Streamlined Mashed Potatoes
Mashed potatoes aren’t difficult to prepare. But when it comes to holiday entertaining, anything that streamlines the process is welcome in my book.
That’s why I was excited to see a neat shortcut method for mashed potatoes in the November issue of Cook’s Country magazine.
The article was actually about garlic mashed potatoes. If you’ve never had potatoes mashed with roasted garlic, they are absolutely delicious.
Roasting garlic turns it sweet and mellow. The problem is it takes 40 minutes or more of oven time to get that great flavor.
The Cook’s Country article shows how sautéing the garlic with a little sugar and then cooking it with the potatoes approximates the flavor of roasted garlic.
But what really caught my attention was the overall method for the potatoes. Rather than boiling potatoes, draining them and then combining them with butter and milk or cream, The Cook’s Country recipe cooks the potatoes with butter and half-and-half and just a little bit of water, as well as garlic.
In other words, this recipe eliminates the step of draining the potatoes. Once they are cooked, you basically just mash and serve them.
Here’s the recipe from Cook’s Country. I’m not sure whether I’ll put garlic in mine for Christmas dinner —my menu has so many different flavors going on that the garlic might get in the way. But I’ll definitely be cooking my potatoes this way to save myself a step.
Garlic Mashed Potatoes
Recipe from the November issue of Cook’s Country.
4 pounds russet potatoes, peeled, quartered and cut into ½-inch cubes
12 tablespoons (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, cut into pieces, divided use
12 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon sugar
1½ cups half-and-half, divided use
½ cup water
Salt and pepper
1. Rinse potatoes under cold running water. Drain thoroughly.
2. Melt 4 tablespoons of the butter in a Dutch oven over medium heat. Add garlic and sugar and cook, stirring often, until sticky and straw-colored, 3 to 4 minutes. Add rinsed potatoes, 1¼ cups half-and-half, water and 1 teaspoon salt to pot. Stir to combine. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer, covered and stirring occasionally, until potatoes are tender and most of the liquid is absorbed, 25 to 30 minutes.
3. Off the heat, add remaining 8 tablespoons butter and mash with potato masher until smooth. Using rubber spatula, fold in remaining ¼ cup half-and-half until liquid is absorbed and potatoes are creamy. Season with salt and pepper. Serve.
Makes 8 to 10 servings.
