A recipe for enough rich, buttery, mashed sweet potatoes to feed a crowd, made and kept warm in an Instant Pot. Just enough added sweetness to enhance the potatoes’ natural flavor without making them taste like a dessert food. No marshmallows!
Mashed Sweet Potatoes for a Crowd, in an Instant Pot
Course: SidesCuisine: American8
cups10-12
people lavishly1
hour30
minutesIngredients
1½ cups water
5 lbs. sweet potatoes
1½ sticks of butter, room temperature
1 cup milk (2% is fine)
2 Tbs honey
1 tsp thyme
¾ tsp salt
Directions
- Place a short trivet into an Instant Pot. Pour in water. Place 5 lbs. whole, unpeeled sweet potatoes into the pot. (See notes.) Set the Instant Pot to STEAM, more (15 minutes), high (pressure); natural release 15 minutes.
- Dump the pot’s contents into a strainer and remove the trivet. Once the potatoes are cool enough to handle, it’s easy to peel the skins off by hand.
- Mash by hand with butter, milk, honey, thyme, and salt.
Notes
- This recipe was developed for a six-quart Instant Pot. If using a different size or type of pot, you may need to make modifications. Five pounds of sweet potatoes may pile up higher than the max line in a six-quart pot, but not so high that the potatoes touch the closed lid. Exceeding the max line may go against the manufacturer’s instructions. I didn’t experience any problem, but I can’t guarantee that you won’t.
- Substitutions: cream for some of the milk, maple syrup for the honey
Social Learning
The “short” trivet is the one that probably came with your Instant Pot. It’s less than an inch tall. I call it the short one, because as I’ve gotten more into Instant Pot cooking, I’ve purchased more trivets of various heights.
As you’re peeling the potatoes, inspect each one to make sure that it doesn’t include any obvious, stringy fibers. You might find these close to the skin, or at the stem end. I don’t come across this commonly, but I do come across it. Those fibers will not mash smoothly; make sure to discard them along with the peels. The fibers don’t ruin the flavor, only the texture – and only the texture because you’re mashing them.
Everyone seems to think that sweet potatoes need to be sweetened. I’ve read recipes that recommend anywhere between 2 Tbs and 1/4-cup of anything from sugar to syrup. I think that sweet potatoes are sweet enough on their own, although I don’t mind enhancing their sweetness just a touch. So, I’ve kept the honey very much on the light side. You might even experiment with cutting the amount I’ve recommended in half, or cutting it out completely.
I prefer to mash potatoes by hand, because I like the rustic texture. Even so, I go easy on the mashing. If I feel I’m making too much progress too quickly with a potato masher, I switch to a flexible spatula, and fold them if they still need more mixing.
When it comes to serving, you can keep the potatoes in the pot, with the lid on and the KEEP WARM setting activated. You can also make them ahead: let them cool, refrigerate them, reheat them in batches in the microwave, and keep them warm in the Instant Pot. You will almost certainly need to add a splash of milk – maybe more than a splash – to loosen them up.
The number of servings depends on a few factors. Is this the only side? One of only a few sides? One of many sides? A half-cup serving seems like a good default, in which case this serves a solid sixteen. However, when feeding a crowd, if you try to calculate the amount of food to the number, it will never look like enough.You have to factor in “opulence,” which means you have to overshoot. Your choices are only two: wind up with leftovers, or run out of food. And you never want to run out of food. Serve ten-to-twelve with this recipe, and you’ll feed them lavishly and wind up with leftovers – which is exactly what you’re after.
The Backstory
I like to make this for a big holiday meal when I feel like mashed potatoes might be a touch “automatic.” But I also like to make this recipe on the weekend, as meal prep for the week. I’ll freeze half the batch and use the other half for something like the simple burgers that I photographed for this post, or I might just reheat a cupful for a mid-afternoon snack.
Mashed Sweet Potatoes for a Crowd, in an Instant Pot
Credit for images on this page: Make It Like a Man! unless otherwise credited. This content was not solicited by anyone, nor was it written in exchange for anything. Thank you, Kesor. Thank you, ⌘+C. References: Ina Garten (OJ, brown sugar), Martha Stewart (steamed, brown sugar), Serious Eats (roasted, sous-vide reheated, maple syrup), Rachel Cooks. Make It Like a Man! is ranked by Feedspot as #13 in the Top 30 Men’s Cooking Blogs.
Keep up with us on Bloglovin’
toujours bon la purée de patates duces!
bonne semaine
I don’t own an instapot but could easily make a scaled down version of these for TheHub, who loves sweet potatoes. I have never thought ti add thyme to sweet potatoes. Thanks!
Mmm… sweet potato mash! Yours looks delicious, Jeff.
Thanks, Gary!
You’ve created the perfect cozy dinner side with just 6 ingredients and 3 simple steps… talk about brilliant! I try to serve sweet potatoes almost everyday and this is the perfect way to change up the flavors and texture!
Thanks, Heidi!
I could eat at least one pound of this in one sitting. It looks and sounds very delicious.
Oh, you and me both! You should come over next time I make them!
Hola Jeff. No suelo utilizar mucho la batata, por aquí boniato y eso que me gusta mucho. Lo suelo hacer asado, pero de eso hace mucho.
Este puré tiene muy buena pinta y en compañía de esa hamburguesa conforman un plato estupendo.
Un abrazo.
You know, I was tempted to roast these before mashing them!
Your mashed sweet potatoes look delicious. We never added sweetener to our sweet potatoes either. They must taste amazing with all that butter. I do love the IP!!!
Thanks, Judee!
When it comes to mashed sweet potatos, I always prefer savoury variations with an addition of herbs or spices like smoked paprika. This is right up my alley, despite a little touch of honey.
Thanks, Ben! I was on the fence about the honey, and I think you could easily skip it.
Un piatto meraviglioso e tanto invitante!!!!
Thank you!
Ah, this looks delicious! We’ve made mashed sweet potatoes with a little bit of coconut milk and butter. It sounds odd, but the coconut milk is surprisingly delicious. Oh, and you are quickly becoming the king of all things Instant Pot. Well done.
I’m really getting my use out of that thing, for sure! As I’m writing, I’ve got a pot of insta-rice cooking behind me! I love coconut milk, and I’ll bet it’d be fantastic with sweet potatoes! Thanks for the suggestion!
Un puré delicioso para acompañar muchos platos.
Gracias ♥
Thank you Pepi!
I also prefer to make mashed potatoes by hand, the texture is better. You have cooked a great mash!
Thank you, Javier!
While I never use it with russet or yukon, I love adding a little honey to my sweet potatoes. And forget serving to the crowd. I’d want the entire batch all for ME!
Oh, I know what you mean. I could just sit down and eat the whole pot!
Hola Jeff, me quedo con tu receta yo no suelo utilizar el boniato y eso que en casa nos gusta, parece ha de quedar un puré delicioso. Un abrazo
Thank you, Pilar!
We love mashed sweet potatoes and Mark just asked me why I have never posted my recipe – a good question. I love how many different versions there are! Also, I am impressed you still cook for crowds – I keep my dinners to six max!
That’s because you’re smart, and I’m not! Every time I cook for a crowd, I always wonder why the hell I do it. It’s so exhausing! These potatoes were to bring to a very large family Thanksgiving, and I found them to be so easy and relatively painless that I started doing them now and then for meal prep. The biggest meal I cook every year is for a barbecue for crowd of, like, 30 people that I work with. As I’ve done it for years, I’ve kind of gotten it down to a science. I should post about that sometime.
What a lovely recipe! It’s so convenient to use the Instant Pot, too. It’s perfect for holiday dinners when every element is busy making a billion other sides; this one sits effortlessly in the Instant Pot. I have never needed to sweeten sweet potatoes, they are sweet enough. Hope you’re doing well, spring is just around the corner.
Hand-mashing for that rustic texture? Absolutely agree!
Now that is a lot of sweet potato! Hilariously, Google has offered to translate your post from Spanish to English for me. I should have pressed Go just to see what happened!
cheers
sherry
Oh, that’s funny. I’m sure having it translated would’ve been hilarious! Yes, it is a lot of sweet potatoes. But we ate them all!