Iowa Bound - Lefse Making

We usually head to Iowa in the spring or summer - but this year we decided to wait until late fall to head out there and it's probably the last time we do that!

Of course it snowed here!!  We had quite the storm come in on Sunday on into Monday - and then had another one coming in Tuesday afternoon so we decided to take the chance and head out early Tuesday morning to beat the storm.  But the weathermen were wrong again as there wasn't supposed to be any snow Tuesday night and there was - we had snowy, ice packed roads all the way to Ogallala!

But we beat the next snowstorm at least and it was a relief to pull into Patty and Leonard's early Tuesday evening!

I think Patty and I spent the entire next day drinking coffee and talking!!  Always fun to catch up on all the news and families!

Patty had thought it would be fun to teach me how to make lefse - I LOVE eating it so I was very excited to learn how to make it - and now I REALLY appreciate eating it after I know how much hard work goes into it!

I learned step by step how to make it - and it certainly takes some time!!

Here I am mashing the potatoes - yes, that's what lefse is made of!

Making round balls and then flattening them.

Rolling out the balls of dough - this is by far the hardest part as you have to roll them very thin and the dough is moist!

Then you cook them on a special griddle.

And finally place them inside a folded over sheet to keep them moist while they cool!

The final product - ALMOST PERFECT!!!  It's definitely not a recipe you master the first time you make it!

We also made a second batch a couple of days later so I could bring it back home!  I was excited to learn this skill but of course you need a lot of items to make lefse.  Luckily, Patty had bought a lefse making kit (that she didn't really need and her daughters didn't either) so I ended up buying it from her and only had to order 3 more items when I got back home!  Now the real test is to see if I can do it in my home - but of course I eat all mistakes so that's not a problem!

Thanks Patty for the wonderful lesson!