Baking Soda or Powder in Mashed Potatoes

While waiting for contractors to fix the power in the house yesterday, I spend some time reading the Houston Junior League Cookbook (1968) and under the hints for cooking vegetables (p216) I found "Mashed Potatoes: Add a pinch of baking powder or soda, as well as milk and butter, to make mashed potatoes light and fluffy." Has anyone done this and if so does it work?

I can not see baking soda having much of an effect as milk is not very acidic and so would not produce meaningful CO2 to add lightness to the potatoes. Using buttermilk instead of milk would produce CO2 and should have an effect.

Baking powder should produce CO2 in the milk, but I doubt the heat of the potatoes is enough to cause the second reaction.

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Chris_Young_80640

Milk is more than acidic enough to cause the baking soda to rapidly degrade and produce CO2.

But I'd lean towards baking powder too (single-action would be best) since it's already balanced out between acid and base so that you don't end up shifting the pH of the mashed potatoes (alkaline potatoes are probably not delicious).

DiggingDogFarm_65362

Baking powder is suggested a lot in many old cookbooks.

It does work.

I don't remember ever seeing baking soda recommended.

~Martin

Chris_Young_80640

Interesting. Would love to see a couple of those old recipes posted. I've never tried leavening mashed potato (or any other puree) with a chemical reaction. It's a neat idea.

Tim_Sutherland_52834

I haven't been able to find any mashed potato recipes in any of my cookbooks that list baking powder or baking soda as an ingredient. An online search finds references to adding a pinch of baking power when mashing. I found one recipe with baking soda but buttermilk is being used so it makes sense.

Searching "Baking Powder + Scrambled eggs" returns many recipes (never heard of this either).

Brendan_Lee_56950

I've seen that before. I remember my grandma would do that when wok frying scrambled eggs. She said it's what maid them nice and puffy.

DiggingDogFarm_65362

Here's one from an old edition of the Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook:

I know there are recipes in some of the other older cookbooks that I have (hundreds of them that I inherited from my Grandmother) the problem is I can't recall exactly which ones. LOL

~Martin

Chris_Young_80640

Thanks Martin. I'll have to try the technique.

hueezer

If you're here from BuzzFeed, make sure you check out our Beef Gravy Recipe that'll go along great with mash potatoes: http://www.chefsteps.com/activities/beef-gravy

Edwardo_30331

All true Tim, works great!

you can also use the baking powder & milk on fresh Squid, soak in a bowl for 15 minutes then coat & fry. It makes the squid very tender. Here in Thailand they soak squid in Soy sauce, sugar & fish sauce overnight then flash fry, Ed

Joan_Brink_Perkins_679322

My Dad always made the best mashed potatoes and he always added a pinch of baking powder