"Potatoes"

I am a lover of potatoes.

I love them any way you can give them to me.

These are some potatoes from our garden this year. Yummy :)

Because I'm always on the lookout for new and yummy potato recipes, I was searching around online for a different mashed potato recipe to go with my meat loaf dinner tonight.

And I came across something that at first confused me, then shocked me, then made me so very sad. It was a very emotional event.

I found a recipe called Mashed "Potatoes". What peaked my curiosity was the quotations around the potato part. Why the quotes?

As I read the recipe, I realized that there was nothing potato about them. It was a recipe for mashed cauliflower. With a few other ingredients, these mashed cauliflowers (can you pluralize cauliflower? Probably not, but work with me here.) are supposed to taste just. like. mashed potatoes.

Uh, no.

There is no way something that smells and tastes as strong as cauliflower could ever be a potato. It really shocks me (probably a bit too much) that it has come to this. That people are so scared of what they put in their mouth they are willing to 1. stop eating potatoes and 2. pretend that other foods are potatoes.

Really, is it worth it?

Studies have shown that most of the western world's current obesity problem is due to lack of movement and too much process foods.

During all this hype though, certain foods like eggs, potatoes, rice and wheat products have developed a bad name, and really, these are foods that are so healthy for you and have so much nutritive value! These are not processed foods, these are simple foods that if eaten in proper portions are very beneficial to our health.

And you need to move!! Move Move Move!!

And I'm not some skinny person preaching here. I'm overweight, by about 50 pounds. And I know that when I start to move and eat simple whole foods in appropriate portions my weight goes down. My problem is continuing those eating habits, but that is a totally different post.

I'm a soap box sort of mood today. But I digress.

Potatoes.

Eat them. They are good for you! One medium potato has just 150 calories, zero fat, 5 grams of fiber, 900 mg of potassium, and are a good source of vitamins C and B6.

And don't make other vegetables, pretend they are potatoes. Really, it isn't good for their self esteem. Or your taste buds.

I also wanted to share my favourite mashed potato recipe with you. So go grab some potatoes, or dig them out of the garden like we did just last week,

and start cooking!

Creamy Mashed Potatoes

• 4 large potatoes (I'm a fan of Yukon gold, but any potato will do)

• 2 table spoons butter

• 2 table spoons fresh chopped parsley or chives

• 1/4-1/2 cup milk (whole milk makes it creamier, but we use 2% and it still works well. If you are going to use skim, up the cream cheese by 1/2 a table spoon)

• 2 tablespoons plain cream cheese

• Salt and pepper to taste

Boil the potatoes until just fork tender, drain and add all remaining ingredients except for the milk. Mash it all together. Add the milk in bit by bit until you get the desired creaminess. Some people like to mash first and then add the other ingredients one by one to control the creaminess of the dish (and to make sure it doesn't get too watery), but I've done it so many times I just dump everything in and mash away.

Eat and enjoy! Just don't eat the whole pot.

Cheers!
Marina