Tip: How to Keep Mashed Potatoes Warm (Or Re-Heat Ones You Made Ahead of Time)

Reader kari-anne brought up a good question in our most recent Open Thread. She's making Thanksgiving dinner for 20 people and wonders how she can make the mashed potatoes ahead of time and keep them warm. We have a few tricks we've used...

Mashed potatoes do get stiff and gluey once they sit for a while. And while, to be honest, we'll eat them cold and hard, straight from the refrigerator, obviously you want them to be fluffy and creamy on your Thanksgiving table. But they cool down fast, and making them at the last minute isn't always an option.

One tip that we've used before (art also mentioned it) is to set your bowl of potatoes over a pot of simmering water, just like a double boiler. Cover the top of the bowl with plastic wrap or (our choice) a dish towel. Give it a stir every 15 minutes or so to keep the mixture well heated.

If you only need to keep the potatoes warm for about 20 minutes, we've simply covered the bowl with a dish towel and let it sit. We usually make our mashed potatoes in our standing mixer, so we just throw a towel over the top of the mixing bowl and the potatoes stay plenty warm for up to half an hour.

We've also made mashed potatoes the day before Thanksgiving and re-warmed them with great success. Here's our best tip for going that route: Add a healthy extra dose of cream and butter, so that the potatoes are almost soupy. You want them to just about drip off the end of a spoon. Put them in a deep casserole or soufflé dish—even a dutch oven will do—and store in the fridge overnight. Then warm them up in the oven the next day, uncovered, with a little butter on top. The extra moisture will evaporate and you'll have creamy potatoes. If you're really nervous about the outcome, do a test run to see how much extra liquid you need to add to get the consistency you want.

Any other tips?

(Image: Flickr member Steffe, licensed for use under Creative Commons)

Comments (15)

My tried-and-true truc: make your spuds, and then pour a THIN layer of milk/cream/half-and-half (any of them) onto the surface of the potatoes. Let it sit, cover it, and before you're ready to serve, put the pan back over low heat, and blend in the liquid with a fork (not a whisk). I've done this ever since watching a teacher of mine do it in cooking school, and it works like a charm.
If you have to re-heat the next day, just do the same thing: cold potatoes into pot, cover with thin layer of the above, bring the heat up slowly, and then fold in and serve.

Crock pot! Make them in the morning (or the day before) and keep them on the warm setting until you want to serve. I agree to start with a little extra cream or butter or milk and keep mixing.

My family's do-ahead potatoes. These freeze well. Go ahead and make them this weekend!

Ingredients:
5 lbs. potatoes
2 T butter
1 t salt
1/4 t pepper
1 C sour cream
1 pkg (8 oz) cream cheese

Boil potatoes and mash with remaining ingredients. Place in greased casserole dish. Dot with additional butter and cover. Refrigerate or freeze.

To serve, bake at 350F for 15 minutes covered with aluminum foil. Remove cover and bake 15 minutes more.

ENJOY!

Adding milk, cream or butter which are cold brings down the temperature of the potatoes. It may help to consider melting the butter and warming the milk or cream to mitigate some of that effect. Also, I leave the potatoes in the same pan they were cooked in with the lid on rather than move them to a serving dish.

The potatoes pictured at the top of this piece are unnaturally yellow. How much butter was added to them?!

Orchid - they look like Yukon Golds. There are certain types of potatoes that are naturally that yellow. There are also potatoes with red flesh and blue flesh, that remain those colors even after cooking.

This isn't about reheating, but here is my tip for better mashed potatoes -- it's something I learned from my mother-in-law.

When you boil the potatoes, add a peeled onion, cut in half; discard when the potatoes are done.

It heightens the flavour of the potatoes -- you won't notice the taste, but the potatoes will taste better. Try it.

Do like my oma and put the pot of mashed potatoes in the bed under the covers.

Imagine my surprise seeing this as a post! I just grabbed my boyfriend from the living room to show him. I feel so special :-)

Anyhow, this is excellent timing as I hosted a dinner last night for 8 and "tested" a method to keep mashed potatoes warm.

I ended up making them ahead of time and placing them in a terracotta pot (I will use my large dutch oven during Thanksgiving). I put the pot in the oven at around 400 degrees for about 30 minutes. I tossed some milk and butter on the top before putting them in the oven. They turned out great!

I've been eating leftovers this morning. And, yes, they were cold - straight of the fridge :-)

Thanks everyone for the great advice!

These tips have been helpful. I have always wondered if I could make mashed potatoes the day before a dinner...I'm going to try it. MERCI.

If you're only needing to keep them hot for an hour or less I always follow the tips above (towel over the top), but before serving I put them in a casserole dish put a few pats of butter on top and throw them under the broiler for a few minutes. It helps reheat the whole dish and gives you a golden buttery crust on top that we always fought over as kids.

If you make them early in the day (before the last-minute rush), pile them into Crockpots to keep warm. Even if you don't have a "warm" setting (mine doesn't), just keep them on "low" and stir every now and then. If they start to dry out, a tad more milk will invigorate them before serving.

i just heat them up in the microwave and add extra milk if they aren't the right consistency

I make my mashed potatoes 1st thing in the morning. I set my crock pot on low, put a little milk and butter in the bottom then add the mashed potatoes. They are perfectly warm and ready for hot gravy when dinner is served!

This is exactly what I needed to know. I made my mashed potatoes yesterday, and I want them to be awesome today. Will be following these tips. Thanks!

I used the crock pot to keep my potatoes warm this year- after reading this thread.... they were AWFUL!!! They cooked to the point of browning on the bottom. As they began to cool, they got super hard. And, yes, I used the low setting. And yes, they started out very tasty.
I will never do this again.