How many cups of Potatoes in 5 lbs?

Today I cooked 5 lbs of red skin potatoes to see exactly how many cups that would give me. You see, I’m really tired of going to websites that clearly are not making the food! I’m creating another meal plan for the homeless shelter and my numbers need to be exact or someone won’t get a meal! What I have learned is that I need to make the meals first so I know how many I am serving and I take notes–so I can give a recipe for mashed potatoes.

So . . . on this website you will always know that I make the food, I take the pictures and I whatever I write about–I serve my family.

How many cups of mashed potatoes did I get?

I had 8 cups of mashed potatoes. I put 1 cup of mashed potatoes on a plate and that looked like too much with the Mini Meatloaves. I decided that 1/2 cup of mashed potatoes/gravy with the meatloaf, a side of broccoli and the salad is a nice portion of food. Can’t forget we are having cookies for dessert!

We need to feed 50 so 5 lbs makes 8 cups, makes 16 1/2 cup servings . . . the math doesn’t quite work out for 50–so we need 3 people to make 5 lbs and one person to make a smaller batch of one pound or 3 pounds.

FRUGAL TIP: I like to buy bags of potatoes because they are typically cheaper than buying potatoes individually.

We often have mashed potatoes in our home–plain, with cheese, or with cheese and broccoli, or with cheese, broccoli and bacon, or with cheese, broccoli, bacon and onions . . . it is an easy meal that can be vegan!

You get the idea.

[yumprint-recipe id=’3'] Making mashed potatoes isn’t hard . . . but there are some tricks like:

1. Fill the pan about 3/4 of the way with peeled, cubed potatoes and you will never have trouble with enough room to mash.
2. Add chives, roasted garlic or caramelized onions after you mash the potatoes.
3. You don’t have to peel the potatoes–I often just give mine a little scrub and then cook.
4. The smaller the cubes the easier it will be to mash and the quicker they will cook.
5. You can make mashed potatoes ahead of time and reheat in muffin tins–very cute for single serving, freeze them to use later in soups, or use leftovers for Potato Kinish.

Be Blessed.

Originally published at reneebaude.com on November 22, 2013.