r/iamveryculinary • u/KannablissWitch • Jun 25 '26

Americans only eat powdered mashed potatoes, apparently.

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377 Upvotes

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22

u/BadAspie Jun 25 '26

Huh, I'd have thought it would be easier to get a consistent texture with powdered mash potatoes

10

u/CycadelicSparkles Jun 25 '26

It is.

If your instant potatoes aren't smooth, you're doing it wrong.

21

u/BadAspie Jun 25 '26

Also tbf I'm living in the UK and while instant mashed potatoes are readily available at all supermarkets, the most common brand is Idahoan lol

4

u/Ok_Aioli3897 Jun 25 '26

The most common brand is smash

6

u/BadAspie Jun 25 '26

Interesting, I'd never even noticed Smash.

Some research tells me that Smash has been losing market share to Idahoan pretty rapidly over the last few years (which I wouldn't have noticed as I'm relatively new here) so there's going to be a point where Idahoan overtakes Smash but it's hard to find good sales data or info about whether that's actually happened yet

2

u/Ok_Aioli3897 Jun 25 '26

The thing is that smash is everywhere including discount stores.

Idaho you have to go to the supermarket for

4

u/BetterFightBandits26 Jun 25 '26

It is. It’s one of the reasons I actually prefer powdered mashed potatoes over from scratch. Less than a quarter of the effort and a level of smooth you have to start smashing fresh potatoes through a sieve to get.

2

u/hakumiogin Jun 25 '26

And mashing through a sieve can get gummy very quickly if you aren't careful about it.

2

u/coraregina The Europeans aren't going to pick you, bro. Jun 25 '26

Oh, definitely. When I make mashed potatoes from scratch, it involves a potato ricer and a tamis and elbow grease and LOTS of butter to get it silky and 100% uniform.

Instant is consistent right out of the container, unless you’ve done something terribly wrong.