Vegan MoFo Giveaway Winner - Brandi! & Creamy Garlic Potatoes

Brandi has won a copy of Ani Phyo's Raw Food Essentials! Please contact me at thediscerningkitchen@gmail.com with mailing info so I can send the book to you. I hope this book will help you add more delicious raw food into your diet!


I have been taking part in creating some great dishes lately in preparation for Thanksgiving, but the camera has not been available to capture them. Last night we had a few friends over for dinner and enjoyed roasted garlic potatoes, sauteed kale, spinach dip, sliced veggies, and cranberry chutney (which oddly went really well with the potatoes and spinach). For dessert - Gluten Free Apple Pie. Tonight it was No Clam Chowder. Despite the lack of pictures, I will post the recipe for very garlicky mashed potatoes - and hopefully return soon to post a picture.

Creamy Garlic Potatoes
Serves 4 people with some left overs
4 medium-large Yellow Skinned potatoes (you can use red or russet, but this is the variety I chose)
2/3 cup cashews
2/3 cup water
1 head of garlic (yep, the whole thing)
1 tsp salt
1/2 lemon, juiced

Cut the top off the garlic head exposing the tops of the cloves. Drizzle a small amount of olive oil over the top, and put the garlic into the oven, preheated to 400 degrees. I can usually tell it's done when the house starts to smell of garlic (10-15 minutes?). The garlic will not discolor, but become a little transparent and be pierced easily with a fork.

Cooking the potatoes: Thoroughly scrub the skins of the potatoes and rinse them. Place the potatoes (skin on) in a large pot of salted water and set the burner temperature to medium. It will take around 30-45 minutes to boil the potatoes; cook until the potatoes are easily pierced with a fork.

Take the potatoes out of the water, drain them, and use a cooking mitt to hold them while you peel them. You don't want cold mashed potatoes, do you? :) Mash in a large bowl with a potato masher.

Put the cashews, water, lemon, salt, and all of those roasted garlic cloves in that head into a high speed blender. Blend until smooth and creamy. Slowly combine the liquid into the mash potatoes. If you want really creamy potatoes, use a hand mixer until you have achieved the consistency you like. I prefer mine lumpy.

Potato Tips: Potatoes need to be stored carefully and used quickly. One they start to develop green sprouts or a greenish hue to the skin, they have a toxin called solanine. The solanine is not in the green areas specifically (that's chlorophyll), but is rather an indicator that the toxin is present. Cutting off the green skins is not sufficient. While it takes a large amount of green potatoes (4+ lbs according to snopes.com) to start developing symptoms, it's best to not to buy them in excess. Those cheap 10 pound bags aren't always the bargain they seem - wasted food is very expensive.

Potato Storage: Storing potatoes out of the reach of light will increase the shelf life. I put mine in a cabinet in my kitchen. Storage temperatures are ideally mild, but not overly cold. When the weather is overly warm or your house gets too cool in the winter, they will age faster.