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Mashed Potatoes

Simple mashed potato dish from scratch. There are a whole bunch of variations on this dish, each with their own qualities. This recipe sticks to the base elements present in the variations and creates a side dish that will highlight a sauce pairing.

Ingredients

Makes 4 servings.

  • 2lb Yukon Gold Potatoes
  • 8 tbsp Unsalted Butter (1 stick)
  • 1/2 cup whole milk
  • Salt + Pepper to taste

Tools

  • Potato masher
  • Potato peeler
  • Pot big enough to hold potato mixture
  • Colander
  • Spatula

Steps

  1. Get butter out of fridge and cut into smaller pieces (~1 tbsp pieces works). Leave out to get butter to room temp.

Prep Potatoes

  1. Peel potatoes. Put peeled potatoes into cold water bath to prevent oxidation.
  2. Cut potatoes into even sized cubes (for faster cooking). Put into cold water bath.
  3. Rinse starch off cubed potatoes. Could take a 2-3 rinses until the water is clear.

Cook Potatoes

  1. In pot, put potatoes and enough cold water to fully submerge the potatoes. Have a little excess water.
  2. Add a good pinch of salt to potato + water mixture.
  3. Turn heat to HIGH to boil the pot. Cover to reach boiling faster.
    • Careful that pot does not overflow during boil
  4. Once boiling, lower heat to LOW and make sure potatoes are simmering.
  5. Simmer until potatoes break apart easily with fork. Usually ~20 minutes.
  6. Drain potatoes using colander. Leave draining for ~5 minutes to release excess moisture.

Create the Mash

  1. Clean out pot of all residue.
  2. Put potatoes back in pot and put pot on stove on LOW-MED heat.
  3. Use masher to break up the cubed potatoes into smaller chunks.
  4. Add in salt and ground black pepper.
  5. Drop in 2-4 pieces of butter and mash.
  6. Repeat until all butter pieces are incorporated.
    • If you want more of a whipped texture, use spatula to incorporate instead of mashing.
    • Overmashing will cause the potato to stick together more and possibly create an undesireable texture (though personally I don't mind this texture either)

At this stage, you can store the potatoes if you aren't going to serve immediately. Since we haven't incorporated the milk, this potato mixture will keep for a couple days in the fridge. When ready to serve, continue with the recipe.

Smooth Out Mash Texture

  1. Heat up milk.
  2. Add a portion of the milk into the potato mixture.
  3. Stir to incorporate the milk.
  4. Repeat previous steps (add portion of milk and stir) until desired smoothness is reached.
  5. Salt + Pepper to taste. Will likely need a lot of salt in the end. Depends on how much salt was added earlier.
  6. Plate and serve.

Notes

To scale up the dish:

  • Scale up the butter for more whipped texture. If you add more butter, be careful when using with gravy since the mashed potatoes will disintegrate.
  • Can use heavy cream, sour cream, or some mixture of creams/milk in place of whole milk.
  • If consistency is too soupy, add more boiled potatoes to the mixture.
  • Can add in roasted garlic to make the mashed potatoes stand out more on their own.
  • Garnish not required but always makes things picture-worthy.

Common Questions

  • What kind of Potato?
    • Use starchy potatoes (i.e. Yukon Gold or Russett). Not waxy red potatoes.
    • Russett will give more textured and more bland mashed potato. Useful to pair with a strong sauce or gravy.
    • Yukon Gold seems to be the common choice if you want to have your potatoes have a bit of creamy flavor.
    • Can use a mix of Russett and Yukon Gold to balance out both worlds
  • How much butter?
    • Some recipes say 4:1 potato-to-butter ratio is optimal for an American palette. Others say 2:1 for French palette which is more butter heavy
    • In the end, go by taste
  • What kind of potato masher?
    • There are all types of mashers - wire mashers, ricers, electric, food mill, wire strainer + fork.
    • Doesn't seem like it matters much.
  • Why rinse the potatoes?
    • Potatoes have starch. If too much of that starch is present in the mash stage, the mash becomes gluey and leads to an unwanted texture.
  • Leave skin on or not?
    • Keeping the skin will add an additional texture to your mashed potato.
    • My opinion is that if your mashed potatoes are meant to standalone, you should add that extra texture to make the mashed potatoes more interesting. If your potatoes are paired with a sauce/gravy, keep the mashed potatoes plain and highlight the sauce.
  • Peel skin before or after boiling?
    • Good question. Will experiment and find out the difference.

References