Italian Mashed Potatoes
My 100th recipe! Of course it’s a potato recipe!
What’s better than a side of mashed potatoes with that steak dinner or alongside Mama’s Meatloaf? They are my take on traditional mashed potatoes with an Italian twist! How about these Italian Mashed Potatoes made with pancetta and mascarpone cheese? These are so decadent! These potatoes are rich and creamy! I actually don’t mash these until smooth as you would with regular mashed potatoes. I like these rustic with a few chunky bits! You get a bite of all that this has going on that way! These are certainly delicious right after mashing everything together, but I like toast some Italian style breadcrumbs in the pancetta fat and top the potatoes. A quick blast in a hot oven and you have a crispy topping for a little crunch! These were gobbled up at our house! Perfect for dinner tonight!
Italian Mashed Potatoes
Ingredients
- 4-5 medium potatoes
- 2 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 small medium onion finely chopped
- 3 cloves garlic finely chopped
- 4 ounces pancetta
- 1 8 ounce container mascarpone cheese
- 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese grated
- 2 tablsepoon butter cubed
- 1 tablespoon fresh rosemary finely chopped
- 1/4 cup Italian style breadcrumbs
- salt & pepper
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- Remove mascarpone from the refridgerator to come to room temperature.
- Wash and peel potatoes and cut into quarters.
- In a large sauce pan boil potatoes about 15-20 minutes until tender.
- While potatoes are cooking, chop onion & garlic.
- Chop rosemary.
- Add the pancetta, garlic and onion to a small saute pan with 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Add salt and pepper.
- Fry until the pancetta is golden. Be careful not to burn the garlic. This should take about 10 minutes. In the alternative, fry the pancetta first until crispy and then add the garlic and onion. Set aside.
- Once the potatoes are cooked, drain them and return them to the hot pan off the heat.
- In the warm pan add the pancetta mixture, fresh rosemary, butter, Parmesan cheese and mascarpone cheese. Do not discard any goodness in the saute pan where you cooked the pancetta. Just set the pan aside.
- Mash with a potato masher until all the large pieces of potato are smooth. Leave the mixture a little chunky.
- In the pan where the pancetta mixture was cooked, add the breadcrumbs and toss in the pancetta fat.
- Toast to a light golden brown over low heat. About 3-5 minutes.
- Remove the potatoes to a baking dish and smooth out the top. You can serve them as is if you like!
- Top with toasted breadcrumbs.
- Bake until golden brown - about 5 minutes. Serve
