Mashed Potatoes

Potatoes cooked until tender, then mashed with warm butter and milk. No country is claimed, it is a European staple that has travelled everywhere, most associated in Britain with bangers and mash. The one thing the recipe does that matters is warming the butter and milk together before they go in. Cold dairy into hot potato drops the temperature and makes the mash claggy; warm dairy is absorbed smoothly. It is a small step that nobody does and everybody should. The other decision is the tool, and it determines the result. A hand masher leaves texture and works quickly. A ricer or food mill gives the smoothest possible mash by pushing the potato through small holes without working it. An electric mixer or food processor is the one to avoid: over-beating ruptures the starch cells and releases enough starch to turn mashed potato genuinely gluey, and there is no recovering from it. The source's explanation of mashed versus smashed potatoes contradicts itself between paragraphs, it defines smashed as roughly mashed, then describes mashed as the chunkier of the two. The distinction generally drawn is that smashed potatoes are left rough and lumpy, often with the skins on, while mashed are worked smooth.