Mashed potatoes! The beatings, the maulings, and the ultimate degradation to a which an honest Irish potato must submit tomorrow turn me sad-eyed from my plate.

Claire Warner Churchill, From “An Oregon Protest Against Mashed Potatoes”

Now there’s a woman who doesn’t mince her words. The quote above is just a small extract from a 5 page complaint about potatoes being “fluffed, whipped, paddled, pounded, beaten, bruised, crushed, flouced and shaken, but never – oh the pity of it – never mashed”. Notwithstanding the fact that I am intrigued by the notion of flounced potatoes, I have a certain amount of sympathy with the woman’s stated position on what some people do in the name of mash.

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