How to REALLY Make French Fries
French fries might just be the perfect snack food. They are so simple, yet can be incredibly satisfying when they have the perfect combination of crunchy, salty, and potatoey goodness. However, they’ve always been a food that I’ve always shied away from making at home. Deep fried french fries would come out incredibly starchy, while baked french fries would be dry and bland.
Then I saw this post on Serious Eats. With a large amount of clever trickery and culinary experimentation, the writers at Serious Eats figured out how to imitate the venerable McDonald’s french fry at home.
McDonald’s-style french fries that I could make at home? While McDonald’s may not be a gourmet food establishment of any sort, they do have delicious french fries. As the author of the Serious Eats article says, “At their best, they are everything a french fry should be: salty, crisp, light, and not greasy.” Not only that, but I could freeze these french fries for months and have them ready to be prepared whenever I want? I had 10 pounds of potatoes on my kitchen counter within the hour.
Rather than cutting up potatoes and tossing them right into the deep fryer, this recipe was a multi-step process. Instead, the potatoes were cut, blanched in a pot of boiling water with vinegar, deep fried, frozen, then deep fried one last time – a process similar to the one used by McDonald’s to cook their fries. And it works.
These really are the perfect french fries. I even froze a bag of them and made them into garlic fries a few days later by tossing them with butter, Parmesan cheese, and parsley after they were fried. My sister and I ate them too fast to take any pictures.
Want to make Perfect French Fries? You can find the recipe at Serious Eats.
PS: If you like to know the behind-the-scenes stuff about why cooking something one way over another is better, the article on how the McDonald’s recipe was deconstructed is a great way to know why you will be able to make perfect french fries with this recipe. LINK.
