Q&A | Are those instant potatoes?
When you say you made mashed potatoes is that cooking them and whipping them with butter and milk or cream? I ask because a friend uses the packages- even for holiday meals. I’ve never purchased them- probably a lot of sodium. She also buys jarred gravy.
-Nan
Oh yes, when I make mashed potatoes it's always from fresh potatoes. I honestly just don't find them to be that much work; I cut the potatoes into smallish pieces and they cook while I'm prepping whatever else I'm gonna eat for dinner.
Then it's just a matter of mashing and adding butter, half and half, salt, and pepper, which is quick work.
Some instant potatoes, like these ones, contain just potatoes, while some do have other ingredients. But I'm guessing that most instant potatoes don't taste quite as good as fresh-cooked ones, so I'm just gonna stick with real potatoes.
About gravy: I don't think I have ever bought the jarred, but then again, usually when I'm making mashed potatoes, I am eating them with something other than gravy!
I top mine with things like fried eggs, chicken and veggies, or shrimp and veggies.
When I do make a gravy like I did the other night for my rotisserie chicken, it's usually just a quick milk gravy.
In that case, I poured the juices from the rotisserie chicken into a measuring cup and added enough milk to make a cup (if you have chicken broth handy, that's helpful too!)
I melt a tablespoon of butter in a skillet, add a tablespoon of flour, then whisk in the liquids, bring to a boil, and season with salt and pepper.
Done!
How do you roast red peppers? Or can they be bought already roasted? In a can? Frozen? I am completely ignorant here.
-Jana
You can buy roasted red peppers in a glass jar at the grocery store. But they are so easy to make, I pretty much never buy them.
I usually just roast them, sliced longways, in a foil-lined pan under the broiler until the skins are blistered and black. Then I wrap the foil around the peppers and as they cool in the packet, the skins loosen and can be easily removed.
You can also roast them a little more slowly at something like 450° but that takes longer; maybe about 20 minutes.
The roasted peppers freeze nicely, so this is a handy way to deal with a glut of peppers.
And this roasted red pepper/basil mayo is so so so good on sandwiches or as a veggie dip. 10/10!
How do you like to prepare your green beans? They look so vibrant and fresh! Yum.
-Dori
Yes! I like my beans to be bright green.
And I like them to have a little crunch.
To me, canned green beans at the absolute antithesis of what a green bean should be, although I know, I know, some people really adore them. One little girl I used to babysit had cold canned green beans as her bedtime snack every night, actually.
Wanting those beans before bed was unimaginable to me, but you know, as bedtime snacks go, canned green beans are hardly the worst choice possible!
Anyway...I cook my beans loosely following this method, although I don't always do the quick-steam part.
I think the most important thing is that they're sauteed in a hot pan with a little bit of oil, plus some seasoning. Pan-sauteed beans are almost always crunchier and greener than beans that have been boiled or steamed.
And if you have only ever had canned or boiled green beans and you think you don't like green beans, well, give the sauteed ones a try. You just might like them. 🙂
Alrighty, guys! Let's discuss potatoes, gravy, roasted red peppers, and green beans.
(It's a food-themed Q&A for sure!)
Roasting your own red peppers is also great if you're making your own hummus! Roasted red pepper hummus is my fave.
@Ruth T, do you have a simple recipe for this? I'm always on the lookout for recipes that take very few ingredients. (@JD sent me her recipe for ranch dressing mix, which I will make after my next trip to Winco for the ingredients from their bulk bins). Trying to join Team Sauce here (while mourning the absence of sweets).
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, This is the one that I use: https://www.inspiredtaste.net/22016/roasted-red-pepper-hummus-recipe/
Good luck!
"Instant" mashed potatoes may contain sulfites, a serious allergy, for some of my family members. Plus the real thing is just so much better. You can save the water you boil potatoes in and use it in bread. I have an old recipe that calls for the potato water.
How I cook varies with each season of life. When I was a young mom with 2 kids in diapers, their dad out to sea, no family around, and coupons helped with the grocery bill, I often used instant mashed potatoes and lots of cream of whatever soups in my recipes. I even had a Campbell's cookbook that used those cans of soups to make sauces and gravies. Now that its just us two, I cook everything from scratch except for gravy. My gravy batches tend to be huge and watery! I'm in awe of young parents who cook from scratch, make super healthy meals, and still manage to keep it all together. Also, it does seem like produce is more available nowadays than 40 years ago.
As for green beans, I have learned how much I LOVE steamed whole green beans with a little sea salt. I eat them like french fries. 🙂 Canned green beans are only eaten on Thanksgiving. With the canned soup recipe, its a nostalgia thing for my grownup kids.
@MommaJo, ohhh, very good point. Season of life makes a huge difference! Especially with a periodically-absent spouse.
Your impressions are correct, produce is more varied and more widely available than it used to be. Just a single example: used to be you could get only 3-4 varieties of apple in a supermarket. Now a dozen is common, plus many cities have a lot more farmers markets as well.
@MommaJo, How I cook also varies of my season of life. Getting dinner on the table every night was important to me when the kids were little and so I used whatever convenience foods made that easiest for this full-time working mom. Now that it's just the two of us, I cook almost exclusively from scratch.
@MommaJo, stages of life changing cooking is a great point! I’ve had the opposite experience: I have more time to cook from scratch as a stay at home mom of a 1 year old and 3 year old than I did when I worked full time and got home at 5 pm. However, I can’t IMAGINE doing it without my husband around. Kudos to you for feeding your family and keeping things going in your husband’s absences!
@MommaJo, do you find that sea salt tastes any better or different from normal/table/shaker (what is it called??) salt?
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, I don't really know, but I like the sea salt that is coarse. So maybe I just like the texture.
Lately every time I have purchased a bag of potatoes there has been a rotten potato in the bag and it has spoiled the others! The food waste has been very frustrating. Not sure why this has been such a problem the past few bags. We eat baked and mashed potatoes frequently so it’s not like they have even had time to spoil or sprout. This week I decided to use instant mashed potatoes due to the spoilage issues. Our family’s favorite green bean recipe is Kristen’s Garlic Green Beans!! We have used her recipe for every holiday or BBQ for many years and it is so good! Thanks for the red roasted pepper method, we will give it a try.
@Elisabeth, I've found it is necessary to empty the big bag of potatoes into the potato drawer rather than leave in the bag because YES there is usually a bad one and it needs to be tossed sooner rather than later 🙂
@Elisabeth, unfortunately some years are great for potato production and other years, not so much. In the off years, if your potatoes come from that region, then the incidence of potatoes that have gone bad will be higher. The cellar or packer may have packed it in good shape but things can deteriorate somewhat quickly with the temperature changes inherent in shipping.
@Elisabeth, my sister taught me a few years ago to store them loosely, but separate from the onions as well. I used to dump them all together in basket. It makes a difference in keeping both fresh longer.
@Elisabeth, I agree, take them out of the bag. If you're like me, you can smell the one that is starting to go bad. My sense of smell for that is likely genetic.
@Elisabeth, same goes for onions. Those are a visual/feel as no odor to me like a rotting/rotten/going bad potato.
@Elisabeth, I smell the potato bag before I put it in my cart.
I've blackened the skin of a pepper over the flame of a gas burner before putting it in a brown bag or wrapping it in foil to allow the skin to loosen. Kristen's oven method is better, tho, so use that!
Every so often I make a roasted red pepper cream sauce to go over fried polenta. My husband loves it.
As for green beans, I do the steam/saute method. I put a little pat of butter in pan or a bit of olive oil. Stop cooking before the beans are fully done. Add chives and fresh lemon juice. My haricot vert beans and lemons usually come from Aldi, so quite affordable.
I use instant mashed potatoes in breads, as in Beth Hensperger’s recipes in The Bread Lover’s Bread Machine Cookbook. Small amounts, usually, but wonderful breads!
Thank you for the recipes, Kirsten! They sound wonderful.
I’ve heard that the instant potatoes are made from the absolute dregs of the potatoes at the processor. I don’t know if it’s true, but it’s put me off instant potatoes. Also, it’s so easy to make them from scratch. I love my potato ricer (thrifted, of course)!
I steam most of my veggies. I might have to try the pan frying thing.
I freeze my peppers raw! I use them in stir fry and on pizza.
It's food! I have thoughts!
--I made milk gravy all the time, but with even less work: Cornstarch mixed into the milk, then dumped in the pan with the juices/pan-fried bits and stirred around until thick. I usually add some onion or garlic powder, too.
--We've gotten the instant potato flakes (the kind that are 100% just dehydrated potatoes) from excess commodities before, and they work well for thickening soups or stretching mashed potatoes when I need more leftover potatoes for shepherd's pie or something. I have a couple of kids that actually like them by themselves because they make completely smooth mashed potatoes.
--My favorite way to eat green beans is roasted with olive oil and minced garlic. Kind of like those garlickly green beans they have at Chinese buffets, which were about the only thing I ever liked at those buffets.
--I don't roast peppers, except the one time I roasted green chiles, I did do the thing where you cover them and the skins can be peeled off. Now I buy green chiles by the five-gallon bucket in the fall from a truck on the side of the road where they roast them for you in these big rotating drums and then dump them in a plastic bag hot. Which also steams them to make the skins peel off. And if you drive home 100 miles with that bag of hot chiles, your car will smell like roasted green chiles for a solid week. Very New Mexican. 🙂
@kristin @ going country,
I also live in the southwest and enjoy the amazing smell of roasted green chilies that is in the air from our local grocery store. The NM hatch chilies are the best!
@kristin @ going country, the smell of Hatch chiles roasting in front of the grocery store is epitome of fall for me.
@kristin @ going country,
One of my sisters lives in Colorado, and buys roasted hatch chiles at the farmers market. Guessing her car has that smell for a week, lol. 🙂
Mashed potatoes: I don't eat them. I prefer potatoes baked, used in soups/stews, or (when I have the time) sliced thin and roasted with garlic salt, pepper, and herbs. However, I bought a package of Bob's Red Mill potato flakes at Ollie's a while back and have been using these in bread machine potato bread.
Gravy and roasted red peppers: Also no. But every summer, I buy a few bell peppers, chop them, freeze them on a cookie sheet, and then put them in a Ziploc in the freezer. These are fine for the few recipes I make that require bell peppers.
Green beans: I agree that the canned ones are an abomination. Usually, I just boil fresh green beans *very* lightly and marinate them in olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt, pepper, and herbs. But once a summer or so, I revert to my Southern roots and boil a batch for an hour or so with some bacon or salt pork.
@A. Marie, My parents grew a slew of green beans. And my mom would cook them with onion & bacon for hours. I must admit, I loved them. I will occasionally serve them that way (SE OH native here), but mainly steam & saute them now.
@A. Marie, same I never think to make mashed potatoes except for Thanksgiving! I like roasted red or yellow potatoes (I eat the skins) but I just chunk them, not slice them thin.
@Diane,
My mother in law, who grew up in Appalachian Kentucky, would cook green beans (fresh or frozen) with onions for hours, same as you mention. Not sure why she didn't throw some bacon in there, but I agree, they were delicious.
(I also like sauteed fresh green beans, garlicky green beans, the Chinese buffet green beans, etc. etc. No green bean casserole, though.)
I usually have some instant mashed potatoes on hand for emergencies and/or to stretch a meal if unexpected guests are over, but the majority of the time I make my own. I have to admit I'll get creative with mashed potatoes- half and half with butter are my favorite combo, but sour cream, any type of broth, and even vanilla almond milk have made their way in. I don't recommend the vanilla almond milk!
I always forget about roasting red peppers! Once in a while I'll make a roasted veggie sandwich and they make their way in, but I need to remember to do it more regularly. I usually just throw them in a hot pan- same with green beans!
@Shelly, for thoroughly indulgent mashed potatoes, I add caramelized onions and roasted garlic along with the butter and milk.
@Shelly, i use plain yogurt in my mashed potatoes- along with a little butter and milk. I always salt the water I boil the potatoes in too.
@WilliamB, I second this emotion. Bonus points if you have them already on hand, saved in the freezer ala Kristin-with-an-I's suggestion (to caramelize more than you need to save for future use.)
@Jean C, I used to sometimes add sour cream but never thought about yogurt! I’ll try that next along with William’s caramelized onions!!!
@WilliamB,
That sounds AHHMAZING.
Mashed potatoes from real potatoes every time. It really isn’t hard to make them, as Kristen points out. My daughter adds mayonnaise and butter to hers instead of just butter as the fat and we all like to make garlic mashed potatoes.
I don’t make roasted red peppers but I may try that. We always enjoyed them fresh so much they didn’t hang around long. Then I had to take them out of my diet for a good while but I may try growing them this year.
I grew up eating southern style green beans- cooked a long time with seasoning, often a ham bone. I learned to eat them sautéed and like them, but my favorite way is still low and slow.
I’ve used boxed Mac and cheese but the instant potatoes, minute rice, gravy mixes, etc. never appealed to me. DS2 had so many food allergies as a kid I couldn’t use them anyway. She couldn’t have yellow dye, citric acid and citrus fruits, tomatoes, caffeine, several preservatives, strawberries, most cured meats…
@JD, see my remark above about Southern-style green beans. I don't often have a ham bone handy during green bean season, but that's another excellent source of the essential porkiness.
@A. Marie,
I save bones in the freezer for that first big pot of slow cooked summer fresh beans. Nowadays the ham bones will be less frequent since buying a ham for one means a lot of ham, even when freezing it!
Regarding chicken broth—I save all my vegetable and herb scraps in the freezer. I also save bones from rotisserie chickens and fresh chicken bones (necks, backs) and parm rinds. I make quarts of delicious bone broth for the freezer. It’s healthier and practically free!
I am one of the crazies who like canned greened beans that have been cooked at least an hour and are sooooft and falling apart.
I think the bright crispy green beans look very pretty tho!
We eat a lot of frozen steamed in the bag green beans in a pinch. Not my absolute fave but they do the trick. I add butter salt and pepper and parm if I have it.
I do not understand this at all, but I am glad that those beans are making you happy! Heh.
@Stephanie, in my experience, even cooking canned green beans Southern-style (see my and @JD's comments above) can't redeem them. But you do you.
@A. Marie, @Stephanie - Maybe it's a Stephanie thing - I also prefer the canned ones even after years of trying to learn to like fresh ones (unless the fresh ones are cooked super soft with ham, like other commenters wrote about.). I like most other veggies made from fresh, so I made peace with this particular preference and fly my canned green beans flag with pride, lol.
@Stephanie, my parents grew a lot of green beans and home canned them. We ate so many that now my mom's home canned soft green beans are my favorite. DH doesn't particularly like them that way so I suffer through sauted, crunchy green beans for him. :-)
@Stephanie, Sorry, I’m not a fan but the hubs bought a case of canned green beans at Costco. I can’t do them unless in a bean salad that’s been marinating for a while.
Mashed Potatoes and gravy is my very favorite food. And esp w a little texture (lumps) to the potatoes and milk gravy made with the little crumbly bits from frying chicken. A diner style restaurant near here makes very good mashed potatoes and I commented to the waitress and she said they use "potato pearls." I looked into getting some but never followed through. I never met a cooked potato any style I didn't like. I can rattle off the names like "Bubba's Shrimp."
Green beans. The very best recipe is one from the "Cooking for Two" (?) recipe book by America's Test Kitchen. It is the garlic green beans. The secret is in carefully seasoning some oil with garlic in the microwave. Green beans were a staple in our home growing up. Mom (and I) canned many a green bean. We liked them better than the frozen ones.
I have developed an affection for fresh red peppers esp from my Misfits box. I was supposed to get some in the one that arrived Saturday but there was a "slight change" in my order. I was really looking forward to them. I do like roasted red peppers, too.
I have never made roasted red peppers. Fresh sliced peppers taste so delicious they never make it into a pan, I have tried.
I love the idea of instant potatoes but have never been able to make them taste good. The closest was adding chicken stock, garlic, butter, and cream.
One of my grandmothers grew her own beans and canned them with onion. Seriously the best green beans I’ve ever tasted. She probably cooked them with bacon too.
I never really make gravy but when I cooked for my mom she craved gravy so I made it every meal. Whatever pan dripping, broth, seasonings and corn starch. She longed for sausage gravy but was allergic to milk and flour. I tried it once with plant milk and cornstarch and it was only ok.
Seriously, now I want a red pepper. I grew them once and would eat them fresh in the garden like an apple.
@Tiana,
Home canned green beans are a whole ‘nother animal from store bought canned green beans. I like to put onion in mine, too.
@Tiana, I’m allergic to milk and wheat. When I make sausage gravy or any other milk based gravy, I use brown rice flour as the thickener. Same proportions. I also try to use cashew milk. Even unsweetened, it doesn’t have the slightly sweet undertone that some of the other plant-based milks do. I’ll also swap out some of the plant based milk for chicken broth. And, I always add Worcestershire sauce to my gravies.
@Tiana, I forgot to mention I also added powdered Parmesan to instant potatoes.
@Tiana, I also put Parmesan cheese on instant potatoes.
I'm with you on the ease of making mashed potatoes. But nowadays I do a skinny mashed version which uses far less butter, just a smidge of milk, and low salt. If they are reds or yellows, I sometimes leave the peel on. And gravy is easy to do, but I totally understand the working mom using convenience foods like instant potatoes and jarred gravy for a family. Been there in the past, done that.
Instead Of pan frying (or seaming or boiling), try air frying those green beans. Toss with a tiny amount of oil, salt, and garlic powder, then 10-12 min at 400-425 F.
I don't eat mashed potatoes much but when I do, I make them from scratch. Since they're an indulgence for me I want the good stuff. I did run an extensive tasting, learning that Betty Crocker Potato Buds are much better than most other brands.
Speaking (writing?) of premade things, I also found that Swanson's Chicken Bone Broth is much, much better than most boxed chicken stock. I also note that it has 9 g protein per cup instead of the usual 1 g. Now o usually keep a box or two ion hand for stock emergencies.
One possible stock emergency would be a sudden need for gravy. Me, I would rather have no gravy than jarred. I realize that 5-10 min and another dish to make can be a lot on top of other dishes, and that YMMV. Since I don't like milk gravies mine are always made with drippings and stock. Hmmm, I have some drippings in the freezer. I feel the need for a crazy-based dish coming on...
Kristen, I love the Q&A posts. I always think they're so interesting.
So here's a grammar question for you since you love words so much. What is the deal with everyone saying 'these ones'?....I want to put an exclamation point after that because it drives me nuts? (& a laughing emoji because it's not that important.) I think you're use of it here in linking the mashed potato post may be the first time I've heard it in written word, usually I just hear it spoken. But it sounds like a double negative. When I hear/see this phrase I feel like you're repeating the same word twice. "like these ones" is referring to mashed potatoes...these mashed potatoes like there are more than one I guess? But in my head I read mashed potatoes twice. Weird I know.
I did not know you could buy instant mashed potatoes that are just potatoes? We almost never eat them but my family likes the Bob Evans ready-to-eat potatoes. They aren't very economical.
And we love canned green beans at our house, sauteed in butter with a little diced onion, sometimes mushrooms. It has to be a sturdy bean, not French cut. I sometimes use olive oil but we just love the taste of butter!
Hmmm, that is interesting. So you'd have just said, "these" instead of "these ones"?
If you were choosing between several pairs of shoes, would you say, "I want these." vs. "I want these ones?"
I wonder if it is a regional thing!
@Jenny Young, years ago a newspaper editor explained the use of "these ones" to me. She said that the phrase isn't grammatically incorrect. In this case "these" is used as an adjective and should be followed by a noun, "ones." However, she would always change "these ones" to "these" because she believed that good communication required simplicity--no extra words.
She also had strong opinions on the use of "alright"--it was not acceptable--and "you guys."
I would agree with her for something more formal, such as newspaper writing (or school papers! I am formal in education-related writing).
But for my blog, I generally just write the way I talk: chatty, casual, and conversational, which explains my use of both "alrighty" (which is not even a word as far as I know) and "guys" at the end of this post. 😉
@Jenny Young, I've never thought about this before. (Made me smile to see that you accidentally used "you're" instead of "your". in your observation about grammar. . . don't you hate that we can't correct our own comments?)
The use of "these ones" sounds like a regional idiom, similar to people saying, "I love me some . . ."
The idea (from @Darlene Too) that "these" is an adjective needing a noun but dropping the noun to keep things simple makes sense.
One thing I've learned if you can't have dairy: boil the potatoes with herbs and garlic in the water, and mash with BOTH something fatty (olive oil, animal fat) and something watery (broth or water.) I used to just add herbs and oil and the texture was never right. You need something watery for a fluffy texture!
For green beans, I love a sauteed bean, but I often boil them for speed. I boil them in heavily salted water and take them out after 3-5 minutes, depending on the thickness. They always come out bright green. I either add salted butter and lots of pepper, or gomaae.
Do you know something funny? I've only had gravy maybe twice in my life. Gravy with meat isn't really a thing for Ashkenazi Jews, or at least not in my family. I find gravy (and things like roasted turkey, stuffing, and cranberry sauce) to be quite exotic.
@Meira@meirathebear, for creaminess, my brother-in-law used to mash potatoes with a raw egg. Had to be done vigorously and quickly so that the egg cooked from the heat of the potatoes while being well-mixed in so as to not cook in chunks. He worked up a sweat every Thanksgiving treating that mashed potato responsibility like a matter of national security.
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, I saw a chef on IG the other day do this and they looked very creamy and lovely. I guess it would be like duchess potatoes, but you don't bake them after. I thought I would try it next time to do away with a bit of the dairy (I eat dairy, but my belly doesn't like it).
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, that's a great idea, thanks! I've seen that in potatoes used for shepherd's pie. It does make them nice and creamy.
@Central Calif. Artist Jana,
My mother used to thoroughly mix an egg in with cold leftover mashed potatoes, form patties, roll them in a dusting of flour and fry them slowly in butter in a skillet. I loved those potato patties.
I tried that once and mine were TOO loose. I think I needed stiffer potatoes to start with! My patties just flattened right out in the skillet.
@JD, My MIL always did that, shaped like little cigars, called them crumplets, and they were delicious.
@JD, my mom and mammaw would add a bit of flower to the mashed potatoes, no egg, and fry up. I've yet to figure out the "bit of flour" but we rarely have leftover mashed potatoes. My pappaw used to put mayo on them (they weren't made with mayo). Much as I love mayo, the mere thought of that makes my stomach turn. Go figure.
@JD, One of my favorite memories! She especially used to do it the morning after Thanksgiving if we had leftover mashed potatoes. Even after I was married and out of the house, she would call me and tell me she'd make potato patties if I wanted to come eat. Sadly, I have never mastered them. (I have a big-eating husband and two now-grown sons who ate everything in sight.
We never had left over mashed potatoes!)
I may be in the minority but I love instant potatoes. If I make them, I would probably sub chicken broth for the water. When I eat out, if they are real potatoes, I sigh. If they are instant, I'm like, yes, these are the good potatoes! We cook rather low carb for the most part so I usually only fix mashed potatoes about once a year (and they are real, for Thanksgiving).
The funny thing is, I don't know if I have ever actually HAD instant potatoes! So I don't even know if I like them or not.
@Kristen, if you've had KFC potatoes, you've had instant. 🙂
@Kristen, Ha, I was thinking the same.
I make mashed potatoes from scratch in the Instant Pot.
I steam green beans then sauté in butter and garlic.
I grew up on instant and jarred everything and was amazed the first time I ate non-instant mashed potatoes! My son can’t eat the typical boxed potatoes due to his dairy allergy, so I have only ever made them from scratch. I like the potato skin left on and the texture not too smooth, and like to refer to my version as “smashed potatoes”. I still do not like gravy, though. My dad always brings a couple jars at Thanksgiving for himself and my husband.
@JenRR, I also grew up on canned green beans, garlic powder, and canned or jarred mushrooms and was amazed to learn that the real things actually tasted good. Same thing when I had butter instead of margarine—never looked back.
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, I’m not sure if it was a generational thing or what (my parents were born in the 1940s). I discovered good vegetables as an adult!
a package of mashed potatoes are yummy
DS2 is famous around here for his mashed potatoes. His main secret is to cook the potatoes in chicken broth or stock. It sets the stage for deliciousness when the usual things are added later.
You can then save the yummy drained potato brothy water for future soups or gravies.
I love a number of Kristen’s recipes as well as so many tips from the commentariat! Thanks for these posts. Besides cooking ideas, this group is loaded with great ideas; I never fail to hear a super idea to consider.
I remember dating a guy in high school that came to dinner and later said to me that my mom's potatoes were full of lumps. His mom had never made anything other than instant so he couldn't understand why my mom's had lumps haha.
I prefer making mashed potatoes, but I keep a thing of instant potatoes in the cabinet to thicken soups (like broccoli cheese soup or potato soup or whatever).
Roasted red peppers are one of the few convenience items that I will pay more for rather than do them. I HATE peeling the skins off of peppers. No matter what method...I find it tedious and not an easy job. And usually I find that the jarred roasted peppers don't cost much more than buying red peppers since you get a couple in the jar.
I'm a southern "cook them til they're dead" green bean girl. I will saute some for DH and I for a meal real quick, but if the kids are coming for dinner or it is a holiday...the beans get the life cooked out of them with bacon grease, onion, a touch of sugar, etc.
All gravy is good in my book. The only time I do jarred gravy is sometimes I will add leftover Thanksgiving gravy to a jar of gravy if we don't have enough leftover gravy.
@Marlena, I assume that the boyfriend who called out your mom's potatoes for lumps got shown the door fairly quickly! 😀
@A. Marie, I couldn't figure out what he was talking about until I went to his house and his mom made potatoes. I was like...what is this? This isn't potatoes haha. Neither of us had widened our horizons beyond our own homes or table at that time in life 🙂
@Marlena, well, live and learn!
@Marlena, I bought a jar of roasted red peppers at Dollar Tree!
Thank you for the explanation and the link to the basil/roasted pepper mayo. Since cutting out as much sugar and pasta/bread/potatoes as possible (The If-It-Tastes-Good-Spit-It-Out diet), much of the pleasure has gone out of eating. So, I will be joining Team Sauce to find ways to add zest to meals. (NOT giving up dark chocolate, NOT NOT NOT. So there.) I have basil growing on my window sill right now, so now I need to get some peppers. They are "only" $3/each at my local grocery store.
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, Zucchini is a pretty good side dish alternative to starches. If you add sauces to the sauteed zucchini--or summer squash--it will just taste like the sauce. So like pesto, roasted tomato sauce, cream-based sauces, etc.
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, my vote for side includes cauliflower. It adds body to a lot of things, such as stews. I have a recipe to try that involves tossing florets in tahini and garlic, then roasting. Fl the funny thing is, I used to hate cauliflower.
@WillamB, yea!—just got back from the grocery store (Rich People Grocery Store, not Winco) and bought cauliflower because it was on sale. "Only" $3/head. . . I don't like potatoes, and Husband hates cauliflower, so it will be fun to see if I can turn it into something we'll both enjoy for dinner tonight. Wish I'd thought to read recipes before stumbling across it and impulsively tossing it in the cart, because most recipes call cream cheese their "secret ingredient" to making great mashed cauliflower. I have cottage cheese, butter, and sour cream, so we'll survive.
@Central Calif. Artist Jana, no need to give up dark chocolate - the darker the better as a matter of fact. It is good for you in the appropriate serving size.
I love instant mashed potatoes. I only buy the plain ones, not pre-seasoned, due to allergies.
I started using them because I had chronic fatigue for several years and needed all the shortcuts I could find. I could make them from scratch now, but I love how easy the instant ones are and how soft and smooth they turn out. And buying whole potatoes is not necessarily cheaper. I've done price comparisons and found that the instant potato flakes are almost always the best bargain in my stores, unless there's an especially good sale on fresh potatoes. Plus, being dried, they don't go bad, and they're very handy when I need just a little bit to thicken soup or something like that.
@Elizabeth M, thank you so much for this comment. I'm six-ish weeks late to the game but still came to the comments to say that it's very ableist to denigrate products like instant mashed potatoes. For people who are disabled, something like this can be a lifesaver. I love real mashed potatoes, I love instant mashed potatoes. (I love just about any kind of potatoes! 🙂 There was a time in my life when I was quite ill and instant mashed potatoes were easy to make and very comforting to me. They provided sustenance for a meal here or there, when I didn't have a lot of choices. Shana Minei Spence, MS,RDN,CDN, has an account on Instagram called @thenutritiontea and has written a book called Live Nourished (highly recommended!). She talks about convenience foods (which are put down by health food influencers, chefs and home cooks who have the skills, time, and money to make everything from scratch) and how they can be lifesavers for disabled people, people who live in food deserts, and people who work multiple jobs/care for children/care for elders etc. who just need to get food on the table. Also, the judgmental comment about "jarred gravy" in the original question is the same kind of thing---I was actually surprised that Kristen didn't call out the question writer for being judgy and unkind. The question seemed the antithesis of the caring, supportive and non-judgmental community she usually cultivates here.
My chief roadblock to making potato anything is the routine of get the ice cream bucket, go out all three porch doors and around the corner of the house to the cellar, go down and pick out however many potatoes from the big bags, and reverse. Why does this make me lazy? I dunno, but it does.
@Karen., sounds like a worthy roadblock to me. Could you keep a smaller number of potatoes in a more convenient location?
@WillamB, you're right, and I usually do. These potatoes are unfortunately to the point where if I keep them in the house, they'll grow way faster.
I did put on my big girl britches and go out last night for potatoes. Just talking about it is encouraging, I guess. lol.
I like frozen green beans. I just sautee half a sweet onion in olive oil with salt and garlic powder and then toss in a bag of whole frozen green beans (alreaddy microwaved quickly while sauteeing the onion) for the last couple of minutes. They're still bright green and crunchy that way. Really good for quick green beans and frozen are usually less expensive as well.
SO excited about this green bean recipe post! Thank you so much! Love all the side dish/accompaniments food talk in this post. Very helpful! Wouldn't mind at all if you made this a regular series because yeah, coming up with side dishes (that I/we actually want to eat) for meals lately has been a real mental block for me lately. I did make a sort of loose New Year's resolution to try more new recipes this year!
Once in a while I buy a pack of instant potato flakes to use to thicken soup or to add moisture to a bread recipe. The most frequent use was making a few spoonfuls to coax my sweet little dachshund who had so many health problems to eat. She loved instant potatoes and meat baby food when her gastritis kicked up and it was mild enough that it stayed put after she ate it.
I once had company whose young child got hungry while at my house. I had applesauce on hand plus I made some instant mashed potatoes using more liquid than usual. The baby was happy with that.
I don't make store bought instant potatoes yet I do use instant potatoes that I make and package in air tight vacuum bags. All I need to do is add what ever seasoning / flavors to the powder, some hot water and a little mixing is all it needs. I will admit that I have a complete kitchen with many items to make my own things. I have such because I know our food supply (meaning manufactures) is very unhealthy for the most part.
If any one is interested in doing the same for them self here is what you will need ~ pot for boiling potatoes, dehydrator or oven, some type of storage (I use my seal-a-meal yet mason jars or containers will work; just depends on how long the are to be stored) and something to mix with.
Boil you potatoes, drain and mash; do not add anything to them. Dry them completely either in a dehydrator or oven. Once dry you can package them for storage or grind them to a fine powder before placing them into storage containers. FYI- you can add dried veggie powders such as bell peppers, carrot, mushrooms or what you like by cutting it up then dehydrating them for later use. When I make my powders I grind them to a slightly course grind after drying them then put them in shakers so I can add such to any meal I make. The veggie will soften with cooking or hot water unless you want it a slight bit crunchy as what occurs when I sprinkle my powders on salads.
@Terri,
I had never even thought about dehydration! How do you reconstitute them then?
@JD, boiling water or you can use cold and microwave them. When heating / preparing you can add butter, sour cream or anything you like so it all gets warmed up. I do this sweet potatoes this way as well; have not tried rice yet I have seen this done as well with such. The time saving is not really there other than you can grab and go instantaneously when using them....you still have to make and prepare them for storage yet it is a much better option than store bought.
One thing I forgot to mention is that if you dehydrate anything that is to be store you must be absolutely positive it is completely dry especially if you are not vacuum packing them . It is not hard yet some, that prefer mason jar storage, will also place moisture absorbing packages in said jar as well.
I have friend who says her husband only likes green beans if they're from a can! That always made me laugh as they always had a garden.
@Bonnie, that would be my husband as well!
I cannot stand over-cooked or greasy green beans because my mother prepared them by boiling the life out of them with a hunk of fatty salt pork.
@Ruby, Mine, too. He also loves that holiday green bean casserole, which is an abomination in my opinion.
@Lindsey, calling it an abomination is being far too polite in my book.
potatoes: While I enjoy the taste and texture of mashed potatoes a lot (comfort food!), I almost never make them. Don't know why. I tend to cube and roast them instead. I'll make mashed for shepherd's pie, that's about it.
Gravy: something I almost never use, so when I do I use a packet (powder + water) and it turns out great.
Roasted red peppers: Hubby buys them in jar for his salads. I personally don't really care for them
Green beans : I find them so hard to cook right! They stay too crunchy or they become mushy. I feel like there is no middle ground for us. But give me perfectly cooked vibrant green beans = yummy!
@Isa, I grew up on packaged gravy and Minute Rice! Both so easy to make from scratch, but my mom was more of a baker than a cook.
I love reading all the comments!
Potatoes: I'll eat both real and instant. I usually keep the instant for emergencies, but I have made them in non-emergency situations and I like them. I often add in extras (cheese, sour cream, and bacon bits) and those make everything yummy!
Green Beans: I buy canned (no salt...for my husband). Neither of us are wild about them. He likes "crunchy" ones. I grew up on my mom's canned green beans that she always heated up with bacon and that's the way I prefer them (soft and a bit greasy from the bacon). I really should try some of the ways I read in your comments! They sound better. I, overall, am not wild about green beans.
Gravy: I mostly make it if I fry chicken (not very often). I drain off most of the oil, and stir flour into the oil and fried bits left in the pan. I cook that a bit, then add milk and cook till I get the consistency I want. We love it! My mom and dad both made this kind of gravy and it makes me think of them...both great cooks!
Roasted red peppers: I just don't think to make them, but they sound yummy and easy!
Better half has been buying these instant mashed potatoes (smaller bag for the two of us, larger when feeding four. A guest brings homemade for holidays).
https://idahoan.com/products/baby-reds-flavored-mashed-potatoes/
The sodium content is not bad - 17% of daily value.
I'll make sausage gravy for biscuits and gravy. Heinz poultry gravy (no MSG) is good, other flavors meh.
Mashed potatoes with green peas: my comfort foods. I use the real potatoes, peel them, boil them and mash with a potato masher. When my kids were young, they considered mashed potatoes to be a treat. My son used to call them "smashed potatoes" as in "Yay, we're having smashed potatoes tonight."
I always make my own mashed potatoes and sub in plant based milk and margarine for allergy reasons. They’re not bad! I did buy some pure potato flakes for an emergency and used them for making mashed potatoes while camping. Not.A.Fan! Now, in an effort to avoid food waste and use up the big bag, I’m using them to thicken soups, which is fine. On the other hand, instant hash browns, are just fine!
I like to stir fry green beans, but still want them soft. I love to eat raw green beans! And, always have a can or two around for a last-minute side dish or bean salad.
Early on, I occasionally blenderized my too lumpy gravy; but, I can’t remember the last time that happened. The key is really to make the slurry ahead and blend in slowly. Stirring is an absolute necessity. If someone helps me in the kitchen, I will always compliment them … “you sure did get a good stir on that gravy!”
Mashed potatoes in the instant pot is a game changer for me. I use broth instead of water and once they steam, you just fish out the trivet from the IP and add your butter, sour cream, liquid of choice and mash away. No crossing the kitchen to drain the pot and such good flavor steamed vs boiled.
Ever since reading your green beans in a dry pan post many years ago when you first posted it, that has been the only way that I've made green beans. I don't eat them very often these days as they're too high in carbs but they are so good done this way.
Cold, canned green beans for a child's bedtime snack?! What that what?
That is supposed to say "What the what?".
@Tammy,
Green beans are not high in carbs.
@Liz B.,
Yes, they, like other legumes are indeed high in carbs.
Real mashed potatoes are not hard and I make them often. But I always have a a box of instant mashed potatoes in my pantry. In a pinch, they work but I most often use them as a thickener for soups like real potato soup or a creamed ham/cheese soup.