How a Michelin Star Chef Makes Mashed Potatoes in 10 Minutes | Made to Order | Bon Appétit

Michelin Star Chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten joins Bon Appétit to make creamy mashed potatoes for Thanksgiving from his NYC restaurant, Four Twenty Five. Discover his restaurant-quality techniques you can emulate at home, using nothing but potatoes, cultured butter, and a pressure cooker to lock in flavor.

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[upbeat music] – Hello, I’m Chef Jean Georges, and I’m at Jean-Georges
Restaurant in New York City, and I will show you my
favorite mashed potato for Thanksgiving.
[upbeat music continues] [bell dings]
In New York City, we operate about 18 restaurants
on about 65 worldwide. That mashed potato goes from
Shanghai to Paris, London, Marrakesh, back to New York. Our mashed potato here is very simple. We use a pressure cooker. It takes six minutes to cook it. Buttercream, salt, very simple. [upbeat music] So the first step here
is to cook the potato. I use a pressure cooker, but
you can use regular pots. It would take a little longer. I’m adding about two pounds
of Yukon Gold into my pots. They absorb not too much
water when they cook, they stay firm, you know,
they have a great texture. It’s a low starch potato,
but lots of flavor. I’m adding about a quarter
and a half of water. Some salt, tablespoon. If I say that to my mother, cooking mashed potato
in a pressure cooker, she would kill me. Six minutes, walk away,
come back when it’s cooked. Pressure cooker really
keeps all the flavors, steams together. It cooks faster, but as well, it keeps… Nothing evaporates,
everything stays in the pots. And when it cools down, you
open up, it’s like magic. Magic in one pot. I think it is perfect mashed potato because you can walk away now. For the next 10 minutes,
you can prep something else. General time downstairs
in our prep kitchen, we have six of those going all day long. Making stews, making stocks,
making all kind of preparation. We’re gonna let the potato
cook and get back to it later. [upbeat music] [pressure cooker hisses] Six minutes on high pressure,
potato are cooked now. We let the steam go off, and then we’ll… Gonna drain them.
[pressure cooker hisses] Smells like potato. All the pressure’s releasing. Here we go.
[lid clicks] Voila, here we go. [indistinct] I’m gonna drain the water. That’s good. Well, now, we’re gonna use a ricer. So you can see the potato
are cooked, perfect texture. It’s a ricer, it’s a old school technique of pressing the potato. You can open up to a larger
[indistinct] or a smaller one. You want it to be very smooth and perfect. And when you use the mouli,
you know that high hand or any other technique,
sometime it gets really gummy. We’ll add the butter. This is Vermont butter, cultured. I use cultured butter. You know, you make the butter and then you let it ferment a little bit, and it really brings the
flavor of the butter. The cream, look at this. It should be, you know, smooth. I’m gonna add the salt. So salt in the water to
cook and then salt after. Okay, one more spoon. [spoon clangs] More salt. [indistinct] Has to be smooth. They’re not watery. And that’s it. You’re gonna fill up your serving dish or keep it in your warmer. I just like to add a
piece of butter on top. As you go to the table,
it melts a little bit on that spoon is the best. A little pepper. This is mashed potato for Thanksgiving in every restaurant we have in New York. [upbeat music] So the best part is when
you eat where the butter is. [upbeat music continues] Delicious. So you can see the potato are very smooth. I like when the butter is melting here. Little pepper.
[upbeat music continues] [hums] Great texture. To do a perfect mashed
potato, it’s very simple. It’s, you know, just
choose the right potato. It is not [indistinct]. Mashed potato is something very homey. Happy Thanksgiving.
[upbeat music ends]