Aligot: French Mashed Potatoes
I love mashed potatoes. Really. It's my favorite side dish for the main course. I also like to have good mashed potatoes on their own. Preparation is not entirely trivial, many things can go wrong. If it's good, I can appreciate it properly.
So when I was reading about French specialties from the Toulouse region and came across aligot, my list of dishes to try got richer by another item.
Aligot is mashed potatoes mixed with cheese, cream, butter, and often a little garlic. It is a traditional French rural specialty from the Aubrac region, which is complemented by, for example, Toulouse sausages or roast pork. The taste of aligot is greatly influenced by the cheese chosen for preparation, most often Tomme, Cantal, but also the more familiar mozzarella.
Each manufacturer has its own recipe, but up to 500 grams of cheese is added to 1 kilogram of potatoes. Aligot is prepared in large pots, you will find it in restaurants, but also at markets. I tried the truffle version of aligot called truffade at the Sunday market Saint-Aubin.
The large portion of truffade, which you can see in the picture, cost 5.40 EUR. And how did it taste? Great! If you like mashed potatoes like me, after tasting aligot (or truffade with truffle), you will expand your list of beloved dishes by another item, I guarantee it.
Bon appétit!
