Holiday Recipe: Golden Mashed Potatoes (2024)

FAQs

Are gold potatoes good for mashed potatoes? ›

Their medium starch content, density, and inherently buttery flavor make Yukon Golds great for all your mashing needs. “Yukon Gold potatoes tend to absorb less water than most other potatoes as they cook,” says former senior food editor Christina Chaey, “so they don't run the same risk of getting waterlogged or gummy.”

Yukon gold potatoes: Arguably the best potato out there (although, they're all pretty stellar). You don't need to peel them, just give them a wash, chop them into cubes and boil them until they're tender. The skins add a lovely rustic element to mashed potatoes (plus, it's less labor-intensive).

You soak the potatoes in iced water before they are cooked. This eliminates much of the starches in the potatoes, resulting in a super light and fluffy mash. It's also like when you make rice.

Sour cream adds a little bit of tangy flavor and a boost of richness to mashed potatoes. It's a fun change from the standard milk or cream and butter combo usually flavoring mashed taters. You can even try your hand at making homemade sour cream from heavy cream!

The Yukon Gold potato, though yellow fleshed, is a cross between a yellow and a white potato and is usually labeled as such. A “yellow” or “gold” potato is not a Yukon Gold potato, but all three potatoes have similar starch contents and flavors and can be used interchangeably in recipes.

Yukon Gold potatoes deliver creamy mashed potatoes and are usually small enough to cook whole. We recommend boiling them for 30 minutes. Then peel by rubbing the skins off with a dish towel. Some people love the color of purple potatoes, which are typically a similar size and have a similar texture to Yukon.

Do You Cut Potatoes Before Boiling? You don't have to cut potatoes to boil them, but smaller pieces of potato will boil faster than larger pieces. It will also be easier to work with smaller pieces if they will later become mashed potatoes or another dish.

"Potatoes are firmly in the buried-in-soil category, so they'll need a thorough wash before cooking," says Catt Fields White, chef and the founder of San Diego Markets and The Farmers Market Pros. "In addition to good and bad bacteria, pesticides can linger in the soil and those need to go."

Mix up your mashed potato game by adding in other root veggies with your potatoes. Try turnips, parsnips, carrots, or celeriac to give your basic mashed potato recipe a boost of flavor (and a boost in nutrition, too).

For the fluffiest and lightest mashed potatoes, use Russets and rinse off excess potato starch before and after cooking. Kenji is the former culinary director for Serious Eats and a current culinary consultant for the site.

What happens if you don't soak potatoes? ›

Soaking potatoes in water helps remove excess starch. Excess starch can inhibit the potatoes from cooking evenly as well as creating a gummy or sticky texture on the outside of your potatoes.

Directions. Throw just a pinch of ARM & HAMMER™ Baking Soda into potatoes while mashing to make them fluffier.

Adding egg yolks to a pot of mashed potatoes is an easy, dairy-free texture and taste upgrade that doesn't require any special techniques. The yolks harbor all the flavorful fats and emulsifying components and will thus effectively unify the fat and water in potatoes, translating to a smoother, uniformly creamy pot.

The best potatoes for mashed potatoes are a starchy varieties like russet, Idaho or Yukon gold. Starchy potatoes are best for mashed potatoes because they have a fluffy, almost airy texture that breaks down easily.

Avoid waxy varieties like Red Bliss and fingerling when making mashed potatoes.

Yukon Gold: Hasselback, roasting, and mashed

These yellow-fleshed potatoes are waxy enough to stand up to Hasselbacking, but fluffy enough to make the best possible mash. And for crispy roasted potatoes, nothing is better, they get a good crackly crunch and a creamy interior that cannot be beat.

The secret weapon, a good potato ricer (affiliate). This pushes the potatoes into strings, which helps them soak up every bit of the cream and achieve maximum fluffliness.