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Potatoes

Mashed, baked, chipped or roasted potatoes are a great British favourite. The majority of our potatoes are British and Red Tractor accredited all year. Selecting the correct potato variety for your chosen dish is key to achieving the best results. We have created the guide below to help you produce perfect potatoes.

Baking

Pauleys offers baking potatoes in a range of sizes to make it easy to select according to the occasion. Baking Potatoes 30s is the largest baker we offer and 80s is the smallest.   

Chef's suggestion:

  • Rub the potatoes with oil before baking to achieve delicious crunchy skins.

Mashing

The secret to good mashed potato is to select a potato with a moderate dry matter. If the dry matter levels are too high, mash can be lumpy and grainy and if the water levels are too high, the mash might be sloppy. Certain varieties usually have moderate dry matter levels, which makes them ideal for mashing.

We recommend:

  • Maris Piper - excellent
  • Rooster - excellent
  • King Edward - good
  • White Ware - good
  • Red Ware - good


Chef's suggestion:

  • When adding milk and butter, warm them before adding to the potato, this stops the potato going cold. 

Chipping

Two factors contribute towards the perfect chipping potato. Firstly the dry matter should be fairly high as too much water in the potato will lead to soggy chips. Secondly, storage conditions are important. If the potatoes are exposed to storage conditions that are too cold, they can produce sugar which then may cause burning during frying. We take care to ensure our storage conditions are suitable.  

We recommend:

  • King Edward - excellent
  • Maris Piper - excellent
  • Rooster - good
  • White Ware - good
  • Red Ware - good


Chef's suggestions:

  • Try blanching in boiling water before frying to make sure your chips are perfectly cooked. 
  • Chipping potatoes are also great for making potato wedges.

Roasting

The properties of a good roasting potato are similar to a good chipping potato; a fairly high dry matter and suitable storage conditions. The best potatoes for roasting are King Edwards and Maris Piper.

We recommend:

  • King Edward - excellent
  • Maris Piper - excellent
  • Rooster - excellent
  • White Ware - good
  • Red Ware - good
  • Washed Salad - good
  • Vivaldi - good

Chef's suggestion:

  • Par-boil the potatoes in gently boiling salted water. Leave to cool completely, then scratch roughly with a fork and season with a little fine salt.