Friday, 12 September 2008

Slovak potato pancakes (sweet or savoury)

Sepedi: tapola
Ruanda: ibiraya
Suahili: kiazi
Sestwana: lekwele
Bemba: ifyumbu
Shona: mbatátisi
Swazi: li-tábhane
Zulu: ilizambane
Xhosa: izambane
Hausa: dànkálȉ
Lingala: mbala
Maasai: ilpiasi

This is a small collection of "potato" in several African languages. Africa is known to be by far the most linguistically diverse continent. The number of African languages is usually put at around 2000 but it is difficult to estimate. I love languages and don't like to be "eurocentric" but for me it reslts quite difficult to find good african resources. But with potato, it worked :) Even if yam would be Africa's staple starchy root vegetable, not potato. While here, in Central Europe, potato is very, very important. And Slovakia is a country in the heart of Europe. And Slovak potato pancakes (lokše) are really tasty!

see also: Lithuanian potato fritters
see also: Slovak potato dumplings

1 kg potatoes
300 gr flour
1 egg
a pinch of salt

optionally:
+ vanilla sugar, icing sugar and apple mousse
+ slices of ham and grated cheese*

1. Cook potatoes, peel, mash and mix with flour and egg. Add a pinch of salt and, if they will beserved sweet with apple mousse or jam, you can add vanilla sugar (1 teaspoon or more)

2. Sprinkle your workplace with flour. Roll the dough thinly, as thin as you can. But beware, it is a hard work! Don't get descouraged cause the final result is really great!



3. Fry thin pancakes in few oil.

4.* There are some ways of serving savoury lokše. Here is one of them: leave one pancake on the pan and fry it only from 1 side. As quickly as you can, put a slice of ham and grated cheese (or slices of cheese) on 1 halve of the pancake. Cover with the secon halve, close the edges well by pushing them with a fork. Fry a bit more to be sure that the cheese inside melts.

(my version without ham)




(sweet lokše with apple jam)

3 comments:

gjpb1953 said...

Thank you for your great website. I have been looking for a potato lokse recipe because I have not had them in 25 years. My grandmother use to make them with leftover mashed potatoes.

lubos said...

Howdy! As you mentioned in your post, your recipe is for "lokše". When I think of potato pancakes, I think of the hashbrown / latke-like "haruľa". Here is my recipe for potato pancakes.

Ewa said...

@gjpb1953": yes, it is rather a "leftovers" dish, but how delicious! I wonder if your grandmother was making them same way as I did them? They are not easy to make, but too delicious!

@Ibrieda: your recipe is for zemiakové placky, true? We have the same thing in Poland: placki ziemniaczane, known worldwide as latkes. Differrent potato dishes are very popular in this part of the world. Lokše are made with cooked potatoes, while latkes with crude ones. Both are tasty!