4 Levels of Mashed Potatoes: Amateur to Food Scientist | Epicurious

I'm Emily and I'm a level one chef. I'm Lorenzo and I'm a level two chef. I'm Berry from the Institute of Culinary Education and I've been a professional chef for 16 years. I guess

mashed

potatoes

remind me of that. I'm a little bit away from home. I think we ate a lot of

potatoes

when we were kids, I mean, along with other things, not just potatoes. I make

mashed

potatoes at least once a week, it's an easy source to eat. Mashed potatoes are one of my everythings. -time favorites and I'm going to take them to the next level by smoking them with hey, let's start with our potatoes, these are small potato things, Yukon Gold potatoes because they're the creamiest for a mashed potatoes, so I'm going first to grab mine The Wrap potatoes and I'm going to peel them, you can leave the skin on, but if I want creamy mashed potatoes, which I'm doing here, I'm going to remove the skin once you've scraped them.

I don't have to peel them so I'll just chop them so they cook faster because if you make them whole it can take a long time. I like these potatoes because they are rich, decadent and creamy, you can tell when they are cooked. below, they will be only silk. Small potatoes are good because they cook faster and taste great too. I mean, you're not really losing anything flavor-wise, so I could have them all the same size, this ensures that the cooking is done and I'm going to start putting in the water because I want it to boil, so now I'm going to add my potatoes.

It's cold water, it doesn't get hot at all. If we put them in hot water and start cooking them, they end up being soft on the outside and raw in the center and the texture will be poor, okay, my water is boiling, so I'm going to add my potatoes, season the sauce and now it's very important to add enough salt at this stage if we don't have enough salt now we're going to have to make up for that put at the end and we'll end up with a salty mashed potato, let's take these boils out and let them boil for about 15 minutes, contrary to popular belief, you never want to do that. boil a potato as the cinema allows them to cook very evenly they have been boiling for about 25 minutes tender pork so now my guards have been simmering for about 10 minutes they are fully cooked and I'm going to go ahead and strain them, okay potatoes.

They are all drained and now I go to the next step, which is to elevate them so that they are super soft. I use the potato masher just because that's what I have. I'm sure there are fancy devices you could use, but I don't know what. They are so this little gadget is called a runner look it's raining delicious. I mean, hello, using a potato masher you tend to put more force into the potatoes and can risk making them sticky. I'm going to pass my potatoes. a Tammy to give me a super fine texture. I'm using a bowl scraper.

It has a large surface area that you can push the potatoes through carefully. At this point I'm just trying to break up all the potatoes so that there are no big chunks here, the measurement is great also because you don't have to go to the gym because the bicep works well only on one side. I guess it's okay, the last one smells good, honestly I'd eat it like that. Give me some salt and butter, forget it, forget it, so now you can see that my potatoes have a super fine, soft texture. Okay, they're all rice and I actually have to leave them in this pot and let them sit for a while to dry out.

If you don't try them, you'll end up with soggy mashed potatoes. I mean, you're not going to make toothpaste next. I'm going to add a unique flavor to my potatoes by smoking them with hay, so I'm going to add my potatoes to a sizzling pan and then I'm going to place this container that has hay in the bottom on top of the heating pad, so I bought this hay from a supplier of specialized

food

, so if you are trying this at home, please don't run to the nearest field because you may not get the flavor profile you are looking for, so now that the hay is smoking, I will add my potatoes and leave them smoke for about 5 minutes.

By using hay at this point, I'm going to add a soft, grassy note to the mashed potatoes. Now that the potatoes have been inside for about 5 minutes, my potatoes are completely smoked. Next I'm going to make some cultured butter so here take some live yogurt heavy cream and beat everything until smooth and we're going to let this culture at room temperature for 36 hours so now that that's cultured for 36 hours, we will add our cultured cream mixture to Kitchen Aid. and I'm going to start whipping the cream until the butterfat and the buttermilk separate now we're going to take the butter solids, I'm going to place them in an ice bath to remove all the milk from the bottom.

I'm going to shape it into a roll so we can store it in the refrigerator until we need it, so while my potatoes are drying I'm going to prepare my cream sauce with a little olive oil. Now I have my potatoes with spoonfuls of garlic. I'm going to add my two sticks of butter oh oh, I like a lot of butter, okay. I'm going to pour my milk too, shooby doo-wop. I'm going to add the batter, this will help spread some southwestern flavor into my mash. potatoes, it will also help thicken my mashed potatoes if I go too far and eat too many things, so now the heavy cream and heavy cream will add some richness to the potatoes and loosen them up a little bit.

I'm going to strain them. the cream in the potatoes, another fun part, the hats and add a button up and we're going to stir this gently, this will add a rich flavor and slightly acidic notes of our culture, oh my goodness, the potatoes are infused with who isn't. I like butter Hello, now the butter is incorporated. I'm going to lower the heat and add the fresh cream. This fresh cream will add a little note to the potatoes. Now we're going to add some salt, just taste it as you go, so that's actually it. I have a pretty good salt content.

I'm going to give you a little more. I say salt content like I know what I'm talking about. I'm going to add some Maldon smoked salt. This is a salt from England and has a smoky flavor and will pair perfectly with smoked potatoes. I'm going to add Tellicherry pepper. This is a large Indian peppercorn allowing the peppercorn to grow means we can get a full aroma without that bite taking over the flavor. of the potatoes and the last thing I'm going to do is add our chives so I have my pastry bag here and I'm just going to fill it with the potato mixture and you can see how creamy and rich these potatoes are without the mashed portion the potatoes would be complete without sauce this is a sauce packet.

I'm actually reading the package quickly to make sure I know what I'm doing here and now I'm going to miss the water in your fairly advanced recipe. try this at home, this is bacon grease guys. I'm going to bloom these red pepper flakes, onion, celery and carrots instead of salsa. In fact, the first thing I'm going to do is cover my mashed potatoes with a chicken and truffle sauce. What I'm going to do is season my chicken wings and now I'm going to heat up my pan and I want them to be super spicy and smoky.

I'm going to add a little bit of grapeseed oil. I am choosing oil with a high and neutral smoke point. flavor for this on my chicken wings so I used a sauce packet just because it basically has the flavor of the sauce but you don't have to make a whole turkey to get it now my chicken wings have browned nicely. I'm going to remove them. the chicken and I'm going to set it aside and I'm going to strain my pan to remove the excess fat, shallots from the head of garlic, some peppercorns and thyme, sage in the margarine spicy flavor, but it's really delicious, so my flower has the same amount of butter.

The flour will be used to thicken this, so now my aromatics have been sautéed and sweated. I'm going to add some Madeira wine. This is a dry wine, it has notes of caramel and orange and now I'll just scrape it gently. the bottom of the pan releases all that delicious chicken flavor and I'm going to reduce this Madeira by about three quarters. In the chicken stick, we're getting all the delicious bits on the bottom and now I'm going to add back in our grilled chicken wings and we're going to reduce this mixture down to a sauce coated consistency.

Here I have some black truffle. This will give a luxurious flavor to the sauce at the end. Now my sauce has reduced and all the flavor has come together. I'm going to strain it, please don't throw any of this away. I'm straining bacon in the oven with a little butter and a little chicken broth and you will have an incredible filling. Now I'm going to add a little bit of cold butter. Now I'm going to add a pinch of salt now the final component is the rich black truffle we're going to let this soak for a minute okay this looks good it's thickened a little bit and I think it's ready to go okay let's get to the plate like this I'm going to make a nice big spoonful of potatoes, it seems like a good abortion.

I have to say it, so I have my potatoes in the piping bag. I simply place them right in the center of the plate. I'm going to add my sauce now I'm going to add my chicken in truffle sauce, let's go for the cheddar cheese, let's add some butter and now my chives and my bacon, do I need to? Thanks, honey, why are you going to eat bacon? bacon I love bacon and last but not least ground black pepper and here are my mashed potatoes and these are my mashed potatoes and here are my mashed potatoes they look absolutely delicious I can't wait to dig into you guys, It's really good, but I need potatoes along with the aromatic truffle sauce it's fantastic for me together this is Sunday dinner I'm going to play.

I love that the Grammy is really good. Let's take a look at how our three chefs managed to make mashed potatoes. There are two main categories of potatoes. Neely and waxy Neelys have more starch in their cells and when heated, the starches swell and stay separated, resulting in a nice, fluffy texture. In waxy varieties, the cells tend to stick together for denser results. Emily used new potatoes, meaning they were harvested when they were young, these are game things, small potatoes, they have a higher water content and a slightly waxy texture which makes them good for roasting and holding their shape.

Emily left the skin which will add a bit of texture to the final dish. I like fur. I don't care, the skin also contains phenolic compounds, some of which increase the nutritional quality of the potatoes. Lorenzo used Yukon Gold potatoes, which are slightly waxy and get their buttery color from natural carotenoid pigments. It is the creamiest for mashed potatoes. It is best to use a special type of fry called vrat, which is from France. They are flourier, so their cells stay separate after cooking, which means you can cover each cell with lots of butter. Each chef used a different method of mashing.

Emily used. a manual crusher. I use the potato masher just because that's what I have. This is simple and good, but it doesn't remove as much starch from your potato sales as other methods do, the more starch you expect, the more you can cover. butter or other fats to make a creamier dish Lorenzo extruded the potatoes from it through a

food

mill. This process added small amounts of air to them, resulting in soft, slightly fluffy mashed potatoes. Barry used a special piece of equipment called tammy. His Latinus provided more surface area for extrusion. Emily added butter and heavy cream to flavor her potatoes.

I like a lot of butter, the butter she used was unsalted which allowed her to control the saltiness of the final product, she added the heavy cream. a mild opacity Lorenzo made a cream sauce flavored with garlic and thickened with corn-based starch batter; However, potatoes are already inherently starchy, so the thickening properties of the batter are only really beneficial if the mashed potatoes are ready. Oops! Lorenzo's Yukon Gold potatoes are a combination of flour and waxy so they can withstand the huge amounts of butter he added, the butter coats the individual cells of the potato and adds a ton of flavor and decadent neighborhood fermentation to add a spicy quality to their potatoes, mixing live yogurt cultures with heavy cream and storing them in the room.

The temperature for 36 hours allowed cultures of lactic acid bacteria to grow, this lowers the pH which is where the Tang comes from and thickens the heavy cream by destabilizing the proteins. All of these things helped make his potato silky, smooth and creamy. He also smoked his potatoes. By lighting the hay, giving them an earthy, moldy flavor, each of the chefs made a sauce that is essentially a hot liquid thickened with a roux containing equal parts fat and starch. Ruth is thickened through a process called gelatinization, in this process heat is added. Hydrogen bonds within the starch molecules are broken and water is absorbed.

Emily's sauce is a convenient, processed product package that includes pregelatinized dry starch in the form of powdered seasonings and coloring products like these are savory and work well if you're nervous about making a lumpy sauce, this is very lumpy but I'm at level 1, it's okay if it looks terrible. Lorenzo used aromatic vegetables and spices to make his saucereally felt. He also used chicken broth which lightened its color and added bacon fat with all-purpose flour to make the roux and thickening it with fat and starch together will thicken a liquid, although you don't want to add cold flour directly to a hot broth, the outside of the flour particles will do it well and form a membrane around the dry interior with starch forming clumps.

Barry made a chicken-based sauce by sautéing chicken wings at high temperature in neutral grapeseed oil. The berry aromas included a sweet fortified wine from Portugal called Madeira, which added residual sweetness to the potatoes from it. Emily made her mashed potatoes as a side dish. The sprinkle of green parsley in it is visually appealing and added a fresh quality to the dressings in it. Lorenzo used chives and added more butter and black pepper. He also added bacon and cheddar cheese. The cheese added additional layers of fat and saltiness with spicy, sharp notes to balance the salt from the bacon.

Barry's has complex, complicated mashed potatoes, so his simple chive dressing is a refreshing and visually appealing note that adds a light onion flavor without changing the chemistry of his dish. These flavors are a perfect combination. Mashed potatoes seem like just a simple part of your meal, but there are many things you can do to improve them.