Dairy Free Mashed Potatoes and Gravy
Growing up I’d gladly have mashed potatoes and gravy with every meal. Oh, who am I kidding… I’d gladly do that now! Here’s the kicker: the way I used to make them had loads of butter and heavy cream and man, were they delicious! Since going mostly dairy free, I’ve really missed a proper creamy mashed potato. I can’t handle liquid dairy in any form but butter and hard aged cheeses are acceptable for me. For the sake of this mashed potato experiment, I wanted to make them completely dairy free for those of you who can’t handle butter either.
I’ve tried many ways to make them creamy and have been mostly disappointed with the results. Apologies to my family for the less than stellar mashed potato experiment over Thanksgiving. I didn’t give up and finally have discovered the secret is to add an egg to the mash. I figured this out when making my chicken shepherd’s pie as I was thinking that adding an egg would help it rise a bit like a little mashed potato crust. What I discovered instead, was the most amazing dairy free mashed potatoes I had ever tasted!!! These are so close to the “real deal” that I bet I could fool my family with my next Thanksgiving feast 🙂
I, of course, then had to make a dairy free gravy to go with it and also made it gluten-free by using rice flour while I was at it. I’m finally back in mashed potato heaven!!!!
P.S. These work as an easy make ahead dairy free mashed potatoes too!
- 4-6 potatoes, peeled and cut into large chunks
- 1 teaspoon pink himalayan salt (for cooking water)
- ½ teaspoon pink himalayan salt
- ¼ teaspoon pepper
- ¼ cup coconut milk or low sodium chicken broth
- 1 egg
- 3 tablespoons olive oil or butter
- 1 tablespoons chives
- FOR GRAVY:
- 3 tablespoons butter, olive oil or lard
- 3 tablespoons rice flour
- 2 cups reserved water from cooked potatoes (or use broth)
- ¼ cup pan drippings from cooked meat (ham drippings are especially tasty!)
- ⅛ teaspoon pepper
- ¼ teaspoon salt or more to taste, optional. This will depend heavily on how flavorful/seasoned the pan drippings are.
- Place cut potatoes in a large saucepan and add water to about 1 inch above potatoes. Add 1 teaspoon salt.
- Boil potatoes until fork tender, about 30-40 minutes.
- Drain potatoes and reserve 2 cups of the potato cooking water for the gravy.
- Mash potatoes with a potato masher or use a hand-mixer and blend in salt, pepper, coconut milk (or broth), egg, olive oil and chives.
- FOR GRAVY:
- Place butter/olive oil or lard in a small saucepan and heat until melted. Add rice flour and whisk to make a thick slurry.
- Add reserved potato water (or broth), pan drippings, salt and pepper and whisk to combine.
- Boil until thick, about 5 minutes.
This recipe also works with 8-10 medium size potatoes for a larger group. Just double all of the ingredients!
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