The Common Culinarian

I got a potato ricer for Christmas, so my in-laws wanted to see it in action. I decided to make some roasted red pepper mashed potatoes, and they turned out pretty good. Basically, you take your standard mashed potato recipe and add some roasted red pepper puree and there you have it. The most challenging thing for me was roasting the red peppers.

This recipe was inspired by this post at Culinary Therapy, which only fed two people. I expanded it to make six generous servings, and thought it to be very easy. There are a million and one ways to make mashed potatoes, and I thought this one did a decent job cutting back on the “bad” ingredients. At the end of the day, each serving only gets less than 3 tablespoons of sour cream and butter combined. I also up’d the proportion of red pepper puree to potatoes, because I didn’t think the flavor could come through enough.

Ingredients:

• 6 medium russet potatoes
• 3-6 cloves of garlic
• 1/2 cup of sour cream
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) of butter
• 1 1/2 cup of chicken broth
• 3 roasted red peppers, pureed

Directions:

1. Roast the red peppers in the oven, under the broiler, until the skin is black and blistered.
2. Once the peppers are roasted, place them in a plastic zip-top bag for 15 minutes to steam.
3. Meanwhile, skin the potatoes and cut them into cubes.
4. Place the potatoes and garlic in a large pot and cover them with cold water.
5. Cover the pot and bring the water to a boil.
6. While the water is coming up to a boil, run the red peppers under cold water to help peel the skin.
7. Remove the seeds and the ribs from the peppers and puree.
8. Boil the pototoes until they are fork tender, then drain.
9. Mash the potatoes (or run them through a ricer).
10. Add the sour cream, butter, and pepper puree to the potatoes.
11. Stir to combine, adding the chicken broth until you have reach the desired consistency.
12. Salt and pepper to taste.

These potatoes are really tasty, and relatively easy. If you make them ahead and you aren’t ready to serve them, you can put them in a double boiler to keep them warm.

Enjoy!