Originally Posted by
BamaVol
I grew up with basic, bland food. Watching my mother, I learned to mash potatoes with the addition of milk and margarine.
Over time, I’ve experimented with roasted garlic, butter, various seasonings like smoked paprika, parsley or thyme. I always add some form of non dairy milk as well for texture.
I was watching a favorite vlogger on YouTube, Atomic Shrimp, and he added butter, sage, chives and a raw egg. I’d never seen a raw egg used before.
what goes in your mashed potatoes?
Nothing. I’ve only made mashed potatoes once this way. Patricia Wells, who I think was the food critic at the International Herald Tribune back in the 80s and 90s wrote a number of food books as well. For one of them she went in the kitchen of Joel Robuchon in Paris and worked with him to write a cookbook of some of his recipes. One of them was his mashed potatoes. It started with nearly as much butter as potatoes and maybe a bit of heavy cream. That was mixed in a large blender with a heavy arm to mostly mix it up. Then the potato/butter mix was pushed through a fine screen with a wooden mallet, multiple times to make them very, very, smooth. I thought my arms were going to fall off from pushing a thick mix of potatoes and butter through that screen. But they were divine. You can approximate them without the screen. The large amount of butter is critical. I’ve also had them in his restaurants which lets someone else do the work.
Oops. I posted when I read the first post and didn’t scroll to the end. But yes, the Joel Robuchon version. Wonderful.