You can use milk, cream, half-and-half, tangy buttermilk, or chicken or vegetable stock to rehydrate your mashed potatoes. Start with a ½ cup of liquid for 4 cups of mashed potatoes, and add it gradually so you don't end up with potato soup. Adding extra butter is a good idea, too.
If this occurs, the outlet recommends correcting course with more fat: Adding more liquid in the form of melted butter, extra-virgin olive oil, cream, or full-fat milk.
Doing so is a science thing – soaking cut potatoes removes excess potato starch. This means fluffy mashed potatoes (and not gluey!)
Make 'em in advance… or throw the diced potatoes in cold water until you're ready to cook them. They can sit in the water for up to 24 hours before cooking. Throw 'em in the fridge, and let them soak overnight if that works better for you.
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. Cold water is used because hot water would react with the starch activating it, making it harder to separate from the potatoes.
What you do to your potatoes after soaking them in water depends on what you're using them for. For roasting: Pat the potatoes completely dry before adding oil and putting them in the oven, says Welsh. For frying: Rinse after soaking to rid the potatoes of excess surface starch, then drain and dry well.
A: The main reasons to cut the potatoes and pre-soak in water are: To allow the excess starches and sugars to be removed from the outer surface of the fry strips AND to keep the potatoes from browning prematurely from exposure to air.
Soak the potatoes in water for at least 4 hours, up to overnight. This step is crucial to really get all of the excess starch off. Fill a large pot with water, rinse off the potatoes one last time and add them to the cold water. Salt the water, place the pot on the stove and turn on the heat.
Prepping the potatoes ahead of time
To save time on peeling and chopping on Thanksgiving Day (or any other day that includes mashed potatoes), you can peel the spuds and keep them submerged in a bowl of water in the fridge, whole or cut up, for hours — even overnight — before boiling.
Too much — or too vigorous — mashing will produce gluey potatoes. Your best tool is an old-fashioned masher, fork, ricer or food mill. If you've already done the damage, turn pasty potatoes into a casserole: Spread them in a baking dish, drizzle with melted butter and sprinkle with grated cheese and breadcrumbs.
Soupy, watery mashed potatoes usually happen because the cooked potatoes were cut into pieces that were too small, weren't drained well enough, or were overcooked. Fix them: Scoop the watery mashed potatoes into a pan and stir constantly over low heat to evaporate the excess liquid.
Instructions: Place Dehydrated Potato Slices into a bowl or container. Add enough boiling hot water to barely cover all of the potatoes. Allow potatoes to hydrate for about 15 minutes or until fully rehydrated.
A great way to enliven potatoes which have been stored since last year's harvest. The milk gives them a creamier texture and a little more body and richness.
We usually recommend no more than 24 hours. You can keep the potatoes from absorbing the water by making sure the water is not salted, and is chilled (you can even add ice to the water). To keep the potatoes from turning black from oxidation, add 1 teaspoon of lemon juice or white wine vinegar to a gallon of water.
For most potato dishes it's important to add the potatoes to cold water and allow the water to come to a boil with the potatoes in the water. The potato starch can react as soon as it comes in contact with hot water, which will promote uneven cooking and mealy potatoes.
First let's talk about why cut potatoes need to be immersed in water to begin with. The reason is to prevent the potatoes exposure to air, which causes dehydration, oxidation, and discoloration. Immersing cut potatoes will also help rinse off excess starch.
Dense potatoes don't absorb seasonings easily, so you'll need to salt the water liberally so that the water the potatoes do drink up also carries in seasoning. And because potatoes are so timid in flavor, they need that salt to bring them out of their shells.
Step 3: Add potatoes to the saltwater so they are completely submerged. Soak for a minimum of 2 hours. This is the secret step … the brining process must not be skipped. This is what gives you a fluffy delicious baked potato that really is the best you've ever tasted.
Rinsing or soaking cut raw potatoes helps to wash away a very small amount of amylose. But the potatoes must be cut into one-inch pieces to expose enough surface area to wash away any significant amount of amylose.
Rinsing potatoes helps remove excess starch, so it is recommended to rinse the potatoes before cooking. To ensure even more starch is out of the way, it's recommended that they even be quickly rinsed after boiling. We recommend using hot water for rinsing after boiling and cold water prior to boiling.