Instead of a long story about how my recipe reminds me of a cosy winter evening in the mountains, I start with a quick difficulty list. This means you can easily decide if you’re up to it or if you’d rather toss a pizza in the oven.

For ingredients, 1 means you may already have all of them at home and 5 means you may need to special order an ingredient.
For equipment, 1 means the most very basic of tools need and 5 means needing to buy a special piece of equipment you may not use often.
For method, 1 means as easy as prepping and tossing in the oven and 5 means you’ll feel like you’re juggling flaming knives.

Ingredients: 1/5
Equipment: 1/5
Method: 1/5

This recipe makes 4-6 portions

Ingredients:

  • 1 kg red potatoes (peeled or not peeled as desired)
  • 1 cup milk
  • 150 ml soured cream
  • 100g salted butter
  • salt, pepper and paprika
  • lemon juice

Equipment:

  • 1 large cooking pot
  • 1 colander
  • Sharp knife
  • Cutting board
  • Potato masher
  • Medium baking dish

Method:

  1. Fill a cooking pot with water and add a generous amount of salt and stir
  2. Chop potatoes into approx 1-inch cubes and add to the pot
  3. Bring the pot to a boil. If peels are still on, boil until peels just start to come off. If peeled, boil until a potato can be easily squashed by a spoon.
  4. Drain water using the colander and put potatoes back into the pot.
  5. Add milk, soured cream and most of the butter leaving about a 5th of it for later
  6. Mash potatoes until lumps are largely gone. If potatoes are still too thick, add a little more milk
  7. Season with salt, pepper and a dash of paprika and continue mashing. Season with salt and pepper to taste continuously
  8. Once complete, scoop the potatoes into the baking tray. Preheat the oven to 200C
  9. Coat the top of the potatoes with the remaining butter
  10. Once the oven is hot, bake the dish uncovered in the oven until crispy on top. Usually about 20 minutes, and can turn on the broil setting for the last 5 minutes to get extra crisp.