If you can spare slightly more prep time, it can be easier to peel potatoes without a vegetable peeler. The key is to first submerge them in boiling water since boiled potatoes drop their skin quite readily.
If you're going to be using a masher and you prefer to not have skins in your mash, you will have to peel the potatoes yourself. But after they're boiled the skins slip off easily. Hold the hot potatoes in a clean kitchen towel-covered hand, then use a paring knife to scrape or pull off the peel.
Step 2: Cool the cooked potatoes
Only leave the cooked potatoes to cook for 5-10 seconds in a bowl of iced water. This stops the cooking process and makes them cool enough to work with. But you won't be able to peel the potatoes if they are cold. So they still have to be hot.
If you're here, you'll probably be glad to know that yes, you can peel and cut potatoes the day before you plan to serve them — and that it's super easy! All you have to do is submerge the bare potato pieces in water and refrigerate (more on that later).
Cold water is used because hot water would react with the starch activating it, making it harder to separate from the potatoes.
Why use salt water for soaking potatoes? There's moisture naturally found in potatoes, and moisture is drawn to higher concentrations of salt. (This is a process called osmosis.) So, if you put the potatoes in a salt water bath, that will help draw out some of their moisture, resulting in crispier fries.
Some people may prefer to peel the potatoes before boiling, but we would recommend you leave the skins on. This ensures that the nutrients and flavours are not lost during cooking and you get all those lovely vitamins too.
Potatoes soak up a lot of flavor, so salting the water prior to cooking is a good idea for the best taste. And you aren't limited to plain salted water for boiling your potatoes, either.
As with pasta water, there's a reason to liberally salt the water in which the potatoes will cook: As the starches in potatoes warm up, they open up and absorb water (and salt if you season the water). When they're finished cooking, the cells close off.
Potatoes can be peeled prepped and cut into water up to 2 days before boiling for mash.
Step 2: Place the Peeled Potatoes In Water
As soon as you peel the potatoes, you'll want to place them into a bowl of water so they're fully submerged, and then store the bowl of potatoes and water in the refrigerator. The water will seal off the potatoes from the air, so the chemical reaction can't occur.
Pro tip: If the potatoes are going to be peeled, Fields-White says to clean them with this same process listed above before the knife or peeler comes in contact. "After peeling, put them in water with a little lemon juice if you're not going to cook right away, or they'll discolor," she says.
Soaking peeled, washed, and cut fries in cold water overnight removes excess potato starch, which prevents fries from sticking together and helps achieve maximum crispness.
Some people prefer to boil their potatoes whole, while others prefer to cut the vegetables into pieces before boiling. Smaller potatoes (like red gold) will cook faster whole — about 15-20 minutes in boiling water. Larger potatoes (like russet) take a little more time — about 20-30 minutes.
One commercial method used to peel potatoes is to soak them in a solution of NaOH for a short time, remove them from the NaOH, and spray off the peel. The concentration of NaOH is normally in the range of 3 to 6 M.
A: 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).
Give them a cold water bath: Once your potatoes are chopped, toss them into a large bowl. Then cover the potatoes completely with cold water and let them soak for at least 30 minutes (or up to overnight). This will help to rinse off the excess starch and help the potatoes crisp up beautifully in the oven.
Prior to cooking potatoes, one way to reduce acrylamide formation is soaking them in water. According to the FDA, soaking potatoes in water for 15 to 30 minutes is sufficient to reduce the levels of acrylamide during cooking.