Cook the potatoes in their skins the day before or early in the day. Cool slightly and peel. Rice the potatoes (or mash if you don’t have a ricer). Let them become totally cold, cover, and refrigerate several hours or overnight.
Make croutons by cutting bread into cubes.
Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat. Add the bread cubes and fry, stirring frequently, until nicely browned on all sides. Remove from heat and set aside to cool.
Mix into potatoes, 1 cup cornstarch, eggs and salt to make a dough that holds together when formed into dumplings. If the mixture is too moist, add a bit more cornstarch.
Form 12 – 14 dumplings, approximately 2 inches in diameter, adding a few croutons to the middle of each dumpling.
Drop gently into pot of boiling, salted water. Simmer gently, uncovered, about 15 – 20 minutes.
To keep the dumplings from sticking to your hands when you are forming them, you can either wet your hands with water, or dust your hands with flour. Either way works.
Test cook one dumpling to make sure it stays together, before you cook the rest. If it doesn’t, you’ll need to add a bit extra flour or liquid, depending on how sticky or dry your ‘dough’
I don’t really get the croutons in the center, but aside from that they were pretty good! But I think next time we’ll try something different in the center.