"Here"....use raw potatoes, grate them, salt-n-pepper them in the bowl and stir to distribute.  Then heat good old fashioned Crisco in your fryin' pan till fairly hot .   The grease should be hot enough that the taters sizzle when you put them in the skillet.  Gently add the taters, put a lid on and wait a few minutes......maybe 4????  Depends on the skillet.  Take the lid off, use a flat pancake-turner and turn the taters over to brown on the other side, put the lid back on for maybe 3 minutes.   Don't try to do too many in a batch...the centers will be raw and the outsides burnt.