I made these last night, thinking “Snort, who doesn’t know how to boil potatoes?” Me, evidently, because they Would Not Smash. Finally we quartered them with a knife and beat the holy hell out of them with a meat tenderizer, scalding ourselves with pieces of potato. So you didn’t get little individual potato smashes, but after they came out of the broiler they were most crispy and excellently good.
These really are the most awesome potatoes! And so variable. I’ve only made them once, but I put dried rosemary, bacon bits, salt and pepper on them while roasting, then added sour cream and chives after they were done. Way better than twice baked potatoes, and so easy!
We’re having them again this week. My husband loves them. They’ve definitely made it into the rotation.
ETA: I didn’t boil mine long enough either.
I made these a couple weeks ago while we were on vacation. I didn’t have a recipe, was working from seeing the article once online.
I boil potatoes fairly often, so it’s not like a strange new method to me.
After the potatoes had boiled for plenty long, I’d poked them with a fork and they seemed done. But the first one didn’t smash properly, obviously not soft enough. So I put that one in the microwave for a bit and put the rest back in the pot to cook some more.
I checked the taties again, they’ve been on quite a long while and should be really soft, don’t want to overcook - they seem ok when I poke 'em, but…they still weren’t really done.
We were getting hungry, so I went ahead anyway. They weren’t very pretty because they didn’t smash right, but even so, they came out tasty.
Eventually I realized that I was at 9000 feet and it was going to take a really, really long damn time to boil anything. 
P.S. My one thought for the next time (which will be back at sea-level where I know how to cook, thank you very much) is to score the top of the potatoes before you smash them. I think it’d be much easier and they’d break where I want them to.
Yeah, scoring didn’t really help. I tried that. We just eventually reduced it to a pan of potato rubble, which turned out plenty good. I used olive oil, salt, pepper, and Sunny Paris seasoning.
Great name for a recipe.
wow this sounds very very familiar for some reason…
yeah the bits that were cooked were damn tasty though.
It might help if you boil the potatoes until the skin cracks on its own. The first one I mashed didn’t look exactly like the pictures (I over mashed it), but with a little practice, I got them looking fairly close. Once I mashed them, I scrunched and shaped them back together a bit by hand, so they weren’t so flat.
I just whipped out a batch of 4 of these using 2 red, one Yukon gold and one blue potato. Microwaved for 10 minutes till tender, mashed with the masher, topped with a dash of olive oil, a thin pat of butter, a sprinkle of dried chives and now for the drum roll, Bacon Salt. They tasted fantastic. The only change I would make would be adding the bacon salt just for the last few minutes, the little nuggets of goodness became quite hard and crunchy while in the oven.
One of the stores I shop at has potatoes on sale (buy one one 5 lb bag, get one free - so I’ll be eating a lot of potatoes over the next few weeks). I’m making quick ‘n’ dirty stew to use up some leftover chuck steak tonight, but I’m setting aside the smallest potatoes to use for this recipe later in the week.*
I also noticed that the bag the pototoes came in tells you how to cook potatoes in the microwave, but not on the stovetop.
*which reminds me I need to find something I can use as a potato masher
Potato masher for this recipe, or for mashed potatoes? For this recipe, a washed and dried heavy can works - I use a big chili bean can from my pantry. After I smoosh the taters, I sort of stab at the surface with a fork a few times to get the nooks and crannies. Or I use the pointy end of my meat pounder thingy - nice nooks and crannies, but kind of a pain to clean.
For mashed potatoes, I like a handheld mixer best. Which, technically speaking, gives you **whipped **potatoes, but I love 'em smooth and fluffy.
For this recipe; thanks for the suggestion. I generally prefer my mashed potatoes chunky (and with the skins on), so I usually just cut the potatoes into chunks, boil them until fork-tender, then mash 'em with a fork, adding butter and whatever to taste.
It’s nice to have a real masher, though - I use it for guacamole, makes it a lot easier to make in case the avocado is a little hard.
I have a food chopper that I’ve used for making guacamole, but somehow I don’t think it would work as well for mashed potatoes.
That’s 'cause you make that gross smooth blended guacamole. Chunks is where it’s at. With tomato bits and onions.
Does anyone else d use that “if it grows above the ground-into boiling water, if it grows below the ground- into cold water” rule?
It’s the one my granny taught me for cooking veg.
To cook faster get a wider, shallower pan which will boil faster than a narrow, tall one, and don’t pack the potatoes in, make sure there is plenty of room for the water to circulate.
Actually, it depends on my mood. And whether I’m too lazy to chop the onions by hand and decided to use the chopper instead. My last batch was fork-mashed, with salsa and bacon salt.
Good Gad.
Gently rub the bowl with crushed garlic. Gently smooth the avocado with a spoon against the bowl to a uniform smoothness.
One must have some principles.
Well, it depends. The Southern Green Beans, Potatoes, and Bacon that I learned how to make from watching my Dad and neighbor, was all boiled from the ground up, usually way overcooked by today’s standards - It was a simple recipe for
Giant Runner Beans, bacon, onion, and diced potatoes…
A couple of pounds of bacon chopped, (salt pork or ham and hambone optional)
4 onions chopped
About 4 pounds of Fresh Green Beans, snapped and stringed
5 potatoes peeled and diced
Water to cover
A large amount of salt
Plenty of pepper
Sautee the bacon and onions together in the bottom of a large stockpot until transparent, and the bacon is developed and crispy. Add the Green Beans and the Potatoes, add enough water to cover as well as a the goodly amount of salt and pepper. Bring to boil, and turn to a simmer. Simmer for at least two hours uncovered.
There’s something to be said for Greens beans fresh from the garden and boiled till mush with bacon and potatoes, along with its likker over the modern quick sautee method.
[Damn Yankee] And that something would be, “yuck!” [/DY] 
Has anyone tried this recipe with Russets?, I was in the store yesterday and I didn’t want to buy the 5lb bag of reds, and only Russets were sold individually.