Last Updated on March 1, 2022 by
Mashing potatoes with an immersion blender will be on your mind if you do not have other tools except for the hand blender in your kitchen. So, you have asked an excellent question.
If you are a lover of potatoes, then you may be looking for several ways to prepare your potato dishes to make them look palatable. Of truth, you will not want to be limited to just frying or boiling your potatoes.
Other options could be explored, such as mashing your potatoes. Mashed potato could be made as a side dish and added with milk, butter, salt, and pepper. Having mashed potatoes for a meal may sound appealing to you until you are stuck with having to mash the potato. If you are looking to make one, you may wonder if you can mash potatoes with an immersion blender.
An immersion blender, also known as a stick blender or hand blender, is a kitchen tool that can blend several food ingredients. It is basically a stick that has blender blades at the end of it. Immersion blenders are different from regular blenders.
It differs from regular blenders so that you do not have to pour the ingredient into the blender, rather the blender is inserted into the container that contains the food ingredient that you want to blend, and then it is turned on. You can then go ahead to move the immersion blender around the container to blend your food ingredients uniformly.
Immersion blenders are helpful when you have a large number of food ingredients that you want to blend. It is powerful and can blend all types of food ingredients. They are excellent kitchen tools. They can be used to make various sauces and soups.
Let’s find out whether we can mash potatoes with an Immersion blender.
Immersion blenders can also be used to mash potatoes, but they have some limitations in that they do not really make good mashed potatoes. If you are a good chef, you will notice that you love your food coming with some particular texture and consistency.
While immersion blenders may cut through potatoes, making them smooth and creamy with no lumps, they make the potatoes turn out gummy. When this happens, these potatoes become sticky and thick due to the speed of these immersion blenders.
Although immersion blenders cannot give mashed potatoes the best texture, they are not entirely useless as they can be used for other purposes, which include:
- Immersion blenders are good when it comes to making smoothies and milkshakes. Whether you want a creamy milkshake or a smoothie, the immersion blenders give it to you at your preferable texture. It also blends ice and frozen fruits.
- If you have an immersion blender, then you do not have to worry about beating your eggs as they do this perfectly. They are fast and easy, and they ensure that the yokes and the albumen are combined uniformly.
- Are you a lover of pancakes, then you need an immersion blender to perfectly blend your pancake batter? Your ingredients for making pancakes can be thoroughly mixed using an immersion blender.
- Instead of transferring your hot soup into a blender to blend it, you can make it easier using an immersion blender. If you have ever transferred your soup to the blender to puree it, then you would know how stressful it is. Pureeing a hot soup is made much easier with an immersion blender that can be dipped into the pot, making it easy and fast.
- Immersion blenders are also good when it comes to making whipped cream. You do not need to use the stand mixer or stress yourself looking for a blender. The immersion blender will give you the best-whipped cream within some minutes. In addition to this, you can also make homemade mayonnaise and a sauce for your pasta using your immersion blender.
Immersion blenders also go as far as helping you make your own salad dressings and pureeing tomato sauce.
Immersion blenders are compact. They take up little space and can fit anywhere. They can be used in tiny kitchen apartments, and it is perfect for such places as a result of their small size. They are also cheap and versatile.
Immersion blenders are fast, which is one reason they do not make proper mashed potatoes, but this speed is a great advantage when it comes to making other recipes. They are easy to clean up. All you have to do is clean the blender piece and the bowl or pot used for blending.
Other methods to mash potatoes to achieve the perfect consistency
There are other methods through which you can mash your potatoes and make them come out perfect. They include
Food Mill
Food mills (like the Cuisipro Deluxe Food Mill) are utensils used for sieving and mashing soft foods. They consist of three parts, which include a bowl, a bottom plate with holes, and a crank fitted with a blade that is made of metal, and it crushes the food and forces it to pass through the holes in the plate.
The food mill’s bottom plate may be interchangeable, or it may be a permanent part of the device. The plates could also come in different hole sizes. Food mills can be made of stainless steel or aluminium, and the bowl may be made of plastic, especially if they are small in size.
In addition to mashing potatoes, food mills can also remove seeds from cooked tomatoes and remove pulp or larger pieces from foods. It is best for light and fluffy mashed potatoes. This food mill forces cooked potato through the holes and produces light and fluffy potatoes.
Food Processor
Food processors ( like the Breville food processor) are used to facilitate the preparation of food. They are similar to blenders in several forms except that they require little or no liquid during use. They can be used to blend, chop, and dice food ingredients.
Food processors have several functions. It comprises a base that houses a motor, a bowl made of transparent plastic that fits around the shaft. It also has cutting blades that can be attached to the shaft.
Food processors also come with shredding or slicing disks. Food processors, just like immersion blenders, may make your blends a gummy mess.
Potato masher
A potato masher is a utensil that is used for crushing cooked food. It derives its name from its use, which is crushing cooked potatoes for mashed potatoes.
This potato masher (like this one) comprises a handle connected to a head that is used for mashing. The handle is designed to be either sideways or upright. The beauty of this utensil is seen with the two types of heads.
The first one is a large gauge wire that comes in a rounded zigzag shape. The second one is a plate with holes or slits. The potato can be mashed by using the handle to push down on the foodstuff. It can be used for lumpy, creamy mashed potatoes.
Hand Mixer
A mixer is a utensil that is used for mixing, beating, and kneading food. It is used with whisk like beater attachments. They can be removable from an electric mixer, but they are often designed to be attached permanently to a hand-cranked mixer.
A mixer ( like the KitchenAid Cordless Hand Mixer) has two beaters that spin in place. It has an optional stand that holds the mixer and a bowl that can be rotated while mixing. Sometimes, mixers could be designed to have a stationary bowl and then a single beater that moves around while rotating. These types of mixers are mostly large in size. Mixers are used for creamy mashed potatoes, and they produce good mashed potatoes with a few lumps.
Some precautions should be taken into consideration when using a mixer to make mashed potatoes. You have to keep the mixer at a lower speed to make the potatoes extra fluffy. It is also advisable to rice your potatoes before beating them using a mixer to make them extra smooth and creamy.
Potato Ricer
A potato ricer (like this Priority Chef Potato Ricer) is kitchen equipment used to process potatoes or other food. This works by forcing the potato through small holes about the size of a grain of rice. The potato ricer looks like a garlic press. It comes with two long handles.
One of the handles has a perforated basket at the end, while the other has a flat surface that fits into the basket. The potato is placed in the basket to use this ricer, and then the flat surface is pushed down into the basket by pressing the handles together. This forces the potato through the holes.
Another one is called a rotary ricer that comes with the shape of a cone and small perforations. It has a wooden pestle that can be used to push the potatoes through the holes.
This equipment is commonly used to rice potatoes, and it turns these potatoes into, thin shreds. It gives a light and fluffy potato, allowing the starch cells of potatoes to maintain their integrity and stay separate, giving the potatoes a perfect texture.
After this, you can add the milk and butter and blend, with the result being consistent mashed potatoes. The process works perfectly since the potatoes are passed through the evenly sized holes to create a uniform texture. The ricer has also shown to be useful in several other aspects.
It can remove excess water from foods like cooked greens and grated or sliced potatoes to give you potato chips with improved quality. A ricer is used for smooth, fluffy mashed potatoes. It is similar to a food mill.
Stand Mixer
Stand mixers ( like this Kenwood Stand Mixer) give you creamy and fluffy mashed potatoes. With the paddle attachment’s whipping action, it beats the potatoes, and it does this without opening too many cellular walls, and these results in a creamy mixture.
Potatoes are a good source of nutrients, and having them for a meal is of good nutritional value. You can try out any of the above-listed methods when you want to make your mashed potatoes. Each of these methods gives you a particular texture so you can have your mashed potato served at the texture of your choice.
If you already have an immersion blender, then you can use it to make other recipes. But if you are looking to have mashed potatoes, you can try any of the other methods listed above as they will give you mashed potatoes with your best-desired texture. Potatoes have lots of health benefits.
- Potatoes serve as a source of nutrients. They are packed with many vitamins and minerals. Potatoes are an excellent source of many vitamins and minerals.
- They contain antioxidants that neutralize harmful molecules in the body. As a result, they prevent you from getting some chronic diseases like heart disease, diabetes, and cancers.
- Potatoes also help to improve blood sugar control preventing you from diabetes.
- It also helps to improve your digestive health.
- Potatoes are free of gluten, thereby preventing discomfort in people who are sensitive to gluten. When gluten-sensitive people take foods containing gluten, they begin to experience some symptoms such as sharp pain in the stomach, diarrhoea and bloating. Potato is free of this and serves as the perfect meal for such a group of people.
- Potatoes are filling and versatile. Apart from being mashed, they can be boiled, fried, or steamed.
Have you tried mashing potatoes with any of the methods listed above? You can share your experience with us.