How long to cook slow cooker mashed potatoes is here. The perfect side dish served year round and during the holidays. Fluffy and buttery made in your Crockpot, it can be made and kept warm for hours this way. If you loved air fryer mashed potatoes but wanted them to be tender all the way around here is the answer.
I love making slow cooker mashed potatoes as a side dish because everyone loves them AND theyโre a snap to make! You just need 3 simple ingredients to start with, and then load them up with bacon and goodness!! Just one Crockpot recipe here on The Typical Mom blog. (affiliate links present)
Table of Contents
- Slow Cooker Mashed Potatoes without Sour Cream
- How Long to Cook Mashed Potatoes in a Slow Cooker
- Ingredients
- Do you boil potatoes before putting in slow cooker?
- How to Make Crock pot Mashed Potatoes
- How to Make Instant Mashed Potatoes in Slow Cooker
- What goes good with mashed potatoes?
- Slow Cooker Mashed Potatoes Recipe
Slow Cooker Mashed Potatoes without Sour Cream
Next to our pressure cooker mashed potatoes this is probably one of my go to recipes. It goes with everything! When I say these mashed russets are a snap to make, it couldnโt be more true. And the ingredients you add once they are soft is totally up to you. Some insist on sour cream to make it creamy while my husband needs lactose free items.
I have used it all over the years and continue to swap them out depending on what Iโm serving this with. Simple butter, salt and pepper works great. BUT if you want to really amp it up to new levels go with bacon and chives. You can even use this to make mashed sweet potatoes too for a real tweak!
Letโs talk a little bit about slow cooking shall we?? First off I have a few different varieties and I love them all. Each one has an occasion to be used likeโฆ.
- This is my favorite 6 quart programmable one with a locking lid so itโs great for bringing to a potluck too.
- I prefer not to use liners, but rather just spray olive oil inside before adding my food for easier cleanups.
Let me give you a peek of my pretty thang I bought recently. It goes with my kitchen so I can just leave it out on the countertop all the time. ๐
How Long to Cook Mashed Potatoes in a Slow Cooker
Whether youโre making them for a Thanksgiving side dish or for dinner, itโs great to have something that everyone loves. When you make them in your Crockpot they take 4 hours or so and can be kept warm for quite some time beyond that too! You know how it is. Not everything is going to be done at the same time, and you know that. The best way to bridge the gap is to use something other than the oven.
You can easily prep these and have them ready an hour before the slow cooker turkey crown comes out. Switch to keep warm and fold once more before people start serving. To make things even more fun you could make it simple with just the basics. Have all the other toppings on the side like a bar!
Now of course you could make these crockpot mashed potatoes on the stove top and then transfer them to a bowl to serve. This entails a lot more time standing and monitoring the pot vs. letting it cook by itself all day.
You can do this with brown or Crockpot Sweet Potatoes for a tweak on an old time favorite. Add your milk, sour cream, bacon bits, salt and pepper for a creamy side everyone will love. You can even make a dairy free version if you need that, still delicious.
Ingredients
- Potatoes, pussets or Yukon gold potatoes are best, you could use red potatoes but they will have a firmer texture
- Butter or dairy free variety
- Chicken stock or broth
- Milk or heavy cream
- Salt and pepper to taste
- Add ins
- sour cream
- bacon bits
- chives
- cream cheese
- shredded cheese
Just like when you make a batch of twice baked potatoes you can really load these up before you serve them up!
Do you boil potatoes before putting in slow cooker?
NO Way!! Weโre trying to make things easier here so one step is key to everything I make around here yโall. The only time I would do this is if I was in a hurry and made Instant Pot boiled potatoes.
Russets really are the favorite as far as their price and firmness. You donโt want them in the softer family or the texture is kindaโ weird. You could do half red or Yukon though if you wanted to mix it up a bit.
Of course it depends on how large a load youโre making, but if you use a 5 lb. bag like you see here it will take approximately 4 hours to get tender. The cook time is actually kindaโ perfect because you can just peel and throw in the taters in the morning and theyโll be done mid day. If youโre having an early afternoon meal just finish preparing them and leave them right in the pot on the warm setting, stirring every hour.
YES!! You can make them on the stove, in a pressure cooker, or in your slow cooker and transfer them in order to keep them warm. Once theyโre done, just transfer them into your pot and set to low. This will keep your batch warm for up to 4 hours, stirring once an hour. Then stir before serving and they will stay warm and creamy like you love them.
How to Make Crock pot Mashed Potatoes
- Wash and peel Russet potatoes (what we used)
- Spray inside of pot with non stick cooking spray to ease cleanup when youโre done
- Put potatoes and butter pats on top into your pot
- Pour chicken broth or stock in, then cover and cook on high for 3-4 hours
- for larger batches like this one using 5 lbs. 4 hours works best so theyโre very tender
- Lift lid and drain broth
- keep on the side if you want to use some to thin potatoes out at the end
- Add in all your goodies and mash together until smooth
- Pour in a bit of liquid (milk or broth) to think out until it is the desired consistency you want
- Can keep in pot on warm, or serve immediately
I would suggest getting a plastic potato masher vs. a metal one so you can mash, add yummy ingredients, and leave right in the pot to serve up. Thereโs NO sense in transferring to another dish and have more bowls to clean.
Want to make a batch in your Ninja Foodi?? We do this all the time when weโre in a rush! In fact our Instant Pot garlic mashed potatoes are always on the table at Christmas.
If you want a quick step by step for slow cooker mashed potatoes that are done start to finish in just 5 minutes, use instant potatoes:
How to Make Instant Mashed Potatoes in Slow Cooker
- Put water and butter (amounts indicated on pouch) in microwave for 4 minutes
- Add into crockpot and add cold milk necessary
- Empty packet of instant potatoes into your slow cooker
- Stir
- Cover for 1 minute
- Fluff up and serve
- you can leave inside and keep on warm for a while too
What goes good with mashed potatoes?
- Kale and boursin cheese
- Shredded cheddar cheese and bacon bits
- Maple syrup is great inside sweet potatoes
- Simple herbs like rosemary, garlic salt with thyme is great
- Garlic mashed potatoes paired with pull apart bread
- Every time we make a whole chicken, broccoli and this are our quick easy side dishes
- Load up some Crockpot bbq beef on top and serve!
If this is for the holiday season you could combine these two favorites to make green bean mashed potato casserole too. You really can have these with any main dish if you ask me but there are a few dinners that WE must pair these with. Here are a few of them so you can tell us what you think:
Do you love mashed potatoes too?? I am sure you think of them often at Thanksgiving but do you make them regularly as a side dish for dinner? Theyโre not just great fresh though, use what you have left to make air fryer leftover mashed potato balls the next day.
Theyโre a great (and easy) dish that everyone loves and goes perfectly along side meatloaf, rotisserie chicken, and chicken. Try it this week and let me know what your family thinks!
Other easy potato recipe ideas youโll love
- Easy Shepherdโs pie with ground beef is fabulous with taters
- Instant Pot bacon ranch potatoes
- This is the best way to make baked potatoes in the oven too
Printable version of this recipe is below so you can keep it handy. Of course you can come back to this post as often as youโd like and I encourage you to do so but some of you have created recipe books of your own. We hope this is a new favorite.
Slow Cooker Mashed Potatoes
Equipment
- 1 slow cooker
Ingredients
- 5 lbs potatoes, russet, peeled and diced
- 32 oz chicken stock
- 1 c butter, cubed
- 8 oz sour cream
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1/2 tsp pepper
- 1/2 c milk
- 1/2 c bacon bits, optional
- chives, diced, optional, to top
- cheese, shredded, optional for a mix in
Instructions
- Wash, peel and dice your potatoes. Put them into your Crockpot with 1/2 c of butter cubes on top. Pour chicken stock over the top.
- Cook on high for 4 hours or until potatoes are fork tender.
- Drain off chicken stock (can save for later to thin them out). Leave potatoes in pot.
- Add remaining butter, sour cream, salt, garlic powder, onion powder, pepper and milk.
- Use a potato masher to combine all ingredients. If you want them thinner use more milk or some of drained stock. Add bacon bits and/or chives too if desired before serving.
Video
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
