The beauty of our Catchall Potato Skillet dish is two-fold. (1) You can make this for any meal of the day. Dinner, breakfast, pop it in your kid's lunchbox, whatever. It's all good. (2) You can make the skillet whatever you want it to be. I'd say the key ingredients are: potatoes, onion, sausage, and corn. Otherwise, you can really throw in any veggies you want. And like our Catchall Frittata, you can use up all kinds of weird/random things in your fridge and most of the time, the skillet will be delicious. Less grocery shopping and less wasted food!
How to customize our Catchall Potato Skillet
You can add in extra veggies to this dish as desired. Just note that when you are cooking, throw the denser, harder ingredients in the pan first (the ones that require more cook time, i.e. broccoli, carrots). Here are some additional ways to customize our Catchall Potato Skillet for your family:
🍅Make it Vegetarian! You have a couple options to make the dish vegetarian. (1) Simply omit the sausage, step up the spice level, and add more veggies. (2) Omit the sausage and add in a shredded cheese of your choice. Of course, the skillet would no longer be dairy free. (3) Replace the sausage with pea protein crumbles. I'm a huge fan of Beyond Meat Beefy Crumbles. I've used them for years to make vegetarian chili and it is soooo delicious. I'm definitely a meat eater and I can't tell the difference. Worth noting is that these crumbles are high in protein and also gluten-free.
🍅Make it Vegan! You have a couple options to make the dish vegan. (1) Simply omit the sausage, step up the spice level, and add more veggies. (2) Replace the sausage with pea protein crumbles. I'm a huge fan of Beyond Meat Beefy Crumbles. I've used them for years to make vegetarian chili and it is soooo delicious. I'm definitely a meat eater and I can't tell the difference. Worth noting is that these crumbles are high in protein and also gluten-free.
How kids can help make catchall potato skillet
This dish involves many kid-friendly tasks. Here are some ways for your lil' sous chefs to help out (under adult supervision!):
- Chop potatoes with these awesome kid-friendly knives. We also love this Sani-Tuff cutting board because it’s rubber, has some heft, and won’t slide around on your counter.
- Bring potato water to a boil. his teaches kids to pay attention to the stovetop and see what happens to water when it gets that hot. Yay science!
- Help chop and measure out veggies for skillet mix.
- Break up the meat using a non-metal potato masher, especially if cooking with a non-stick pan.
- Combine and stir cooked meat with veggies. A long, wooden spoon is great for this task.
✔️ Expert Tips & Tricks
🍅Buy pre-sliced mushrooms. The price isn't very different from whole mushrooms and it cuts down on prep time.
🍅 In your skillet, break up the meat using a non-metal potato masher, especially if you're cooking with a non-stick pan.
👶 How to Satisfy Picky Eaters
🍅 Buy mild Italian sausage. Italian sausage tends to have some kick, and some can even be on the spicy side. I love that flavor, but my kids…not so much. Make it easy on yourself and buy sweet or mild sausage. Less whining, more eating 🙂
🍅Put the potatoes and corn on the side. Some kids get freaked out by a big mix of things, even when they like the individual ingredients. I made this meal twice, in two different ways. Truth be told, my kids ate way more the time when I put the potatoes and corn on the side. Just microwave the corn (instead of adding it to the skillet mixture).
🍅Kids pick the veggies. This recipe is highly customizable. And our kids loved making the decisions. Let your kids pick out the veggies at the grocery store, or pick from what's in your fridge….within reason, of course!
🍅 Make fresh corn if you have time. If you happen to have more than 28 minutes, it makes all the difference to oven-roast fresh corn. My kids loved eating the fresh corn. Some ate it right off the cob and others liked it cut off the cob. If you have time, make your first step setting the oven to 450 degrees. I would then move to step #1 and get your potatoes all set in the pan. Then tend to the corn. Shuck, butter and season each ear of corn with salt & pepper. Place the ears in separate sheets of tinfoil, and roll the tinfoil up so the corn is completed enclosed. Place corn on a baking sheet and pop in the oven for 25 minutes. Take the corn out of the tinfoil right away when done, so the corn can cool and will be ready to handle at the table. Making corn this way actually doesn't add a whole lot of time to the recipe.
🥔 Other Potato Dishes to check out:
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Catchall Potato Skillet
Ingredients
- 4 medium red or yukon gold potatoes (diced into small wedges or chunks)
- water
- 1-2 teaspoon salt
- Note: buy more than 4 potatoes if you do the Ms. Potato craft
- 4 Tablespoon cooking oil
- ½ yellow onion (thinly sliced)
- 1 red bell pepper (chopped)
- 2 - 3 cloves garlic (minced)
- 1 Pound ground Italian sausage
- 4 ounce mushrooms (sliced)
- 8 - 10 oz bag frozen corn (see KIDIFY section below about using fresh corn)
- salt & pepper (to taste)
Instructions
- Add the potatoes to a medium skillet on high heat, and spread out evenly. Add enough water to cover potatoes by 1". Bring water to a boil and add the salt. Let the water continue boiling until potatoes are soft, about 10-15 minutes. Periodically use a fork to test them.
- Meanwhile, heat another medium-large skillet on medium and add 2T of the cooking oil. Once heated, add onion, peppers, and garlic. Cook for 5-7 minutes, stirring frequently. When done, scoop into a separate bowl and set aside.
- Using the same skillet on medium heat, add sausage and cook until no longer pink, breaking it up into smaller pieces as it cooks. Once sausage is cooked, add mushrooms, corn and the veggie mix (from Step 2) to skillet. Season with salt & pepper and cook for 5-7 minutes. Stir frequently.
- Once potatoes are soft, remove from water and pat dry with a paper towel. Pour the water out of the skillet. Add the remaining 2 T of the cooking oil to the skillet that held the potatoes and heat on medium. Add potatoes back to the skillet and season them liberally with salt & pepper. Panfry until the the sides of the potatoes are slightly golden brown.
Notes
*Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet. While we are not certified nutritionists, we work with a WordPress-integrated nutrition API to calculate our recipes' ingredient values.
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