Just about every traditional Thanksgiving meal is served with a side of mashed potatoes. Ben, Patty and I had a conversation about mashed potatoes the other day and how we make them. Ben uses regular russet potatoes, milk, butter, salt and pepper. This is the way most people probably make their mashed potatoes, because that's what we grew up eating. My mom didn't get too fancy when it came to making dinner.  As a matter of fact, Mom rarely salt and peppered our food.

In my opinion, there is only ONE way to make mashed potatoes and this is the BEST way.  Even the leftovers are awesome!

Here's my recipe:

5 pounds of Yukon gold potatoes, boiled in salted water until tender then drained.

Invest in a potato ricer!

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Fill the ricer with potatoes and squeeze through. There is just no better way to process mashed potatoes.  When you use a mixer, you could over mix them and that causes your potatoes to be gluey. You'll never have gluey potatoes with a ricer and no lumps either.

For 5 pounds of potatoes, fold in (don't mix with a mixer) 8 ounces of room temperature cream cheese, 2 sticks of room temperature butter, 1/2 cup sour cream, salt and pepper to taste.  If you like a thinner consistency, you can add a splash of cream.

You will never go back to making mashed potatoes the old-fashioned way again.

If you want to kick things up and step out of your comfort zone a bit more, here's a list of 32 New Ways to Make Mashed Potatoes.  Taste of Home shows you how to make garlic red mashed potatoes, double-baked mashed potatoes, swiss cheese mashed potatoes and more.

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