Go to the Recipe: Sous Vide Pomme Purée
Just made these for tomorrows dinner and they are much easier than the previous one on the sieving of the potatoes. As others have commented, it took about 70 min to get the potatoes tender at 0.25 inch thick but other than that I appreciate the updated recipe.
Maybe it's my elevation, when they came out of the bath, they were no where near soft enough to be passed through a ricer. Wound up throwing them on the stove and just mashing them. Oh well.
I love these, and have experimented over the years, this year I did a few things that may help: I did not mash and re-bagged, instead after sous vide, I cooled and refrigerated. I then warmed to 150F for 1h in sous vide, and then mashed lightly with a masher, and here’s the biggest quirk, I used a stick blender to puree into the smooth sticky texture and was amazing. I also used half the butter recommended.
Potatoes in South America are different, and in general of far better quality than the potatoes in North America. Generally speaking, South American potatoes are far more dense than North American potatoes, so I would add some potato starch or drop the amount of liquid to get the same result.
I reheat them SV and use the same temp (approx 70C) as I do for my sauces.
I don't know what am I doing wrong but I can not get this recipe right. Maybe potatoes en Argentina a different. IDk
Interesting. I have done this recipe using butter only (add cream/milk in the final step) and have found they freeze/reheat quite well.
So the best way to reheat the puree is sous vide? How about the microwave?
Not recommended since it will never reheat the same. The cell walls burst when frozen.
Does anyone think this could be frozen at any stage?
Guys, is this correct, 450g of butter? Half as much butter as potatoes? I only had a stick and a half of butter, about 150g, and with the milk, it was a soupy mess.
Kenji Lopez Alt did an experiment over at Serious Eats/Food Lab to see how long you could hold potatoes sous vide at turkey-cooking temps and there was no detrimental impact after something like 12 hours.
Well JC, the recipe is for starchy potatoes and cauliflower has zero starch. You will be making a cauliflower puree and will need very little liquid if any to make smooth. Ultra-tex will help you achieve the potato like puree you are looking for. I would just puree cooked cauliflower with a ;little fat and call it good.
That should be just fine. If the puree is already cooked and cooled, then bagged. All you would have to do is warm it back up in the bag. 3 hours may be excessive.
Any thoughts as to how you might adjust this recipe for cauliflower and coconut milk instead of potato and milk?
I only have one Joule and am trying to sous vide both my turkey breast and my potatoes for Thanksgiving. Do you think I could fully prepare the Pomme Puree @ 194°, bag and seal the finished product, then place it in the water bath with the turkey as it cooks @ 145° for 3 hours?
Do you have timings for cooking taro roots sous vide? As a diabetic I don't eat white potatoes (and don't like sweet potatoes), and taro roots are extremely close in flavor and texture to a white potatoe with far fewer downsides. But the cook time must be very different.
That's my biggest disappoint about ChefSteps. Cannot recall any of them ever answering ANY questions on their own blog.
I use a 5-gal bucket filled with water + bag(s) to within 4" from the top. Works like a charm every time...so far.
you can do the water displacement in room-temperature water -- before you heat it
Hello! I have a medium 20 cm sieve (#50), and it took too much time to pass 3 boiled crushed potatoes through it, so I decided to buy new 30 cm ones (shouldn't I?). Is #40 OK? What could you recommend?
From Grant's recent email: "So many home cooks struggle with gloopy mashed potatoes. Cook them just a bit too much and they release starches like crazy and make for terrible potatoes. Cook the potatoes sous vide, at 194 °F / 90 °C and the potatoes cook up tender without releasing all the starches that make for a gummy paste. Try our pomme puree, in which we cook the potatoes sous vide, in milk and butter, instead of water. This recipe, and our other sous vide potato recipes, will make you realize that potatoes actually have a flavor."
Since a Joule can heat up to 208°F, I'm going to assume there is a reason they specify 194°F. To quote Chris Young: "At The Fat Duck we actually did two blanching steps: the first was at around 70 °C to gelatinize the starch, the second was done between 90 °C and 95 °C to dissolve the cell walls."
MC's adaptation of Heston Blumenthal's recipe is here, sous vide at 162°F followed by boiling directly in water: http://www.modernistrecipesdb.com/recipe/619/
If you google sous vide vegetables, the most common temp is 180-184°F, but thanks to ChefSteps, I usually do 194°F, which cooks much quicker. Other circulators have trouble quickly hitting, or ever getting to and maintaining these temps, which for me is a big selling point in favor of the Joule.
Actually no, we cannot all agree that grams are easier the volumetric or Imperial measures. For example, 900 grams = 1lb 15.7oz. Really? Is there a taste/texture/prep/appearance difference from 2lb? Doubt it. Also, rather than a scale and measuring cup, setting the rare on the cup, adding the liquid to the cup until the right weight is reached, skip the scale and just add the appropriate volume of liquid to the cup. Much easier. Sorry to disagree.
Over 200 degrees sous vide bags inflate, under 200 degrees they do not. We would always have circulatory set to 194 degrees to blanch any vegetables needed at any time. It’s not about the possibility of doing things but the attention to details in doing it.
I think the sieve thing is all about not beating the potatoes up with a motorized blade. The recipe above is close to Joël Robuchon's classic butter with a bit of potato. If they don't rice easily they're under-cooked. Same for a #10 sieve ( 2 mm ). SV seems a strained application here. 194 degrees F is only 18 degrees below the limit that you can take water to so WTF? Joist boil the things in the bag. I cannot imagine a mechanistic reason to limit heat to 194 in an engine that maxes out at 212 if a potato is to be put in it.
Boil them in an unsealed bag at just below a full boil. When they probe 200 at the center rice them, run through a 2 mm test sieve then a 300 µm sieve.
I’ve made these several times with great effort. Finally, I just started using the second smallest grate on my box grater and put the grated potatoes and the released starch directly into my Sous vide bag prefilled with the milk, butter, and salt. I cook them in plenty of water so the mixture is never more than an inch and a half thick during the cooking process. I still think that they need an hour and a quarter to fully lose that raw potato taste, but then they go right through the #10 and as long as you put that mix back in the bath to rewarm it for a few minutes, they also go right through the #50. I hope this helps someone.
One thing we all need to watch is the thickness of the product we slide into the waterbath. Doesn't matter if you slice the potatoes 0.5cm or 2cm thick, if you end up stacking them and making a fat bag of sliced potatoes. Anything thicker will heat or cook slower, so, what I do is divide sliced potatoes, salt and the liquids into separate smaller bags, so no bag is more than 3x slices thick. That way, the waterbath can effectively transfer the heat into my ingredients within the specified timeframe. Also, the more water in the waterbath, the more stable the temperature will be (see how ChefSteps use those big plastic tubs in their videos). If you try and squeeze 900g of potatoes in 1x bag into a small saucepan with Joule tucked on one side, that's going to cook (or transfer the heat into) your food really slow, your potatoes will still be undercooked after an hour. Small bags with less ingredients to reduce the overall thickness, and a high volume of water, may fix all your issues here.
Hello. What if you hold the liquid in the bag at the cooking temp while ricing the potatoes? when it’s time to mix it will bump the temp of the purée up.
I'm back with an update on the way I make this.
As Ann Hupe mentioned, cooking them sous vide can be frustrating in the amount of time it takes for them to become tender. I have switched to baking the potatoes for this reason. Boiling them with the jackets still on probably would work well too.
I have started using Yukon Gold potatoes but this hasn't made an extremely big difference to me besides in color.
After I bake them until tender, I pass them through the fine disk on my ricer into a bowl to weigh the potatoes and plug their weight in on this page to use the ratio here as is. (I eat much less in a serving now and prefer the full amount of butter)
On the stovetop I heat the other ingredients in a pot large enough to hold everything. When hot, I whisk or fold in the potatoes and turn the burner to low.
I have found that it is crucial to keep the potatoes hot when sieving.
Otherwise the butter starts to stiffen them up and sieving takes forever.
The ricing allows me to skip the #10 and just go right to the #50 sieve. I would suggest anyone who is serious about making pomme puree buy one because I came to realize that the texture just isn't the same with only a standard sieve.
I haven't completely abandoned sous vide for this recipe; I tend to make a large batch and portion the potatoes into vacuum bags to freeze them. Then all you have to do is drop a bag into a 150 degree bath (or whatever temp you happen to be cooking protein in) until you're ready to serve. This method is more effective than stovetop reheating and is probably the best method for holding mashed potatoes in general.
If you find that any excess butter has separated from the potatoes when reheating, all that's needed is a short whisking.
I think one of the problems with many of the complaints regarding undercooked potatoes may be this. If you are using old potatoes, the water content will be drastically reduced -- even more so than most would think. Here's the problem. Milk and butter does not contribute much in terms of providing additional water by which to cook the potato. It's like boiling macaroni in milk. There isn't enough water in milk (especially evaporated milk) to adequately rehydrate the pasta. The process of cooking potatoes like this is that you aren't water logging the potatoes. You confitting potatoes. So you need a high water-content, floury potato to make this work.
This was great advice. I have failed with these multiple times, but mandolining the potatoes to to 0,5cm and cooking for 90 minutes made all the difference. Thanks, Gabe.
Easiest solution for those without a sous-vide machine.
In a large round pot, add 1 part sliced potatoes to 2 parts cold milk and 1 part butter mixture. Add salt to taste and Bring to a gentle simmer.
When potatoes are fork tender, strain out the cooked potatoes and save the milk/butter mixture. Pass the potatoes through a ricer or food mill.
Slowly Ladle in the warm milk/butter mixture into the potatoes and mix through until creamy. Adjust seasonings. You may have leftover milk/butter mixture. Save for next time.
Serve immediately or keep puréed potatoes warm over a double boiler until ready to serve.
Having made this several times now, I think I've got a few tips and techniques that may help others.
Budget Friendly Option:
Excellent results can be obtained by only using a #10 (or thereabouts) sieve. This is the "#10" sieve I bought. It's not a true #10 test sieve and I haven't measured it to see what the actual sieve mesh measures, but it seems to work just fine for this purpose, plus it's affordable. Paired with an appropriate sized cake pan to catch the product, you can make fantastic Pomme Puree for under $50.
All of that being said, I purchased a much more expensive 12" #50 sieve and pan as well and I can tell you the finer sieve definitely makes the texture even better. But for large batches or when it needs to be made in a hurry, I would only use the #10. For anyone curious, I bought a Gilson brand #50 sieve and pan on Amazon. I did a lot of price comparison and they seemed to be the least expensive stainless sieves. Whatever you get, 12" should be the minimum size as you'll want the room to work product through.
General Tips:
Hope this helps someone out!
Just as a follow-up, I made the recipe again with two russet potatoes, half the butter, and I skipped the #10 sieve for a potato ricer. I cooked the potatoes for an hour like last time, and they were sliced very thin. Using the potato ricer saved some time, but it's still a challenge getting the potatoes through the #50 sieve. So once again, they were cold by the end of the process. Not a problem as they can be warmed on the stove, but in my experience you need to account for that added time of reheating. Cutting the butter by half had no detrimental effects, and the potatoes were silky smooth. The sieve truly does add another dimension to "mashed potatoes." I'll continue to use this recipe with half the butter, even if it does require a lot of work...
I seem to have experienced what a lot of others have too. I followed the exact recipe scaled to half. I cooked the potatoes for about an hour. They were nowhere near soft at 30 minutes (and I even cut the russets to 0.5cm). The potatoes passed through the #10 sieve ok, but it certainly wasn't easy. The pass through the #50 sieve was painful. My hand was killing me, and I'm a really tough dude:) It took a LONG time, and I only did half the recipe. Worst of all, it took so long that the potatoes were cold by the time I finished (and this probably didn't help passing through the sieve). Sure, I could have reheated, but this certainly isn't a pot-to-table recipe (in my experience). I will try again with a potato ricer as many have suggested. Maybe that will help both the first and second pass through the #10 and #50.
As for the butter content, I was able to whisk it into the potatoes once I forced all the content through the #50 sieve, but the butter leaked out of the puree pretty quickly once on the plate. this might have been due to the cold of the potato????
As for the texture, the sieves and the butter made for something pretty special. I just wish I didn't have to break my hand and eat cold potatoes to experience this....
I could not force the potatoes through the recommended screens. A disaster. The only thing I've encountered on this site that didn't work at all. That said, the screens are amazing, and I use the finest one for stock defatting all the time and love it. SO, buy the screens, scrap this recipe and use a ricer for potatoes.
Waaaaaay too soupy. I've tried it twice. The first time I eyeballed ingredients. The second I figured I did something wrong and went with following it exactly (except the butter). It didn't help. I'm going to bake it tonight in hopes of evaporating some of the moisture, but this recipe needs altering. Keep in mind I already used HALF the butter, and it was still ridiculous for 2 pounds of potatoes.
Just a quick comment-I strongly question the butter to potato ratio. I've made my mashed potatoes for more than 20 years by steaming 1.5" cubed russets for about 45 minutes. I steam for the same reason they sous vide -- boiling completely waterlogs your potatoes. I also run the potatoes through a food mill and swirl in the liquids (butter first, then half-and-half) with a whisk. Very similar technique to theirs and it has been flawless for years. I'm attracted to this recipe because it frees up space on the stovetop and I don't have a big steamer kettle to clean afterwards. Many years ago, I created an Excel spreadsheet that calculates the amount of butter and half-and-half (I use that instead of milk) also in grams. (side note - can we all just agree that grams are easier to use for cooking???) ;-)
My calculator's proportions for 900 grams of potatoes works out to 112 grams of butter, or about 1 stick. My half-and-half comes to 236 grams (theirs is 250) and I even find that a bit too much liquid sometimes, and end up using less. But their recipe calls for 450 grams of butter; basically four sticks!!! That seems like waaaaaaay too much! My recipe results in extremely rich and buttery potatoes; I can hardly imagine adding more, much less three sticks more!
I'm going to try this recipe tonight as a test but I'm sticking to my proportions. I'll check back here after that.
K
I've made these without problem 6 or 7 times now. they are flawless. After the first two times I cut back on the butter by 25% and it didn't affect the results negatively, just saved us from eating an extra stick of butter. 'Cause, really, 3 sticks per side dish should be enough
I'm really sorry so many are struggling with this. Watch the video, follow the recipe, enjoy, repeat.
I've made these twice now. Both times I cooked them for over an hour and the potatoes still end up under cooked. I had to dump the bag into a pot and finish it at a simmer. They turn out amazing, but not with Joule. And why has no one from Chefsteps chimed in on this? Seems like the majority of people are having issues
I don't understand why people have had so much trouble with this recipe. I've done it with russets and yukon golds. I prefer the yukon golds. I've done it with grass fed sweet butter and grassfed cultured butter and I prefer the cultured butter. Next time I try it, I'll try retrograding the starch first, as even a 1/2 portion is far too much food for me to eat as a side and I'd like to see what happens to it when it cools when it's retrograded. The first two times I did this recipe my #50 sieve hadn't arrived yet, so I was pushing them through a plain fine-mesh screen with the back of a spoon. Once my test sieve came, they tasted even smoother. I can't wait for my #10 to arrive so the first mashing process is a little more convenient. The shipper accidentally sent me a #100 that I really have no use for.
As for many of the others this went completely wrong for me. Ended up boiling the whole fatty mess in a pot, not before I had splashed my walls with a butter milk mixture trying to puree them in the kitchenaid.
@Scott Anderson unsalted. different brands of butter use different concentrations of salt. using unsalted butter is a lot easier to control the level of desired salt.
Made this yesterday before reading the comments. Like others, this recipe didn't work at all. Too much butter, and the potatoes weren't cooked even after cooking an extra 15 minutes. I ended up putting everything in a pot on the stove and cooking it for another 20+ minutes. I used Yukon Gold potato, and it was on the soupy side. I managed to scrape together a reasonable meal, but this took double the amount of time listed, and I didn't even sieve it. I just used a potato masher.
I felt compelled to write something because usually your recipes are spot on. Even after tripling the cooking time in Sous Vide and using much less liquids / butter (as others had indicated) it was a hot mess. I can't even imagine how it would have turned out had I followed the instructions verbatim. If for some reason you still feel compelled to try this, do it on a dinner that doesn't matter and ensure you have lots of spare time - don't make the same mistake as me!
Salted or unsalted butter?
Just like most people here, complete disaster! not enough cooking time, too much butter, fiasco of epic proportions on Christmas Dinner night. Had to microwave, then mash and then mix with liquids... I had potatoes to serve but just barely. certainly didn't look like the picture. one thing is certain, you should correct the recipe, because as stated simply doesn't work.
