OT Potatos

my dh also does most of the cooking around here. we have an electric hand mixer, a stick blender, a regular blender and a food processor but all our spuds get mashed with the hand held potato masher. always have been, always will be. we still have the first spud masher we bought for our first home 31yrs ago now. it is metal masher with wooden handle. we also acquired MILs when she went into the nursing home. hers is metal masher (different config to ours) with plastic handle. we use whichever one is closer when we reach for it in the countertop container of most used utensils. all the wooden spoons/forks/spatulas, the masher, the rubber spatula are in that one container (white pitcher that belonged to my Grandma). there is another smaller container for smaller wooden utensils and the various paring/spreading knives. there is a knift block for the bigger knives and another wooden cylinder with odds and sods i like to see but they are used now and then. the small marble mortar and pestle is there too. oops, sorry, i drifted off topic. yup, we mash by hand and no gloopy stuff around here, no lumps either. its not rocket science and not that hard or time consuming to mash'em by hand. j.

"NightMist" wrote ...

Many many men are fine, nay, excellent cooks. My husband is one of them. However he has some quirks. Aside from leaving food and things in the middle of the dirty dishes next to the sink, the one thing that I hate about when he cooks is his use of the mixer to mash potatos. It all but chokes me to try and eat them when they are done like that. Can you say overworked pasty goo? We have two potato mashers, and I really can't blame him for not using them I guess. One is an old style wooden one, only it is rounded at the end instead of flat, which makes it really hard to use. The other is one of those modern bent steel with slots sort of things, and it is way too bendy to be very useful. His idea of hand mashers are the zig zag ones, he thinks they are good because you can bend them back into shape when you are done. On my planet they shouldn't bend in the first place.

The hand mixer died. He doesn't want to drag out the stand mixer for potatos, the pan wouldn't fit and taking it off the stand for something like that seems a bit extreme. So when we have boiled taters now, we have boiled taters. (Yay!) Which means there are sometimes left over potatos for a fry up! (G) If I can beat the rest of the house to them, "potatos and salt, and find no fault" means something here. I am lucky if I have any to work with when I boil them and leave them to cool for chips!

We will of course be getting a new hand mixer. I am also thinking very very hard about spending $10 on a decent potato masher. The kind I know best are the ones that are sort of wannabe ricers, a steel plate with holes in it on a handle. DH is absolutely convinced that the plate will come away from the handle on those. My mom has been using the same one for over fifty years, if anybody can destroy a kitchen gadget in five minutes or less it is her. On the other hand new ones might not be as well made. I think I will take the risk, even though I will have to mail order. Besides, that kind of masher just rocks for juicing fruit to make jelly or wine.

DH says if I want the tatos mashed by hand I can do it myself. I am willing to make the sacrifice if it meands no more library paste and gravy.

NightMist

I have one like that. I've only had it for about 20 years (it was probably about 30 years old when I got it) so it's too early to say if it's really durable, but I'd take the chance anyway.

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I've only ever had potatoes mashed that way. My mom used a mixer, I use a mixer. I use the zigzag thing to smash them first... just like my mom did.

Since taters and gravy are just about my favorite food, I guess I better know how to make them better.

Cindy

I swear by my old-fashioned potato masher like this:

or I have never seen one of these bend out of shape. It is very easy to use. (Believe me, I have tendonitis and arthritis in my hands, and I just used this masher this evening without any significant pain.)

I agree about the electric mixer for potatoes. Totally yuck.

ep

I love potatoes and gravy. Love that combo better than ..... almost anything. We don't have gravy anymore -- it doesn't fit into the new fitness regime which dictates one steamed veggie, one starch, sometimes a meat or meat substitute, a green salad. Once in a while we have oven roasted potatoes, but it's been months since I was able to sneak in good mashed potatoes (by hand) with butter and milk and salt. Even then, no gravy. I live for Thanksgiving. We have gravy then, AND mashed potatoes, AND yams fixed the way I like them.

I don't know if we'll live longer or if it will just feel like it. I am not losing weight on this food plan (not really a diet), and I think it's because my body doesn't recognize what I'm eating as food and therefore has gone into permanent starvation mode. I do get an ice cream cone on a semi-regular basis. But it doesn't make up for potatoes and gravy.

Eat some for me.

Sigh, Sunny

Hoo!

That is the very one I was considering!

Had DH read what you said and he considers that a powerful statement in favor of the thing.

He won't be able to resist using it at least once. It is just how he is. If it as easy as I bet it will be I'll win on this! w00Tt!

NightMist

It is going to depend on how you do. DH whips the poor spuds to within an inch of their life. If you don't overwork them too badly they are probably fine. I reckon it takes a touch, and you might just have it.

NightMist

I have recently read two treatises on mashed potatoes. One is an essay in an excellent anthology by Mark Kurlansky, "The Food of a Younger Land." Among many reviews:

essay was written in the 1930's by a woman who had very decidedopinions about mashed potatoes. It's a hoot. The second is in "Mouth Wide Open" by the wonderful food writer John Thorne. Here 'tis, courtesy of Google Books: At our house we scrub the taters well, cut them into chunks, boil them, drain the water, and use a potato masher. We do not add milk. We do not whip them. I like a little butter; DH likes salt & pepper. We have been known to boil chunked carrots with the taters and mash them together. We call that a smush, and the result is tasty indeed.

Nann in northeasternmost Illinois who has enjoyed the four episodes of Ken Burns' "National Parks" while stitching this week....one more evening to go....

Carrots in mashed potatoes are very good, we also sometimes add mashed cauliflower. Very tasty. Julie in SFBA

Awesome!

And wow, Google Books is really good. I've been using the Guggenheim Project for years, but this is my first gliimpse of Google Books. Free books on line: one of the highest and best uses of Internet technology. As is RCTQ :-) And recipes. For mashed potatoes. Here's the recipe I made tonight (which is pure sin, including the sour-cream sin and the bacon sin. I am absolved by virtue of the fact that I invited my SO's dad over for dinner, so I did it all for him. Yeah right.):

Twice-Baked Mashed Potatoes

2-1/2 lbs. medium potatoes, peeled 1 cup sour cream 1/4 cup milk 2 tbsp. butter, melted 1-1/2 cups (6 oz.) shredded cheddar cheese, divided ½ cup chopped onion 5 strips bacon, cooked and crumbled ½ tsp. salt 1/8 tsp. pepper

Place potatoes in a large saucepan and cover with water. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and cook for 15-20 minutes or until tender. Drain.

In a large bowl, mash potatoes. Add the sour cream, milk, butter and 1 cup cheese. Stir in the onion, bacon, salt, and pepper. Spoon into a greased

2-qt. baking dish. Sprinkle with remaining cheese. Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes, or until heated through. Yield: 6 servings.

ep

Honey, you put 2 sticks of butter in there, they could have the consistency of wall paper paste and they would taste good.

Cindy

My masher is 40+ years old and shaped like

I boil the potatoes, drain off the water and then stand back on the heat for a few seconds so all the water has gone. Then I add a splash of milk, turn off the heat and mash away. If I have used a ring at the front of the stove I may mash with the pan still on the slight residual heat.

Finally I add a knob of butter (enough to exist but not enough to hurt my conscience!) and stir it in briskly with an ordinary table fork. This smooths the potato out but stops it going 'glueky'. Glueky potatoes always look grey.

Results = soft fluffy potatoes.

Sally at the Seaside~~~~~~~~~~~~~uk

Edna Pearl wrote:

> or

Too early in the morning to remember but I think Alton Brown and/or Julia Child can go on and on about the humble mashed potato. You need the 'right' potato - could be Yukon Gold. It does matter. Polly

I use a potato ricer. I squidge the dry potatoes through it and then stir in a little milk and butter.

I also do sweet potato and butternut squash mash, and potato and parsnip mash. To the last I may add a dash of sherry... The nice thing about the ricer is that it squidges up the parsnips and removes any really thready fibres as it goes, and doesn't turn the vegetables into veggie glue.

Chappit neeps *should* be done by boiling the neeps and then drying them as Suzie does her potatoes (and me too, I hasten to add), and then chopping madly in the pan with an old kitchen knife. As I can't do that, I do them carefully with the chopper attachment (like a mini food processor) on my Bamix hand held blender. They should be a finely chopped texture, not mashed or pureed. Then you lightly mix in a good dollop of best butter, a little salt, and plenty of pepper.

Giggle.

My mum still uses her neatly 60 YO Prestige potato masher: round metal plate with rounded slots cut in it, riveted to a Y shaped stalk with a wooden handle.

I've had plenty of different mashers over the years, but finally went out and bought a ricer. Best mash I've ever made gets done on a regular basis now.

Bangers and mash with red onion and port gravy, and peas. Yum! Works best with Scots steak sausages or venison sausages...

You need floury potatoes. King Edwards work well.

Yup, that's what mine is (note: I said "mine" and not "ours"). It was my mom's. At least 60 years old and still smashin' em. Handle is a little different; I couldn't guess as to comparison - it'd take another 60 years (or until the new style fails).

It depends on how ya like yer spuds. The above smasher leaves em a little lumpy, but some folks like a little lumpy. I've used mixers too, but it can really strain the cheap-os.

OTOH, as much as I like em smashed, we only have em that way a couple times a year 'cuz the fat/cholesterol police sez so. (Yes, I know - it's not the taters - it's what you put ON em...) As carboholic as I've become, we hardly ever have *any* kind of spuds anymore... :-(

Wow, an exhaustion ramble! I haven't done *that* in a while...

Doc