And the answer is: Gâteau de Pommes de Terre

Some of you participated in my latest guessing game, but no one got the answer exactly right.

Spacedlaw came pretty close, though, with the suggestion that it looked like a soufflé but could be hachis parmentier, which is similar to the British specialty shepherd's pie. And I'm blogging this at 6:15 am, so you're not going to get any American equivalents of the dish -- this is all I know.

As you can see from the extract above from Les Recettes Faciles de Françoise Bernard -- my precious copy of the book, with the little plus mark at the bottom to indicate "this was good" -- the recipe's name is "Gâteau de pommes de terre."

Since this is not exactly a famous French classic, and no one would look under "gâteau" for a potato recipe, the book cleverly files the recipe under "Pommes de terre (gâteau de)" -- which I somehow find quite charming.

Although it seems like an oxymoron, I'd describe the dish as a potato soufflé -- I'm not sure where the idea of "gâteau" came from as there's nothing cake-like about it.

Rather than start with a bechamel sauce, the base of the dish is mashed potatoes, to which you add 2 egg yolks, two beaten egg whites, and grated cheese.

I usually bake it a little longer than the suggested 25 to 30 minutes to get a cheesy, golden crust over the top. And while separating the eggs and beating the whites sounds like kind of a pain for an everyday dish, I highly suggest keeping this step. I skipped it once and the result was, umm, very compact.

If you can't decipher the recipe above, this version of "Potato soufflé" looks similar and maybe even better. Cream instead of milk! Chives added! I'll have to check it out...