Step 206: Acknowledge that instant mashed potatoes are bullshit
I’m sorry, but they are, especially since real mashed potatoes are among the easiest and most wonderful things on the planet. Eating delicious, non-gruel food is one of the prime advantages of being a human being in the 21st century, you know.
Here is how you make the real thing:
1. Cut some red or white potatoes up into quarters or eighths. Peel them first if you feel it necessary, which I do not.
2. Put some water on to boil, and add salt until it is less salty than sea water, but still noticeably salty to the taste. Put the potatoes in the water while it’s cold.
3. Boil until the potatoes are done, maybe 15 minutes or so. You’ll know because you can poke them with a fork and encounter no resistance.
4. Drain potatoes, then put the pot back on the burner for 30 seconds to evaporate excess water. Add a couple splashes of milk, two or three tablespoons of butter and black pepper. Mash it up with a potato masher or a fork.
5. MASHED POTATOES.
Some optional but delicious things to add are dill, grated cheese of any stripe, sour cream, crumbled bacon and some of the grease that came with it, a little bit of ranch dressing powder, or roasted garlic.
Bonus roasted garlic recipe:
Cut the top off a whole head of garlic, then set on a sheet of aluminum foil. Drizzle olive oil on it, wrap it up in the aluminum foil then set it in a muffin tin. Bake at 400 degrees for 35 minutes; when the garlic squishes easily, you are done. When adding this to the mashed potatoes, I just squish out the individual cloves and use most of the head, because more roasted garlic is better than less roasted garlic.
(original recipe here; trypophobia alert with the head of garlic. Photo via gkdavie)
