In my culinary vocabulary the adjective “mashed” doesn’t apply to potatoes, perhaps because I grew up eating my mother’s mouthwatering Potato Purée, a silky dish that was so rich and fluffy that it cannot be even a distant relative of mashed potatoes.
My mother made me whip potatoes so many times that I can still hear her spurring me “Harder, Tony! You need to whip them harder!”
That must be why to me mashing potatoes equals to ruining them. Potatoes must be whipped, not crushed into a lumpy mixture that sometimes contains their peel or sacrilegious ingredients like garlic.
In my mother’s recipe the potatoes are cooked unpeeled, so that they don’t absorb any water; they are riced with a potato ricer, to preserve their starch; unsalted, high-quality butter is added in the crater of the riced potatoes volcano, together with hot milk and butter, lots of butter. Then this mixture is whipped, whipped, and whipped with a wooden spoon to incorporate air and bestow an unforgettable texture upon the potatoes. And the result is definitely potato poetry for the palate.
Ingredients:
(for 4 people) W F Gf
- 8 medium Yukon gold potatoes or purple potatoes.
- 3 Tbsp. of unsalted butter
- 1-1/2 cup of hot milk
- 1 pinch of salt
Wash the potatoes, cover them with water and cook them until tender.
When the potatoes are almost done, warm up the milk.
Immediately peel the potatoes – don’t wait for them to cool down! – rice them in the same pot where you cooked them (because it’s still warm), make a hole in the middle of the riced potatoes, add the butter, half the hot milk, the salt, and whip with a wooden spoon. Add the rest of the milk a little bit at a time, until the mix turns fluffy. Serve immediately.