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Boiling Potatoes

Potatoes are boiled in salted water until tender, then drained and optionally peeled.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 2 ingredients
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Boiling Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the potatoes well in cold water.

  2. If the potatoes are diseased, peel them and cut out the eyes and black specks.

Cook

  1. Place the potatoes in a saucepan and cover with cold water.

  2. Sprinkle 1 teaspoon of salt over the potatoes.

  3. Bring the saucepan to a boil and cook for 20 to 30 minutes until tender.

Drain and serve

  1. Drain the water and let the potatoes dry by the side of the fire.

  2. If not peeled, carefully peel the potatoes and place them in a hot serving dish.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the main body of the dish, becoming soft and fluffy as their starch cooks in water.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the potatoes and the cooking water so the flesh tastes evenly seasoned.

The step that matters

Cooking until tender. Potatoes are done when a knife slides easily into the centre. Removing them too early leaves a firm, starchy core, while overcooking makes them break apart and turn watery.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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