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Instant Mashed Potatoes

Submitted by admin on Sat, 08/09/2008 - 07:35

Very few things which are labelled "instant" truly are.  Among those that are instant, very few are satisfying in either taste or texture.  Instant mashed potatoes are  one of life's exceptions.  All you need to be able to do is bring water to a boil in order to make something that is so darn close to the real thing, we're betting you could fool a lot of the people a lot of the time.  Instant spuds make a great accompaniment to chili, or you can dress them up and take them out on their own as a complete meal (See Cheesy Spuds).
 
OK, we know, there are instructions on the package, but here are ours anyway:

At Home:

At home, combine the following in a ziploc bag
  • ½ cup Instant Potato flakes per person
  • 1 Tbsp Milk Powder per person
  • ¼ tsp salt per person
  • Optionally, you can add  one or more of these: dried chives, a pinch of garlic powder, dried dill, or other herbs.
And, in a sealed plastic container (don't risk ziplocs) put
  • ½ Tbsp margarine or butter per person

In Camp:

  • In a pot, place water equal to the volume of potato flakes
  • add margarine and bring to a boil
  • Stir in potato flakes
  • Cover and let sit for 3 to 5 minutes.
 
Note:  You can purchase flavoured instant mashed potatoes.  These are actually quite tasty, although, with fixed package sizes, they provide less flexibility in serving sizes.