The most memorable mashed potatoes manage to be both fluffy and buttery at once. Too much butter and they’re heavy; not enough and they’ll seem wimpy. Here’s where choosing the right spud for the job really matters. The texture of a potato after cooking depends on its structure and moisture content. Some varieties, such as Idaho bakers, have low moisture and cook up to be light and airy. Beaten with butter and cream, they make a fluffy mash. High-moisture potatoes, such as red potatoes or new potatoes, can turn “gluey” when beaten. But because they have such a distinctly earthy, nutty flavor, I like to add just one or two to the pot.
A savory pancake inspired this buckle.
This is easily a meal in itself.
Wild arugula and parsley vichyssoise
This comforting casserole of potato and hard-boiled egg slices jumbled in a creamy sauce is one of the national dishes of Hungary.
For the salad, assemble:
This is a combination of my mother's eggplant Parmigiana and a French tian.
Creamy and mild, this simple curried soup is full of tender fall vegetables and the warming flavors of ginger and garlic.
One of the most classic and popular of all Spanish dishes, the egg and potato tortilla is, simply, iconic. It was, fittingly, the first dish I learned to make when I moved to Spain in 1996, in a lesson given to me by my future brother-in-law, Robert. Preparing a tortilla with potato alone is fine, but using an equal amount of onions produces a sweeter, moister, and, in my mind, superior result. While the key to a good tortilla is keeping it moist in the center, the real trick, he showed me, comes in flipping it. Or rather, flipping the tortilla without the bottom sticking.
In our house, Chanukah means latkes, potato pancakes. All five of us love latkes. What's not to like about potatoes fried in oil? We always have them at least once on Chanukah; often more, as our kids clamor for them. Over the past decade, my husband, Jeffrey, became our household's chief latkemaker, in part, I think, in response to my tendency to try to make them a little healthier. "Lots of oil is key," he'll declare as I attempt to demonstrate that you can make "perfectly good" latkes with only a thin film of oil or, even worse, with cooking spray instead of oil. I have to admit that, while a minimal amount of oil does make "perfectly good" latkes, a substantial amount of oil makes perfect latkes.