Live! Budget Gourmet: Holiday Sides Edition

It says we have one person who's waiting, who's out there, who's waiting. Welcome to Making Meals with Mika Live. All right, this is the hottest spot on YouTube. I don't even know what else is going on, but this is where the party is. I have one person, people are gathering, let's go, let's go, let's go. Happy hump day, welcome, welcome, welcome. I just wanna let y'all know that I look forward to Wednesday. After today, I'm gonna look forward to next Wednesday. Welcome. Today, we're keeping up with our holiday side theme. This month, every week, I am going to come in and show you all how to make some delicious holiday sides. When it comes time for the holidays, people are scrambling, they're trying to find recipes. Some people are hosting, some people are guests, they wanna bring something to the party. I am gonna show you how to make delicious sides that we all grew up on, that are very popular, and I'm going to judge them up a little bit. Everything is going to be gourmet. Today, we are making roasted garlic mashed potatoes, and we are doing smothered green beans. Mashed potatoes, green beans, they are very popular throughout pretty much most households and I want to take these pretty basic, we're gonna say they're pretty basic, pretty basic recipes and we're going to judge them up. What that means is we're going to make them taste delicious and make it seem like you have been cooking all day when actually you can make both of these dishes together in under one hour. I'm gonna give everybody time to get in. This is Making Meals with Mika on hump day. This is the party. And I told everyone to bring your cocktails, all right? So I have my cocktail in hand, I have some delicious red wine. Cheers to everyone that's here. Grab your cocktails, let's have a good time, and hopefully when you leave here today, you would have two more recipes that's in your repertoire. So let's get started. We are going to start with preparations for our roasted garlic mashed potato. We're going to use white potatoes. I love white potatoes in this recipe because you can keep the skin on. I am going to peel these potatoes, but I do love keeping the skin on. Hello, hello, we got Ray here, we have Deontay here. Hi guys, welcome, welcome, welcome. You guys know we always party. Like this is my turnout crew, we're partying. I am just telling everybody what we're making today and getting out the ingredients. So if you're just tuning in, you are making meals with Mika and we are making roasted garlic mashed potatoes and we're also doing smothered green beans. With the mashed potatoes, we are using white potatoes. I like white potatoes because the skin is really, really thin and they're not as dirty as like the Ohio, Idaho potatoes. No shade to Idaho, but those potatoes are very dirty and they're huge. So we're going to use these. Now, typically when I make mashed potatoes, I really do like for the skin to be on the mashed potatoes and these are really, really good to keep the skin on. For this recipe, I'm going to take the skin off because we're going to present these in a really nice, elegant way. So welcome everybody, we are getting started on making our roasted garlic mashed potatoes. And here's a disclaimer, okay? Here's a disclaimer. I'm cooking for one, sometimes maybe two, okay? So when I'm over here and I'm making things, just know that visually you're going to see me make a single serving or a double portion. I'm going to give you the recipe and I'm going to give you the measurements to make it for a family of four or a family of eight. But because food prices are so high, we're not going to waste food. I'm not going to make a plethora of food here and it goes to waste because it's just me eating it, you know, and sometimes my boyfriend's here eating it with me. So I'm going to make a smaller portion of these dishes, but I mean, you guys get it, right? You guys understand. So with the mashed potatoes, first thing you're going to do is we have to make the roasted garlic and let me show you how to make roasted garlic. Roasted garlic is the easiest ingredient to make and you can put roasted garlic in pretty much everything. You can put it in potatoes, vegetables. You can smear it on your meat. You can put it in pasta. Roasted garlic is amazing. If you're a person like me who loves garlic, I'm just going to say make you a lot of batches of roasted garlic and you can store it in the refrigerator and it's going to be amazing. So for our roasted garlic mashed potatoes, first you have to roast your garlic, all right? So I have one head of garlic here. The whole thing is a head. This isn't a clove, this is a head, all right? And this is the easiest thing you're going to do. My oven is at 400 degrees and I have my whole head of garlic here and you're just going to simply cut the top off of the garlic. So maybe about one, like a half an inch, not too much. And you want to leave the garlic exposed like this, okay? And then we're going to just take some aluminum foil, place the garlic in the aluminum foil and you want to drizzle with some type of oil. Right here I have an avocado oil. This is my preference, but if you want to use olive oil, I wouldn't say any other oil. So we're going to use either avocado oil or olive oil and you're going to sprinkle just a little bit on here. All right, welcome those of you that are just tuning in. I am showing you how to make the roasted garlic part for our roasted garlic potatoes. And then that's it, you have the head of garlic and you have the oil. The oil is essentially there to keep the garlic nice and juicy so it won't dry out and then so it won't stick to the aluminum foil. And you are going to just fold this up. There's no rhyme or reason, you're going to fold it up and you're going to bake this in the oven for about 35 to 45 minutes. You're going to bake this on 400 degrees. You want the garlic to get nice and soft and brown. And I've done one beforehand and this is how it's going to look, okay? This is a head of roasted garlic. This is gold right here. This is what is going to be our key ingredients in our roasted garlic potatoes, okay? You're going to take your potatoes. Here is a kitchen hack, a food hack. When you're boiling potatoes, whether it's for mashed potatoes or potato salad or anything like that, make sure you keep the skin on, okay? Do not peel your potatoes and cut them before you boil them. If you peel this layer off, the water when you're boiling it is actually, the potatoes want to soak up the water and it's going to change the texture of your dish and make your dish mushy. So whenever you're boiling potatoes, keep the skin on. Okay, guys? So we're going to take these potatoes. I'm going to boil about five or six potatoes with the skin on and that's it for right now. We have our garlic roasting. I'm going to do another thing of garlic and the potatoes are boiling, okay? All right, my potatoes are boiling. I want you guys to know that. And then when they're done, we're going to mash them. You're not going to see me put the water and everything in a pot because we're alive and I really don't have that much time. So for our potatoes, we're going to take the white potatoes. I like these, the smaller ones. We're going to scrub them, scrub the outside, put them in a pot, cover it, and you're going to boil them for about 30 to 40 minutes until they're nice and soft. And that is the start of our potatoes. Hello, hello, welcome, welcome. If you're just tuning in, you are Making Meals with Mika and we are focusing on holiday sides. And I am doing two simple, classic dishes. We're doing roasted garlic mashed potatoes and we're doing smothered green beans. So I have the mashed potatoes and the green beans and I'm going to juice them up so they can be beautiful and delicious. So while the potatoes are boiling, we already have the roasted garlic. Let's get started on the green beans. We are multitasking here. For this recipe, I really do encourage you to use fresh green beans. I know they can be intimidating to some people, but they are really not. I bought these and I just washed them and then I cut the ends off. And the reason for cutting the ends is so they can all look nice and uniform like this, right? You can eat the ends, they just look a little wonky. So I have washed these green beans and I have cut the ends off. This is the green beans that you want for this recipe. We want everything to be as fresh as possible, okay? So we have our green beans. For this, we're also going to slice one onion. We are building flavor here, guys. And with the onion, we're going to slice the onion in just really thin slits. I don't want these to be, I don't want to dice the onion. Diced onions will not go really well with the whole green beans. We want everything to be uniform and eat nicely. So we're not gonna dice the onion. We are going to half one onion and we are going to make really thin slices. And when I say thin, I mean like paper thin. You can get a paper cut from this thin onion, okay? And I am slicing right now one half of an onion. Onion is really good for flavoring, but I really do want the onion to be a co-star in this dish. When you're cooking vegetables, you want to amp up the flavor. So we have the diced onion and we're also going to do some garlic. Let me back up and get some garlic, guys. Onion and garlic go together like peanut butter and jelly. I just want to let you guys know that. So usually, if you see me dicing up or slicing up some onion, I'm going to go ahead and cut that garlic up too. Because, I mean, garlic is one of my favorite ingredients. So for this, I'm only gonna use two heads of garlic, okay? This is the base. Onion, garlic is gonna make everything delicious. So welcome, you guys. Hi, look, we got more people coming to the party. Welcome. For those of you that are just tuning in, you are Making Meals Amika. And right now, we're just doing the prep work for our smothered green beans. And these green beans, you can make these in like 20 minutes but they're gonna taste like they have been cooking all day. Go ahead and give me a thumbs up in the comment section. If you're having a good time, go ahead. Where is everyone's cocktail? Go ahead and let me know what cocktail you are sipping on today. I got my boo here. I got my little brother here. We got Waru here. And now we also got, is it Samia? Hi, Samia, how are you doing? Cheers. If we're sipping on this humday, let me know. Like I said, this is a party here. I am here to cook for you guys but also we need to have a good time. So this is gonna be very interactive. Go ahead and cheers, cheers, boo, cheers. Ask any question that you would like. I'm going to try to continue to be interactive as I am cooking. Any question you have, go ahead and put it in the comments. Let me know what you are sipping on right now. Like my brother said, go ahead and hit the like button as well. If you haven't subscribed to my channel yet, go ahead and subscribe and hit that like button if you are having a good time. Right now, I am just chopping up some garlic to go in these green beans. These green beans are gonna be so deliciously seasoned. You're not gonna believe it. So I have the onions, the garlic, and I have the green beans. Now, listen, I grew up in an African American household. I grew up to smelling smoked meat. You know, for Thanksgiving, grandma, mom, the kids were all in the kitchen. We're cooking, we got music on. We are literally staying up all night and it is some of the best memories. But not only the memories, but the smell. And you just smell like all these aromas coming together and it's just amazing. And that is what the holidays are about. I wish you guys could smell what's going on right now. So for our green beans, not only are we gonna add the garlic and the onions to our gorgeous green beans, we have to add smoked meat, okay? We are putting smoked meat in these green beans. Yes, the smell, the smell is amazing. So this is where you can use whatever you want, okay? I'm gonna give you the foundation. You make this recipe your own. I am using a smoked turkey leg. I'm using part of this smoked turkey leg, okay? Because I want these green beans to taste like they have been cooking all day, all right? Hey, Sumi, Samia, you know what I'm talking about. So when I was roasting the garlic earlier, I just took a smoked turkey leg. I put it in some aluminum foil with a little olive oil to get it nice and tender. And we're gonna cut a little bit of this meat off of the bone. And we are putting this in our green beans. Yes, our green beans are no longer vegetarian. And we are putting meat in these green beans. If you are a vegetarian, please understand, omit this step. You can just use the onions and the garlic, and we're gonna smother it with the smothering liquid. And your green beans are going to be just as delicious if you are a vegetarian and vegan. If you, however, if you are not vegetarian and vegan, go ahead and get you some smoked meat. You can use bacon. I'm using smoked turkey here. You can use a ham hock. Whatever smoked meat you are comfortable with and you like the flavor of, I am giving you the okay to go ahead and use it. I am using a bit of this smoked turkey leg. And all I'm doing is I'm just taking some of the meat off of the bone and I am going to just rough chop this. Okay, this is called building flavor. So right now we are prepping to make these green beans delicious, okay? We just don't season green beans with salt and pepper and call it a day. Not with smothered green beans. We are really seasoning this. So for those of you who are just tuning in, I am chopping up some smoked turkey leg. And this turkey leg is going to go in our smothered green beans. Because we want that taste, even though it's gonna take us maybe 20 minutes to cook these green beans, we want the green beans to taste like they've been cooking all day, okay? So I have part of the chicken, I mean the smoked turkey, okay? And let's get this cooking. It's time to start cooking. 17 minutes in, Mika hasn't started cooking anything yet. Here it goes. We have our skillet preheated, okay? We have our skillet preheated, nice and warm. And I am going to put just a little bit of oil in the pan, just a little bit, all right? Just a little bit because we want all of our seasonings to have a place to go. And right now, everything I just showed you is nothing but seasonings for the green beans. The green beans are the star, okay? Don't get it twisted. These green beans are the star of this dish. Everything else is just a star. And guys, if you guys have kids and you want your kids to eat vegetables, you're gonna have to put a little bit more than just some salt and some pepper, right? You might have to put some onions, some garlic, a little chicken stock to make it delicious, and then they will eat it. We're not adding unhealthy ingredients. We're just seasoning. I have my skillet ready. And to this skillet, I am going to add my sliced onion, okay? Okay, I can turn it up a little bit. I want to make sure that it's hot. We have our sliced onion. And we're just going to cook this onion until it gets nice and translucent, okay? And I did slice these, okay? This is paper-thin, paper-thin onion. I don't want them diced because a diced onion really won't, it wouldn't eat well with the green beans. Cheers to everyone. We are making holiday sides, all right? We're making garlic mashed potatoes and we are also making a smothered green bean. And we're interactive here because this is a party. Feel free to tell me what your favorite holiday dish is or what your favorite holiday side is. You guys, I have so many different favorite holiday sides because I love to cook, but if I could say there was one holiday side that I absolutely love more than anything, it's going to be mac and cheese. You know, I am a sucker for mac and cheese. I love everything about it. And here is a secret, I am gluten intolerant. I know, it's crazy, but I love a good mac and cheese. I love it creamy and cheesy and ooey gooey. So go ahead and let me know what your favorite holiday side is in the comment, please and thank you. I would appreciate that. We're cooking our green beans right now. I do have the potatoes, they are on and they are boiling for our mashed potatoes, okay? The mashed potatoes are going to be so delicious. They're going to be so delicious that you won't even need gravy for these mashed potatoes. That is how delicious they're going to be. Right now we are just sweating out our onions. We want these to be nice and soft, okay? And now I'm also going to add our smoked turkey to this. And I have some of the skin on our smoked turkey, okay? That is going to add texture. We love texture around here. Now let me see. And what that smoked meat is going to do, the smoked meat is going to make these green beans taste like they have been cooking for hours, okay? Let's go, let's go, let's go. While this is cooking, everybody grab your cocktails, cheers. If you are hanging out with me today, cheers. I am drinking a red wine. And I don't know about you guys, but for the holidays when I am cooking, I grew up like in the kitchen, like cooking for the holidays was a whole vibe, okay? It was a whole vibe. The music would be playing, you know, there would be cocktails flowing, people laughing. We're staying up all night. And it's just a really great memory that I have growing up cooking for the holidays. And I hope that you all have similar memories like that. And I want to recreate that here in the kitchen. It's not like me showing you guys how to cook and you're on the other end. We're hanging out, we are cooking holiday sides. So thumbs up, let me know you guys are having a good time. Let me know what you're sipping on. Let me know what your favorite holiday side is. And you never know. You tell me what your favorite holiday side is. It might be my next meal that I cook live. I'm just saying, let me know. Let me know in the comments what your favorite holiday side is. Hi, everybody. We have some newcomers here. Welcome, you are making meals with Mika. And we are cooking holiday sides. And these holiday sides aren't really expensive. We're cooking holiday sides for any budget. Even though they're inexpensive, we are going to make them very fancy, okay? Those of you that follow me and you have hung out with me, you always know our food is fancy. Right now we are sweating out our onions. Everything is smelling good. The onions are nice and soft. You guys see that? And we are using some smoked meat. If you're having a good time, go ahead and hit the like button. I appreciate you guys hanging out with me. All right, now that our onions are nice and soft, we are going to add some garlic. So Deontay says, I asked everyone to let me know what one of your favorite holiday dishes are. And it can be any holiday. I just wanna know what your favorite holiday dishes are. Deontay said he loves baked beans, potato salad, and homemade sage dressing, period. Period. I'm going to agree with every single thing that you said. And I'm gonna put you guys on to an alternative to just regular mustard potato salad. That's gonna be coming a little bit later. I wish you guys could smell what it smells like right now. In this pan I have sliced onions, I have smoked turkey, and I have garlic. Can you guys imagine what it smells like right now? I don't think you can. I don't think you can imagine how delicious it smells right now. This is smelling amazing. And this is for our green beans. We are making a base for the green beans. We don't do anything just regular here, okay? Everything has to be fabulous. So these, everything is where it should be. You see how everything is nice and tender. Now we're going to add our green beans to the skillet. Okay, I'm going to change my utensil because a spoon would not work. And I'm also going to add a little olive oil. Okay, I'm gonna add a little, well this is avocado oil. Thank you Steve Ray S for the gift. Ooh, y'all are gifted today. Thank you very much. For those of you that are just tuning in, you are at the great part. We are making our smothered green beans. Right now in this skillet, I have smoked turkey, I have sliced onion, I have fresh garlic, and I just added some beautiful, nice washed and cut green beans. And I am just sauteing these. And it's time to season. I haven't put any seasoning in this pan yet because the garlic, the onion, and the meat, the smoked turkey, those are natural seasonings. So when I go into seasoning, it's gonna be very easy. I'm just going to put some salt and black pepper. That's it. That's all we need because these are seasoned with everything else that's in here. I'm using crushed black pepper, but by all means use ground black pepper, whatever black pepper you like, okay? And since these are really fresh, I'm gonna be heavy on the seasoning. And right now, we're just going to saute the green beans. I wish you guys could smell what it smells like in this kitchen. Oh my gosh, it smells so amazing. For those of you that are tuning in, we are making holiday sides today. Right now, I'm in the process of making smothered green beans. In this pan, I have some sliced onion, some fresh chopped garlic. I do have some smoked turkey, and I have my green beans. And I'm just going to saute these until my green beans start to wilt and get a little soft. When I am eating green beans regularly, not smothered, I like my green beans to have like a bite to them, like a nice little pop, a little crunch. You guys know what I'm saying? But for these, we're smothering these. And you guys know that anything smothered is going to be nice and tender and soft and delicious. And that's what we're going to go for with these green beans, okay? We're smothering them. So I have these on a medium heat, and it is important to just continue to toss them because we don't want them to stick. We don't want them to get too brown on one side. So this is where you have to pay attention. All right, how is everybody doing today? Give me a thumbs up if you are having a good time. Go ahead and like this live. If you have not subscribed yet, hit the subscribe button. And it goes down every single Wednesday here in my kitchen. We have some gift givers. I want to send a shout out to Steve Reyes. Thank you, thank you for your gift. I really appreciate it. If you guys are learning and you want to send Mika a gift, I am not opposed to gifts, okay? Contrary to belief, all women, we do love gifts. So I am not opposed to any gift giving, okay? Thank you very much. All right, guys, our green beans are looking and smelling delicious. Look at that. Come on, come on now. Look at that, you guys. Beautiful. Thank you, Steve, for your gifts. It goes down here every single Wednesday. Every Wednesday, we are going to cook some delicious food. And we're making holiday sides. And I hope you guys make this side. If you are hosting Thanksgiving, go ahead, put some green beans on that menu. Now, I'm African-American. And African-American tradition for our Thanksgiving, I mean, I can't say we have a certain amount of dishes because we literally cook everything for Thanksgiving, okay? We make turkey, we make ham, Cornish hens, roast. That's the meat. You might get some pig's feet. You might get some chitlins, you know? Then for the sides, we're doing dressing, macaroni and cheese, collard greens, candy yams. We're having sweet potatoes. We're having deviled eggs. Somebody's gonna make a salad. This is like real life. This is real life, guys. You might see some green beans there, okay? You might see some mashed potatoes there or some type of potatoes. And then we have all types of bread. We got garlic bread, corn bread. When it comes to an African-American Thanksgiving, we have literally around 30 dishes. 30 dishes. So I'm giving you some green beans to bring to that, okay? Hi, hello. We got deep plates. We got Pamela. Hi, Pamela. Thank you for joining. If you are just tuning in, a party is jumping, okay? The party is jumping. I am cooking our smothered green beans. It's almost time to start the smothering process. If you are just tuning in, in this pan, I have onion, freshly chopped onion. I have garlic. I have smoked turkey and I have some beautiful fresh green beans. And I am just sauteing these until the green beans get nice and tender. And I season with some salt and pepper. And now it's time to smother these. So to smother these, let me give you guys, let me put you guys on to game. Whenever you are smothering, that means you're adding a liquid to your dish. And what it's gonna do is it's gonna make it nice and tender, tender, okay? And delicious. Whenever you are smothering, I always add warm liquid, okay? I always add warm liquid. If you add, are you guys taking notes? Put this in your notes on your phone, okay? Or a mental note. When you add cold liquid to already hot food, what that does is it brings the temperature of your current dish all the way down. And that could affect the texture and the taste. So whenever possible, if you are adding liquid to anything, if you're smothering, if you're making gravy, when we make our mashed potatoes in a second, I'm gonna add warm cream. Because you want to keep that, you wanna keep the heat level where it is. You don't wanna bring the heat level down. So to this pan, I am adding, this is chicken stock that I have heated up, okay? And this is where the smothering begins. I'm just going to add my chicken stock to this pan. Now, if you are vegetarian or if you are vegan and you wanna keep this strictly vegetarian, add vegetable stock. I'm always gonna give you an option. Everybody eats when Mika cooks, do you understand? No one is left out. So right now, I have put some chicken stock. Now I can talk a little soft because it's calmed down. I have put chicken stock in the green beans, okay? And one more thing I am going to add. I am going to add butter. For those of you that are just tuning in, welcome, welcome, welcome. This is where the party is. We are making holiday sides. I am at the end almost of smothering these green beans. I have fresh garlic, I have onion, I have smoked turkey, and I just added some chicken stock to these green beans. And then I'm going to add real butter. This is not margarine. This is not, so you don't think it's real butter. This is real butter, okay? None of the other things. I'm going to add just one, maybe two, maybe two. I'm going to add, two tablespoons. I'm going to add two teaspoons of butter to these green beans. And what the butter does is, it's just going to make it more delicious, more umptiousness. And then we are going to cover. And you don't have to mix the butter in. Don't worry about mixing the butter in. We're going to cover, and I'm going to turn this down a little bit, and I'm just going to let these smother and marinate for about 10 minutes, okay? So we're going to go ahead and push this out of the way, and that is just marinating. Guess what, guys? It's time for our mashed potatoes, okay? It's time for our mashed potatoes. Our mashed potato, our mashed potatoes have been boiling, and I am going to, this is around a half a cup of heavy cream. You guys, those of you that just tuned in, you're just in time. Everybody's here. You're just in time. I'm about to show you guys how to mash and put together these roasted garlic mashed potatoes. My potatoes are done. I have my roasted garlic are ready to go. I'm about to nuke in the microwave for about one minute my heavy cream, okay? You guys, here are the potatoes. Ooh, they are smoking hot. And I have boiled them with the skin on. And I told everyone, when you are boiling potatoes, make sure you keep the skin on. It is going to prevent your potatoes from getting too mushy and watery. We don't want watery potatoes in our mashed potatoes, okay? Now, since these are hot, let me give you guys a little tip on what I do to handle hot things, because I'm going to peel these with my mom fingers, okay? Okay, so cream is done. These potatoes have been boiling. They are nice and tender and they are hot, but we need to peel them. I have a cup of cold water, okay? Cold water. And this is the same method that I use when I'm making potato salad or anything that has to do with peeling potatoes. Dip your fingers in that cold water. Take the potato and just slide the skin off, okay? You can keep the skin on. For this recipe, we want this to look really nice and pretty so we're not going to keep the skin on, but I love a good mashed potato with the skin on. But whenever you're peeling potatoes for mashed potatoes and or potato salad, keep the skin on. And then your potatoes will come out nice and fuller and more creamy because it's not going to be, they're not going to absorb all of the water, okay? And then we have a cup of cold water. I'm going to dip my hands in the cold water to give my hand a break. And I'm just going to go on and peel the potato. I learned peeling potatoes from my mom and my grandmother and they didn't have a cup of cold water, but I'm not them, okay? Like I don't want my fingers to burn off. So I'm just going to go ahead and use some cold water to give my fingers some relief. Oh, shoot. From these hot potatoes. You guys, I just shattered. I just shattered one of my dishes. Wow, okay. What you guys heard was one of my dishes shattering. Dang, I'm so sad. I just bought that dish, but I had it on the hot stove and it got too hot and it shattered. Listen, this is live. This is what happens when you cook live, okay? I have a whole dish that like literally my plate just shattered, but it's okay. And I was going to use this to plate. Look at that. It was on the stove and I turned on the wrong one. My bad. Dang, that sucks. I'm gonna have to plate these in a different dish. Dang, ain't that crazy? That's what happens when you cook live, guys. Anything could happen. All right. So we have our potatoes here, okay? We have our potatoes. Can you guys see that? And we have our roasted garlic. And all you're gonna do is with this roasted garlic, I like to peel the sides off a little bit because they are kind of feathery and they're gonna fly off. Hi, everyone. Let's go. We are having a great time here. If you're having a great time, go ahead and hit the like button. Put in the comments if you are sipping. What are you doing on this Wednesday? Let me know what your favorite holiday meal is. We are all hanging out here in the kitchen. I am peeling this roasted garlic. Here's the cool thing about roasted garlic. All you gotta do is squeeze it, all right? So we have our roasted garlic and we are going to squeeze the whole entire thing. We're gonna squeeze the whole entire thing into these potatoes. When you roast garlic, it makes it nice and sweet and it takes away some of the strongness of garlic. You know, garlic on its own can be very powerful, but when you roast it, you just bring out all the sweetness, okay? Garlic is really sweet. You just gotta add some heat to it. So I am squeezing all of the garlic out. Let me wash my hands. Okay, that's in there. Then we're going to take, you can use a fork, you can use a potato masher. This is actually like a meat, a meat masher. Oh, a meat grinder and we're going to mash this. We have somebody just getting off of work. Okay, Watkins, welcome. Cheer, are you just getting off of work? Do you have a cocktail? Grab you a cocktail, honey. We are cooking today. So I have the potatoes and the garlic and I'm just gonna take my meat masher. You can use a fork if you want to. You can use a potato masher if you want to. And we want to mash these potatoes. I like texture in my potatoes. So I'm not gonna mash them where they're just like obliterated because I do like a texture, but I am going to mash them so they are nice and chunky and delicious, okay? So we're just gonna keep, keep mashing. Let's go get my fork. And this is, let me show you the consistency that we want. And it just depends on your preference. Some people like really silky, smooth potatoes. I love potatoes that have some texture to them, okay? So I'm gonna go in. If you don't have a masher, just use your fork. Use the back of your fork and you're mashing the potatoes with the garlic and they're gonna form a perfect union, okay? You're gonna form a perfect union. And this is like the texture that you want, okay? This is the texture that you want. I do know how to mash. Capello said, damn, I know how to mash, and I do. So we're gonna go through and mash these, all right? Then we have, we're going to add some butter to these potatoes, real butter. You guys, I'm a real butter fan. We're gonna add about a tablespoon of butter to these potatoes. I wanna make sure I'm heating up my cream. So I just added, in here I have the potatoes and I have the roasted garlic. I just added some butter. What we're going to do is while the cream, I'm heating up the cream in the microwave because what did I say? We never add cold liquids to our dishes, okay? What I'm gonna do is I'm going to chop up some chives. Now chives are pretty difficult to find. If you don't have chives, you could 100% use green onion, okay? The chives are gonna go directly in the mashed potatoes. When you're eating the mashed potatoes and you see the herbs, I mean, it just lets you know you're eating healthy, right? And we also are going to put some fresh parsley in here. What the parsley is going to do is, it's going to brighten up the potatoes. Potatoes can be very heavy, right? And we don't want our potatoes heavy. So this is going to add some brightness and we're gonna mix these right in the potatoes. So we're gonna take our parsley, we're gonna take our chives, and the best way to chop up herbs is just put them in one big ball, okay? This is the absolute best way to chop. And then we're just gonna go through and then we're just gonna chop, okay? And it smells amazing. The chives are part of the onion family, so it's gonna add that. And then parsley, you know, it's a really great herbaceous plant and it just brightens up any type of dish, okay? So I'm going to do a really, really fine chop on this. Welcome you guys, for those of you that's just tuning in, you are seeing my knife skills. I am chopping up some fresh parsley and chives to go into our mashed potatoes, our garlic mash. All right, I think those are chopped enough. And I'm just gonna save a little bit to garnish it. Okay, guys, okay, here we go. So we have the mashed potatoes here. I'm going to mix the butter in there. We're gonna throw the chive, well, I'm gonna reserve a little bit. We're gonna put about a couple tablespoons of those fresh herbs right in here, okay? A couple tablespoons. Then we're going to season this with salt and pepper. Just very, very simple, very, very simple. And then we're going to slowly, and I like to use a fork because I'm constantly mashing as I'm mixing, okay? Do you guys see what I'm doing here? I am stirring and I am mixing. And if you're just tuning in, I am making like, this is for two, this is two servings. So no, there's not a big giant pot of me making mashed potatoes because we are not wasting food here. But you guys get it, right? You can double or triple or quadruple this recipe. So we have our mashed potatoes and then we're going to add the cream a little bit at a time. I add the cream like two tablespoons at a time just so I can get the right texture. Everyone's preferred texture is going to be better. All right, now that we have the cream in here, now I can start stirring. Everyone's texture is going to be different, all right? So depending on the texture you want your mashed potatoes, that's how much cream you're going to add. I can't tell you how much, you're just going to have to eyeball it. But you really don't need a lot. You don't need a lot of heavy cream to make your mashed potatoes nice and silky and smooth and delicious. So right now I've added about 1 1⁄4 cup of cream. And you see that I'm whipping. I am whipping these potatoes, guys. I am whipping these potatoes. Look at that, yep. All right, now it's time to do like a little taste test just to see. Ooh, that's enough. I'm not joking. What it does is with the roasted garlic, the garlic adds like a hint of sweetness. Hello from Jamaica, hello, hello, hello. How are you doing? I was just tasting my roasted garlic mashed potatoes. And you guys, the roasted garlic adds just like a hint of sweetness. Not like a sugary sweet, but it's like a, mm, what is that? It's a really good, delicious sweetness. And look, these are done. Look at this, look at these potatoes. Come on now, come on, come on now. And let me show you how you're gonna plate these up, okay? Let me show you how you're gonna plate these up. If you're presenting these for holiday, for a holiday meal, you're gonna take a nice bowl. Now this is a single or a double side bowl, right? It's just for me. And we are going to spoon the potatoes in the bowl, okay? And I wanna make sure I get all of it out, all of it. Yes, I am scraping this side. I am scraping this side. It smells so delicious. Okay, that's enough, all right. Cause I will sit here and scrape like forever, but I'm not gonna do that. So we have our mashed potatoes in the bowl. Now ideally, these will be like overflowing in the bowl. Thank you for saying these look delicious. Now what we're gonna do is we're gonna make like a little canal or a little, what is this? A little dip. Let's put like a little dip in our mashed potatoes. Just a little dip. And we're gonna take some melted butter. And we're just going to just put the melted butter right in that dip, okay? I don't know what it is about potatoes and melted butter that makes them just irresistible. Y'all see that? And then we're gonna take some of the parsley and the chives and we're just going to just garnish it just nice and pretty and simply, all right? Now imagine this bowl was like four times bigger and this is at your dining room table for Thanksgiving, okay? These are the delicious, creamy, just umptious roasted garlic mashed potatoes, all right? Let me just, mm-hmm. Oh, that's delicious. That is absolutely delicious. Absolutely delicious. Did you guys forget about our green beans? So we have one side done. Look at that, roasted garlic mashed potatoes. Thank you, thank you for sending those, look amazing. Let's check on our green beans. So our green beans, they have been smothering. Oh, they have been smothering for the past, oh my gosh, yes! 15 minutes. So, oh, this is exactly what we want, oh my gosh. You guys, this is exactly what we want. In this pan, I have onions, garlic, some smoked turkey and then our green beans, our fresh green beans and I added some chicken stock to these, right? To smother them. Let me go get one of my dishes broke. I was gonna plate it on this, but it broke. So now I have to go get another dish. Hold on, I'll be right back. I'll be right back, guys. I wasn't even planning to plate on here, but when it's live, you gotta do what you gotta do, right? The show must go on. It is what it is. Thank you for saying it's cooked perfectly. Thank you! The goal is to make you hungry and the goal is for you to go and recreate these dishes. So, our green beans are done. We're going to turn them off and then to plate these, you're just going to take a platter, okay? And we're going to load these up on a platter, all right? We're gonna load them all up. I'm just loading them up right now. I wish you guys could smell what it smells like. You know, like Thanksgiving and Christmas, they have certain smells, you know? The smell of the meat and all the seasonings and all the different dishes coming together. It's, this is what my kitchen smells like right now. It smells like the holidays. And to me, that is one of the best parts about the holiday is the smell. So I'm just getting all the green beans out. Okay, we have Hamid. Welcome, welcome, welcome, Hamid. Those of you that are just tuning in, it's a party here, you guys. We're making really simple, delicious holiday sides and we're making them just delicious and gourmet. Okay, I think I'm done. I'm trying to scrape everything off of this pan and I just need to just go ahead and let it be it. Okay, let's turn this off. And you guys, these are the green beans. Now, when you are serving these, of course, you wanna take a towel and just go around the edges because people eat with their eyes first. Now, a way to garnish these green beans, if you wanna have like a little play, I'm just getting all the rest of the seasoning out of this pan. But if you wanna do a play on green bean casserole, you could take these delicious green beans and you can top them with some fried onion, right? Or I would suggest frying your own onions because you want to have everything as fresh as possible, but you can top these with some fried onions or you don't have to, okay? Because these are delicious as they are. So let's give these a try. These are the smothered green beans. And what makes them smothered is they cooked and they bathed in some chicken broth. And what it does is it not only makes them nice and tender, it gives them the flavor like they have been cooking all day. Just a very comforting homemade flavor. So I'm gonna go in and let's just try them. Look at that. Of course, I'm gonna get some of that meat. I'm gonna get some of those onions on the fork. Blow it. Mm, mm, that is so fire. Mm, this is so delicious. This reminds me of the holidays. If you are vegan or vegetarian, you don't have to put smoked meat in here. You just cook it the exact same. You're gonna use your onion, your garlic. You're going to then saute them and let them marinate in a vegetable stock. If you want the full flavor, if you're not vegan or vegetarian, you can use a smoked meat. You can use bacon. You can use smoked turkey. You can use ham hock. You can use whatever you want to. And it's gonna give you that all day feel. Like these have been cooking for hours and these have only been cooking for about 20 minutes, maybe 25. These are our smothered green beans. And then we also have our roasted garlic mashed potatoes. Two sides that are delicious and they are perfect for the holidays, but they are perfect just any night of the week. And that's it, you guys. We are done today. How did you guys enjoy making meals with Mika? Go ahead, if you enjoyed it, give me a thumbs up. If you are not following my page yet, go ahead and follow. Send me messages. I love hearing from everybody for tips and tricks or things that you want me to cook. This month, we are focusing on holiday sides and I will be back here next Wednesday, okay? Thanksgiving is coming. We are amping it up. And I'm gonna continue to give you guys delicious homemade and wholesome recipes. Thank you guys for hanging out with me. I really appreciate you. But I have to go eat these and I'm gonna make me a nice juicy steak to go with these. The mashed potatoes and the green beans, this is screaming for steak, okay? Thank you very much, Victoria. Thank you very much. Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to hang out with me on this hump day. I will be right back here next Wednesday, 7 p.m. If you enjoyed this, go ahead, send me a thumbs up. Tell your friends, like and share my content. Tell your friends about me and we can all hang out here next Wednesday. Make sure you bring your cocktail, okay? All right, guys. Thank you for hanging out with Mika. I really appreciate y'all. Khalid, thank you. See you later. I'll see you guys later. All right, guys. Bye.