These Dirty Smothered Potatoes Are a Full Meal in One Skillet

All right, folks, look, we're going to get right into this right now. And listen, I'm going to tell you right now, though, I'm going to go ahead and keep up with the theme of everything I've been doing. We've been doing everything Southern, right? And we've been talking about doing everything dirty. So with that being said, we're going to do a dirty smothered potato, right? Now, look, you see these ingredients right here. It's not a whole lot to it. We're using baby potatoes. But one of the things I want to show you is I'm using this ground beef, right? Now, this ground beef right here is 85-15. I slowed up 5%, you know, because normally I do everything 80-20. We're just going to reduce it just a little bit. Don't forget, all of these ingredients are on my website. That's smokingandgrillingwithab.com. And that's w-i-t-a-b.com. Okay, so look, we're going to get right into the nitty gritty, right? So what I'm going to do is I'm going to take this. This is my smoked sausage. Sometimes I use andouille. But this time I'm just going to go ahead just to keep this flavor the way I'm doing it. It's a reason why, you know what I mean? All profiles don't have to have the andouille. I know that I cook with it a lot. But this is what we're going to do. We're just going to cut it down like this. You want these to be pretty much even, right? So let's get these going. Then once you have these, you know, cut down, what we're going to do is we're going to brown them. Now, normally I brown them and I let the, you know, the seasoning and everything and the grease and all of the flavor that's inside of here already, you know, flavor it. But you know what? I did say a southern, so you know what that means. I'm finna get back to cooking with that pork, right? And that means that bacon fat. Now you guys can do whatever you want to do. You know, it's up to you. You don't want to use pork. You can use a beef smoked sausage or anything of that nature. Right. But this is how we're going to do this right here. I'm going to set this off to the side for one second because we got to do some prep. Now, let me go ahead and get some heat, you know, underneath the bottom of my cast iron. Now, listen, if you guys are using a cast iron, right, you want to make sure you guys got a lid, right? You must have a lid to go on top because that's going to be heat, right? And this right here is oven safe. You know what I mean? So this would be the way I would suggest that everybody, you know, have it. All right. So what I did was I put a medium flame underneath the bottom of this. I kind of like that just start off because it's cast iron. You know, it'll hold the heat, but we got to get heat all the way to the edges. Right. So it's been going. Now I'm going to go ahead and just add, you know, just a tablespoon. You know, just a little bit more of my bacon grease. Don't forget, folks, for those of you guys that, you know, do this. This is a great base to start off with some great flavor, right? So what you want to do is you want to make your bacon, get your strainer and start saving. As you can see, I use mine quite often. It's time for me to make some more. Now we're going to go ahead and grab our medallions. Right. And we just add that in there like that. Now, listen, on a recipe, I usually say like a half pound. This is a whole full pound, right? I like everything that I do a little bit on the meaty side. Not sure if I should be pausing right now, but I am right. So I'm just moving this around, letting this, you know, help sweat some of the flavor outside of these the smoked sausage. Right. Oh, yeah. That along with the bacon fat. Come on. All right. So you see right here, we got a little char on here. We cooked it down. And look, you can see we got a lot of little flavor inside of here. Right. So the next thing we're going to do is we're going to add our ground beef. Now, remember the beginning I showed you guys, I use 85, 15. You know what? 90, 10 would work even 94, 6. Reason being, look at this right here. We got enough oil in here, you know, with the flavor to go ahead and cook. Right. So we don't really need to add all of that. You got to think like this. With me getting older, I'm just keeping it real with everybody. You know, I start looking at how much oil I take in, how much salt I use, things of that nature. So you know what? We still want to have flavorful food, but we want it to still taste, you know, taste good and to be as healthy as it can be. Right. You don't have to have all of this. Right. But you see that right here? Yes, sir. Okay. So look, we got all that cooking grease in here. I can see it starting to huff and puff a little bit. Right. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna go ahead and just drop this in here like that. Make sure it's flat and I'm gonna let this sear. Now, I put it right here in the center, obviously. You know what I mean? So we got fire underneath because I'm using a gas burner. Right. So if it pick up a little bit of char, crust, all of that, that's all good. All right. So now what we're going to do is while we got our ground beef in there, getting that little sear on it, I'm getting ready to break it up in just one second. So this will be the part where you guys will go out and make sure you got your meat, you know, masher. Right. So now I'm gonna pull this out right here. Just cut these down. They don't have to be perfect, folks. Then we dice. Remember, small is for flavor. And larger, you know, dices are for the texture and the flavor. But more so, you know, the texture, really. All right. So now I'll go ahead and hit it. You know, just break it up. Again, I'm gonna go ahead and recap on what I said earlier. I noted in the recipe to always say a half and a half, meaning half ground beef and half, you know, smoked sausage, whichever you prefer. Right. But I like, again, I like mine to be a little bit on a meatier side. So I'm gonna show you what it looks like meaty. You know what I mean? It feeds more. And, you know, it just puts a lot more into it. All right. Now, here goes the question that you guys might have. Like, can this recipe right here be served with, you know, be made with, OK, obviously I'm using ground beef. You know, I could have used a pound of Italian sausage or even a breakfast sausage. You could have served this on, you know, Sunday or Saturday, you know, and did a brunch, you know, for your brunch menu. This can be served as a standalone, you know, dish or as a side. OK, so now I got all my veggies, you know, prepped. You guys get a chance to see it right here. You can see right here. Look, I'm gonna go ahead and pull this back right now. You can see, let me just try to sweep it across the top. Not a whole lot of grease. You know, we did reduce it down a little bit. I mean, if you guys want it to be less, don't forget. All you got to do is just get yourself like a leaner, you know, choice of ground beef. Right. So now I'm gonna take this and I'll pick up my look. This is my onions. You guys know I like to do my onions first. All right. So I'm gonna go ahead and let them steam for about one minute. And then I add all of the rest of my veggies, you know, with it. So let's go ahead and move this around. Now, we only once I get all the veggies in here, we only go for about two to three minutes. Really not a whole long time. Just my onions. I like my onions to sweat a little bit more. All right. So one minute almost to the T, right? Now we add the rest of our veggies. Now, you guys, you put as much veggie in here that you like. I love the flavor profile. You know what I mean? You know what happens when we put bell pepper, celery, you know, bell pepper, celery and onions in there, right? You know what we're doing. We can have the discussion down at the bottom. You know, but once we get it in here like this. Oh yeah. You see why I like to go ahead and do mine a little bit on the meatier side. I like to put a lot of veggies in mine too. Listen, it feed more people. And you know what I mean? If you got an appetite like me, you'd like to be able to go back. Right. And that little bit of fat content that was in here, I don't drain that. You know why? Because look, it helps get that, you know, helps get these veggies going. But you see that right there? Look at that. Nice, colorful. We've got the Trinity in here. And we added these veggies, right? So this is a whole lot of layer. But when they marry together and it all blooms, trust me, folks, that's an incredible taste. You won't even see it all the separate. It's a combination of all that makes it taste great. Now, next, I don't have to sweep nothing because we got a lot of, you know, a lot, a lot of protein in here already. So when I go ahead and mince, check it out. I don't have to worry about where it goes. You know what I mean? It's going to go on top. I don't have to worry about it burning right now as I talk and explain. You know what I mean? It shows. So there, that's two garlic cloves. Anything that's left on the side like that, that's still good raw garlic. So I just put it back in there. Come back, top, squeeze. Use something hard and sharp, right? And then we got one more. These are some nice sized garlic cloves, folks. Look at that. Now, we have it on top. You can see it steaming. The veggies are doing anything. They're getting softened. It's marrying with the ground beef, right? So now, I'm going to go ahead and introduce, you know, that minced garlic to it. Again, once you guys have minced garlic or any garlic, once it touches that heat, it speaks to you right off the bat. The aromatic just runs right up into your face and says hello, right? So the combination of everything that we've been smelling as we were building this, look at that. I'm going to go ahead and be quiet and let the camera get in here. Look at this right here. Usually, when I get something like this, you know, I start thinking about a burrito. Where is the cheese, folks? Now, I just washed these and got these cleaned up. What we're going to do is we're going to cut these down. Like, you see this size right here? I want to get all of them that way. Obviously, this is bigger. So if I can get approximately, that's good enough for me. So if they come out like this, you guys get the gist of it, right? Meaning, when the one is done, they're all done, right? We got to check, make sure they're fork tender. You know, things of that nature. All right. So now we got some seasonings left, right? What you want to do is you want to add it all right here. Now, I'll be honest with you, you could have put this in here right after you got your ground beef or whatever ground that you're using. Oh, and earlier, speaking of that, I did mention this about having a healthier version. You know, I forgot to mention the ground chicken and ground turkey, right? So now that we have that in there, let me go ahead and get my spatula and let's just get this all mixed up, right? Because next, we're going to add our proteins back into the pan, right? But right now, I want to make sure that I got it all mixed up, you know, and everything is starting to bloom. Yes, sir. Now, next thing we're going to do after we have that going, let's bring that back, right? And then all of this flavor that's on here, that's why I buy a better style or a better paper plate. You know what I mean? Because I don't want it to be so observant. I want everything to stay on top of there because I cook. So anytime I take something out, you see all of this right here, I don't want to lose it. But you see where we're going with it right now, right, folks? Now, I'm going to make sure I got a medium flame still underneath the bottom of this. I do. It's always good to check. You never know. I didn't have the gremlins come and adjust my fire. Had things take too long and I'm thinking it's not cooking. I mean, I'm thinking it's cooking and it wasn't, then I had things burn. When you got a seasoned pot like this one right here, I got... Ah, yeah, we golden. All right, so the last thing I'm getting ready to do is I'm going to just give it a sprinkle, right, really, which is like a regular pinch of salt. Reason being, I watch how much salt I have. I use, you know, we got smoked sausage that got a little soy, you know, sodium in it, you know, so I know that we don't need it. I'd rather salt at the end. And then if you know you've been watching me for a minute, you know I got to come with the fresh cracked black. All right, I'm going to mix this up and then we're going to introduce, you know, the potatoes. Now, I use baby potatoes. You guys can use whatever type of potato you want. It could be the big Yukon gold. It doesn't make a difference. You know what I mean? If you do them, you got to cut them down and just make sure you get all your chunks the same size, right? Now, that's a lot of goodness right there. Next, potatoes. Okay, so now we add our broth. Have you got everything mixed up? Obviously, you know, let me just go ahead and get this on here. If anything settled down at the bottom, make sure you get all of that in there. Yes. Now, look, this is going to be some of the steam that's going to help get these potatoes soft, right? Now, this usually takes about like 20, 25 minutes or whatever. You know what I mean? It depends on the size that you, you know, you cut your down to, right? And that's a lot of potato in here. Don't forget, this is called dirty. You see why it's dirty, right? Boom. But if it's dirty, you know, dirty smother, we got to have it like that, right? So we got that going. Next, we hit it with the W sauce. Yes, sir. How many of you guys usually cook with the W sauce? I know it's always one person that's going to say, what is the W sauce? You got to be new because you can almost look at it and see what the W sauce is. Mr. Worcestershire, whatever it's called, shire. You know what I mean? That's what it is. Now, check this part out. I'm going to take this piece of butter, the dab of butter that we had, and just drop that right there like that. I know it's not going to make sense right now, but it will at the end, right? So look, I'm going to put my top on here. Boom. Now, I'm going to look at my fire down here and I'm going to go ahead and set it up so I can get a low. Let's get this nice and low. Let it build up some steam. Let it simmer nice and slow and get those potatoes right where we want them. Now, I'm going to show you guys what they look like in about 20 minutes. All right. So look, this is what it looks like after 25 minutes. And you know what? I'm so sorry I didn't say this part earlier. What you want to do is about every like 10 minutes, you want to go ahead and run your spatula or whatever you're using to turn it. You want to do that so you make sure that nothing is sticking. But if you got it on slow and simmer, you go with it, right? So let's go ahead and break this away. Break it this way so that we don't have to deal with no burn, right? Put that there. Now, the rest of the way, we're not even going to use the top, right? Look, you'll see a lot of the liquid is cooked off. But what we want to do now is we want to make sure that we can cook the rest of this off. And we're going to try to crisp up, you know, these potatoes, right? So look at that right there. Yes. I'm going to get me a toothpick or you guys can use a fork. You know what I mean? Look at that. That right there is good. All we're going to do right now is just let this cook some of this liquid off. Get some of this, you know, potatoes. Oh man, they already ready. I don't even need a toothpick. I can just hit them like this. Oh yeah, they fork tender. They'll just finish the way this. They'll be a little bit more, you know, softer. Now, I'm going to go ahead and grate myself some cheese. Let me see here. Yeah, you see this right here? You put this in here. You get it. I didn't even really get a chance to shake it. You know what I mean? This right here is right. Now, let me grate some cheese. We're going to add that to it. We're going to just cook for about five to eight minutes without the top on there. Remember, you want to be super low, folks. So you guys saw that I was shredding the cheese, you know, on the thin side, right? You know, like that small side, right? This is what you want to do. You want to just put something in there and I'll turn my heat off. And what we want to do is just let your heat tie it all in together. And this is thickening it up just a little bit too. Ah, yeah. You don't need a whole lot. Now, those who want to put cheese on there is when they get it. You know what I mean? However they want to do it. And again, this can be as a side dish, you know what I mean? Or this can be the main dish. And you can know where I'm going to tell you right now. I'm going to give you guys a heads up. This right here is a gem. This works very, very well with, you know, fried cabbage. Oh, my goodness. A dirty. You don't need to eat a dirty cabbage. Just a regular fried cabbage. The way I make it. Talk to me, folks. I know y'all thinking like, ah, yeah. I know what I'm going to have with it. Oh, and don't forget the cornbread or a dinner roll. All right. So now you guys see what it looks like. You know what I mean? You got a chance to see it being made, you know, almost in like real time, right? So when I say standalone, you see this right here? You don't need a whole lot. You know, dinner roll, cornbread, something like that. That'll be fire. Actually, I would slide this over and put some cabbage on the side of it, right? So I got it like this. Let me go and get myself a tablespoon. You guys let me know down in the comment section below. What else would you have put in this to make it your own? I know I'm going to take this off the table. I'm not going to say shrimp because everybody's going to say shrimp. Let's use our brains and figure out what could we have done to level that up. Now, I really feel like I'm starting to ramble. You know what I mean? Because my mouth is watering. My brain knows it's that time, right? And I got a little bit of a little heads up for you. It's really like a pro tip. You see the green on here? Now, normally I use green onion, but check this out. This time, I went ahead and diced up some of my green bell pepper just to get that crisp, you know, that little bite with it and that little burst of flavor. So with that being said, cheers, y'all. These potatoes is ripe. Smothered with that cheese. It's super dirty. Seasoned right. Oh, man. Oh, and not to mention the green bell pepper. This right here is fire. Now, listen, if you guys are looking for an alternative, you know what I mean? You've been doing a lot of chicken because I've been doing a lot. Only because the beef is the price has risen so high, right? So listen, if you want to do it, this is still budget friendly. Look, it's still just meat and potatoes and some veggies, right? You put a little cheese on there. Now, I'm going to go ahead and say this part right here because I know that the title, I titled it, you know, smothered. Some of you guys had in your brain when you get here, is he going to make that, you know, that gravy and smother it like that? That's an option too. You guys can do that. But please just try it this way. Let the cheese and the dirty, you know, the dirty beef go ahead and smother these potatoes. And if you get them just right, like how we did here, they fork tender. And really a true pro tip is just dicing up very, very small, you know, some green onion or you can do some green bell pepper. But when I say the green onion, I'm talking about the onion part of it, not just the green part. Let's get down into that white. There's something about that crunch. You know, and that taste is just, all of that is good. Now, if you're new to my channel, let me just take your time to say, hey, thank you for watching this video. Don't forget to like, smash that subscribe button and tell everybody out there. There's a channel out here that's simplifying these recipes and taking the mystery out of cooking. And with that being said, folks, I'm going to sit down, turn off some YouTube, drink a tall glass of ice cold iced tea, and I'm out y'all. Peace.