Boiled potatoes are widely used in salads, mashed potatoes and hundreds of other dishes are made from it. Why is this happening?
What determines the condition of tubers after boiling, if they were in boiling water at the same time, at the same temperature? The "guilty" in the friability of potatoes is primarily starch, which is contained in its composition.
Starch, its content in potatoes
The average starch content in potatoes is 15 percent, but the figure is actually quite averaged. Today, many varieties of this root crop are cultivated, among the whole variety there are options with different indicators of starch content. If it is not enough - potatoes will not be boiled. This applies primarily to young tubers of any variety that have not yet had time to stock up on nutrients for the winter. They are ideal for cooking if you do not want to deal with product spillage. The small size, high density even after boiling makes them an ideal solution for salads, for example.
A high starch content gives the opposite effect. A well-ripened root crop, belonging to one of the varieties rich in this substance, boils to cracks. Vegetables can fall apart when cooked, even without external influences. There are situations when it literally dissolves.Some housewives believe that in such cases we are talking about improperly grown crops that were literally flooded with pesticides, but such claims are not true. The faster, the more potato boils, the more starch it contains - this is the only right answer to this question.
How to choose a suitable potato?
To predict the behavior of tubers during cooking, it is necessary to pay due attention to the choice of product. Starch root crops can be found in advance, focusing on the variety, other indicators. It is enough to ask the seller about this. If this is not possible, you can distinguish the varieties of potatoes by their starchiness on their own - there are signs that allow you to do this at first glance.
If you need to buy mashed potatoes, for example, it makes sense to look for varieties with an average starch content. If the skin of the root crop is stiff and dense, and the flesh is yellowish, it can boil to a soft, friable flesh, it should be chosen for baking. However, for cooking and for salads, these options should not be chosen. Otherwise, the average indicator of 15-25 percent is universal, such a potato is suitable for almost any case.
Tubers with a high starch content, which give a gentle mashed potatoes, are suitable for deep fat, frying. However, when cooking, the root crop will not hold its shape; it is better to refuse such an undertaking. Tubers with a thin skin and whitish flesh have a smaller volume of starch, they can be cooked both in a peel and in a peeled form.
Other causes of potato cracking during cooking
In addition to the starchiness of the vegetable, there are other factors that can cause it to crack during cooking, even complete digestion to a mushy state. Excessively high temperatures, excessive cooking time, mechanical intervention - intensive stirring - all this can lead to the fact that the tubers crack, begin to disintegrate. If you put potatoes of different sizes in a pan, the smallest will cook faster than large ones, begin to boil, gradually turning into mashed potatoes. For this reason, it is necessary to cook root crops of the same size, or cut larger into halves.
Thus, the main reason that potatoes crumble during cooking is the presence of a large amount of starch in this product. However, not all potatoes are the same, if there is a desire to avoid a similar effect, it is enough to simply select low-starch varieties. Today there are many varieties of potatoes, if necessary, there is always the opportunity to choose the option suitable for a particular dish.
