Ingredients

• 900g/2lb potatoes (Désirée or King Edward)
• 50g/2oz butter
• 3 fat garlic cloves
• halved lengthways
• 8 tbsp best quality extra virgin olive oil
• salt and freshly millled black pepper

Directions

• First place the garlic and olive oil in a small saucepan over the gentlest heat possible - a heat diffuser is good for this - and leave for 1 hour for the garlic to infuse and become really soft.
• Use a potato peeler to pare off the skins as thinly as possible and then cut the potatoes into even-sized chunks
• not too small. If they are large
• quarter them and if they are small
• halve them.
• Put the potato chunks in a large saucepan
• then pour boiling water over them
• add 1 dessertspoon of salt
• put on a lid and simmer gently until they are absolutely tender - they should take approximately 25 minutes. The way to tell whether they are ready is to pierce them with a skewer in the thickest part; the potato should not be hard in the centre. And you need to be careful here
• because if they are slightly underdone you do get lumps.
• When the potatoes are cooked
• drain them. Cover them with a clean tea cloth to absorb some of the steam for about 5 minutes
• then using an electric whisk on a low speed
• begin to break them up using half the garlic and oil. As soon as all that is incorporated
• add the rest of the garlic and oil and whisk until smooth
• seasoning well with salt and freshly milled black pepper.