick and Ann’s, in Berkeley, CA, which is my home stomping grounds. It’s tucked up alongside the dowager of resorts, The Claremont Hotel, so if you are staying there, pop in for breakfast at this little joint. Actually, if you are staying at the Claremont, you probably have your breakfast delivered to you and your cat, Mr. Whiskers, in bed on silver platters, so congratulations on that.

Now I need to get creative with some watermelon.