Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, has deployed a fail-safe political weapon as campaigning intensifies ahead of German elections: sharing her recipe for potato soup.

With a new poll showing that almost half of Germans have yet to decide who to vote for in next month’s election, Mrs Merkel fell back on the time-honoured tradition of showing her human side by sharing a recipe with a glossy magazine.

In typical down-to-earth style, she chose a simple everyday staple that is eaten at home by families across Germany: potato soup.

“I always pound the potatoes myself with a potato masher, not with a blender,” she told Bunte magazine. “That way, you get some chunky pieces left in the mash.”

Mrs Merkel told the magazine she likes to use potatoes from her own garden at her country cottage in the Uckermark region north of Berlin. “They’re looking good, but I haven’t started harvesting them yet this year,” she said.

The German chancellor also let slip that she likes to eat late at night.