The dish that will be discussed today is very popular in our country. Mashed potatoes - this is a universal dish that millions of people enjoy every day. It can be combined with anything: with fish, meatballs, meat, eggs, milk, herbs and cream. It all depends on the personal choice of each of us. Here is an article on how to cook delicious mashed potatoes right in your kitchen.
The history of mashed potatoes
Since childhood, we all know mom’s appetizing mashed potatoes, but have you ever wondered where it came from?
I must say that the word puree from French translates as "crushed, clean." For the first time, mashed potatoes were mentioned in the autobiographical book of the doctor Alexander Exkemelin “Pirates of America”. The author in it talked about the repeated raids of sea robbers, robberies and battles, as well as about traditions and preferences in food of the local population. Here is what the author himself wrote:
Potatoes are eaten for breakfast and boiled in a small amount of water, tightly covering the vessel with a rag. After half an hour, he keeps up and resembles chestnuts to taste, but they eat it with bread, seasoning with a sauce of lemon juice, lard and Spanish pepper. A special drink is also prepared from potatoes. To do this, the tubers are peeled, cut, poured with water and a few days later the fermented mass is filtered through a rag to get a sour-tasting drink, very aromatic and healthy. Planters called this drink "mabi" and learned to prepare it from local Indians.
As everyone knows, potatoes come from South America. It's no secret that wild potatoes are bitter, so the Peruvian Indians came up with their own way to get rid of the bitter taste. Surprisingly, they scattered potatoes on bare ground and waited a long time. Under the sun and sometimes rain, the potatoes were fried and soaked, after which the women stamped it with their feet, thereby turning the potatoes into a kind of gruel, freeing them from the peel. However, an unusual dish was obtained, which the Indians called "chuno" and gladly ate the food of the whole tribe. From here came the beloved mashed potatoes, the recipe of which was undoubtedly changed by Europeans. To this day, it is a universal food for every person.
Which potato is right
Many housewives are wondering about how to cook delicious mashed potatoes. And it is safe to say that potatoes really affect the taste of the dish. So, to get an airy and appetizing mashed potatoes, you need to choose starchy varieties, that is, round potatoes with a light skin. It is not recommended to take potatoes with a red peel, since it is poorly digested, lumps may be present in the puree. In the end, starchy potatoes boil much better, which ultimately gives an excellent consistency.
What can be mashed
It seems quite obvious that in a classic puree put potatoes, milk or cream. However, here you can argue, because you have the opportunity to diversify it and add several other ingredients there. For example, adding a few twigs of thyme, rosemary or other herbs, you can easily get a fragrant and tasty dish. It will be useful to butter or olive oil, which will give airiness. In the end, you should not spare money, therefore it is best to purchase oil with high fat content if you really want to get refined mashed potatoes.
Some housewives use grated cheese, natural yogurt or sour cream as an additive. In general, fried onions, raw eggs, mushrooms, fresh herbs - all these ingredients will only improve the taste of your puree, so feel free to experiment.
To make mashed potatoes more diverse, not only in taste, but also in color, boil potatoes with beets, pumpkins or carrots. The unusual color is ready, and the surprise of your friends or relatives is surely guaranteed to you.
Cooking secrets
It seems that the recipe for making mashed potatoes is elementary simple, but it will be useful to learn some secrets that will help to make this dish tastier, to achieve a truly perfect taste. So, write in your notebooks interesting tips on how to make mashed potatoes in a completely normal way, achieving a pleasant taste.
- Potatoes should never be sprouted, because, as a rule, a bitter taste arises. Choose tubers with a dense skin and a high starch content. It is advisable to use ripe potatoes, then lumps will not appear when cooking. There is a folk method that will let you know how much starch is in the potato: cut it into two parts and rub against each other. Clumped halves indicate that the tubers actually have enough starch. Do not hesitate to take this particular variety.
- After peeling potatoes, immediately begin to cook mashed potatoes and do not leave it in cold water, as this significantly affects the taste of the dish.
- Despite the fact that in our time there is a lot of equipment that greatly simplifies cooking, this dish is best obtained if you do it yourself. Take a wooden pusher instead of a mixer or a blender, only in this way you will achieve the unique taste of handmade puree. Just remember that the potatoes need not be crushed, namely beat.
- You can often hear that the color of the puree is affected by milk, which must be necessarily hot. However, this is not quite true. The color is actually affected primarily by the variety of potatoes. Therefore, do not be indignant if the mashed potatoes turn out to be gray, even if you have thoroughly warmed the milk.
- If you start to cook potatoes in cold water, then its middle can simply remain raw, and part of the starch can go into water, which will degrade the taste of your dish.
- Remember: first, knead the potatoes without adding anything to it, and only then you should lay the oil, which you should not regret, while mashed the mass and add a little milk or cream. By the way, those who fast can add almond or soy milk.
- Do not be afraid to add fried onions, bacon, dill and so on during pureeing.
- As you know, you should eat mashed potatoes immediately, hot. However, do not be discouraged if the mashed potato remains half-eaten, and simply use it as a filling for pies or cooking casseroles.
- To make the dish more nutritious, add egg yolk or not very fat cream to it.
What are the cooks arguing about
Many chefs still argue about how to cook a delicious mashed potato and when do you still salt the potatoes? Some say that, undoubtedly, at the beginning, and the second - say that at the end. Still others suggest salt after boiling water. However, not all so simple! Chefs also have different opinions about whether potatoes should be placed in hot or cold water. It all depends on you, but the result should be one: the potato, of course, must be boiled. Check readiness with a knife or fork.
Ingredients:
- three medium tubers;
- butter - 1 tsp (without slide);
- milk - ½ cup;
- iodized edible salt - to taste.
Making classic mashed potatoes
There is no difficulty in making mashed milk. The recipe is very simple, the main thing is to know some tricks, the rest is yours.
Let's start cooking. To start, wash thoroughly, and then peel the tubers and cut into roughly equal large cubes. In this form, the potatoes are cooked better and faster. Put the potatoes in a pan and pour hot water, it should cover the vegetable by 1 cm. Then add salt and put on fire, closing the lid.
Magnificent mashed potatoes of the right color will be obtained only if the milk is hot. While your potatoes are boiling, bring the milk to a boil, but do not boil further.
After your potatoes are boiled, drain the water and transfer it to a colander. Let it dry a little and drain the water, then put it in a saucepan and heat for 2-3 minutes. on the stove. As a result, unnecessary liquid evaporates. Remember that the hotter the potato, the easier it is to knead it.
Since mashed potatoes are recommended to be cooked "in a manual way", grab a pusher with holes and start whipping, alternately adding hot milk and butter. Mix well and better spend more time on it, then you will never regret it. Mashed potatoes should turn out magnificent and appetizing look.
At the end, you can add various spices to make the dish more fun for you. Take into account all the subtleties and secrets of cooking, it is then that you will understand how to prepare delicious mashed potatoes for your family.
Mashed potatoes for children
As a child grows up, his diet also changes. At the age of six months, only mother's milk is not enough for him. Therefore, a huge number of mothers are already preparing in advance to begin to introduce complementary foods for their baby. Usually, safe, hypoallergenic and, most importantly, high-quality foods, such as carrots, potatoes and cauliflower, are required for the first vegetable feeding. Older children can already try zucchini, pumpkin and beets. Despite the fact that vegetables should be added gradually to the child’s diet, it will soon be possible to make mashed potatoes from different vegetables.
Vegetable puree for the first feeding
How to cook mashed potatoes for feeding? Absolutely uncomplicated, and the technology is very slightly different from the classic puree recipe. Take carrots, potatoes and cabbage.
First of all, vegetables should be washed in warm water, peeled and cut into small pieces. Pour a small amount of water into the pan so that they retain their beneficial properties, put carrots and cabbage there and cook over low heat, covering with a lid. Then add the potatoes and continue cooking. Once the vegetables are cooked, drain the broth into another dish. Next, you need to rub them through a sieve, dilute the puree with a decoction and mix to a soft consistency. Bring the dish to a boil, stir occasionally, then add a little butter.
Keep track of the quality of the products and your baby will be satisfied.
Multicomponent vegetable puree for babies
Now we will consider how to prepare mashed potatoes for babies.
Ingredients:
- 1 potato tuber;
- a third of carrots;
- a third of beets;
- leaf of cabbage;
- 1 tsp finely chopped greens;
- 1/8 part of the bulb;
- 2 tbsp. l vegetable oil;
- ½ tsp salt.
All the above vegetables, except potatoes, wash thoroughly, cut and stew in hot boiled water. After the vegetables are almost ready, add chopped potatoes to them and stew until the products are ready. Add butter, salt and milk at the end. It remains only to make mashed potatoes: wipe them through a sieve and mix well until the consistency of sour cream.
The dish is ready. Now you know how to make mashed potatoes for a child, so you will be able to feed your baby with such useful vegetable puree with pleasure.
Cheese puree in a blender
As you know, in mashed potatoes you can add anything if only you were satisfied. This time you are presented with information on how to make mashed potatoes, and even with cheese, which, no doubt, gives a delicious taste to the dish.
For this recipe you will need:
- 1 kg of potatoes;
- ¼ kg of cheese;
- 2 tbsp. l butter;
- pepper and salt;
- 2 cloves of garlic.
Coarsely chop the potato tubers, then send them to boiling water and salt them immediately. Next, drain the water, dry the potatoes and mash to a puree condition. Then grate the cheese, and fry the chopped garlic for 3-4 minutes. in a frying pan, mash, transfer to a blender bowl. So, add the grated cheese and fried garlic to the potatoes and beat well.
The dish is ready! Indeed, fast and tireless enough. This recipe is suitable even for children who are very fond of mashed potatoes.
Original mashed potatoes
How to cook mashed potatoes is now clear. But what can be made from the puree itself, if it remains, but you don’t want to warm it up? Below you will find the answer to this question.
Cutlets
In fact, you get beautiful cutlets from yesterday's mashed potatoes. All you need:
- 600 g of finished mashed potatoes;
- 1 egg
- 50 g of flour;
- salt pepper;
- greens;
- 1 tbsp. breadcrumbs for breading;
- vegetable oil.
The recipe is pretty simple. Stir the egg, chopped herbs, flour, salt and pepper. We make cutlets and dip them into the breading mixture. It remains to fry on both sides - and the cutlets are ready!
Fritters
I must say that mashed potato pancakes differ from ordinary pancakes only in that they have a crispier crust. We will need:
- 2 tbsp. mashed potatoes;
- 1 onion;
- 1 egg
- salt pepper;
- vegetable oil.
Beat the egg and chop the onion, after which we add them in mashed potatoes, which need to be salt and pepper. Mix until smooth. We make small cakes with a thickness of not more than 2 cm, and fry over low heat in a frying pan on both sides.
Mashed potato pancakes are perfect for breakfast or dinner. Serve them with your favorite sauces, ketchup or sour cream.
Potato balls
Very unusual, quite tasty and very beautiful side dish. It is suitable for both meat and vegetable and fish dishes.
Ingredients:
- 700 g of mashed potatoes;
- 1 egg
- 100 g of flour;
- salt;
- breadcrumbs;
- vegetable oil.
Beat the egg with a fork. We roll balls from mashed potatoes (size at your discretion) and roll in flour, and then dip in an egg. Next, roll the balls in the breading mixture. Fry them on both sides, preheating a frying pan with vegetable oil. When the potato balls are ready, remove and place them on a napkin or paper so that the excess fat is gone. Feel free to serve. Enjoy your meal!