roasted garlic mashed potatoes

I used to have a weird thing with homemade mashed potatoes. I didn’t really like them. I know, I know. Let me double back for a minute. This was many moons ago, and I had only ever made them once or twice. And they always turned out watery, yet oddly dry at the same time. How can something be both watery and dry? I couldn’t wrap my head around their unusual texture. It turns out, in my attempt to keep things ‘light’ I was missing the crucial elements that make mashed potatoes smooth, creamy and fluffy: butter and cream. Correction: lots of butter and lots of cream. Or at least a lot more than I had been willing to use in the past.

One year for Thanksgiving, I was assigned/picked to bring mashed potatoes to the family feast. Instead of shying away, I decided to find a recipe that was going to be fool proof, then make it and not really tell people exactly how much butter and cream were actually floating around in their potatoes.

I found this intriguing, but a bit complicated, recipe for roasted garlic mashed potatoes from Michael Chiarello. His recipe called for 2lbs of potatoes, 1 1/2 cups of heavy cream, and 3 sticks of butter. I was a bit shocked at first. Holy smokes, 3 sticks of butter for 2 lbs of potatoes? Wow. Well, they were bound to taste better than my previous attempts, so set off to make these buttery spuds.

While making them, I stopped adding butter after two sticks because they were turning into potato soup instead of mashed potatoes, so I figured perhaps there was a typo in the recipe. No big deal. With only two sticks of butter, these were bound to have a lesser chance of sending my family members into cardiac arrest around the dinner table. These potatoes did not disappoint. Everyone loved them and no one got sent to the hospital.

 

The following year, I wanted to make them again. But as I mentioned, the original recipe was a bit involved. It called for soaking the potatoes overnight, making a paste with the garlic, and again, the 3 2 sticks of butter. I had come around to admit that the butter and cream were absolute necessities for creamy and dreamy potatoes, but I needed to simplify this recipe a bit and also just experiment with using just a touch less butter.

I swapped Russet Potatoes for the Yukon Golds as they are just so readily available this time of year. I dropped the cream from 1 1/2 cups to 1 cup and the butter down to just one stick. It’s practically diet food now, people.

My alterations were successful and everyone still loved them. They are now a staple on ‘My Ultimate Thanksgiving’ menu. I’m getting hungry just thinking about them. Excuse me while I go sneak another bite.