/ck/ - Food & Cooking

>>5588317
>Thoughts from the collective al/ck/oholism as well?
enjoy the ride.

as for fries, don't forget- fry once at a lower temp, then again at a higher temp.

>>5588317
>cut into thick chips
>place in cold water over the hob
>let it reach boiling point then turn off the heat and leave it for 5 minutes
>put them in a mixing boil
>add olive oil and give it a shake until they're all coated
>add chilli power, much chilli power
>shake again until they're all coated
>place in a pre-heated 200°C oven for 20 minutes or more depending on how crisp you like them

An alternative seasoning to chilli powder would be ground pepper, salt and paprika. Frying is shit tier, oven baked chips are God tier.

>>5588317

Try out Heston's triple cooked chips method. It works really well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCB9jIpNGzY

>>5588317
Cut fries with mandolin or potato cutter or knife(implements listed in order of suitability)
Soak them in a large bowl of cold water for about 2 hours
Fry them once
Let them rest
Fry them again
Salt immediately
Eat

>>5588317

My recipe for fries:
-Cut russet potatoes into your desired size
-Soak in cold water for about 30 min, then rinse with cold water.
-Put on a rack to dry or use a kitchen towel
-Deep fry at 300-315 F until you just barely start to see some color on the fries.
-Remove from the oil, spread out on a rack to cool.
-Deep fry again at 350F (or higher if your oil can take it). I think the color in OP photo is perfect, but some like them lighter or darker.
-Drain, and season.

Oils to use? Duck/goose fat or beef tallow are the best, but may not be practical. Lard is excellent too. A practical choice for home is peanut oil.

Seasoning is really up to your preferance. Sometimes I use just plain salt, sometimes seasoned salt, sometimes I get crazy and make my own seasoning and maybe even toss some herbs in there--it really depends on what I'm serving the fries with.

Oh, and one last thing regarding the frying: For the first fry you can load up the oil pretty good. It doesn't matter much if the temp drops for the first fry. But for the 2nd fry (the one at high temp), make sure you don't overload the fryer. You want it hot for the best crispiness.

Keep in mind that all of these recipes are written for sea level. You have to adjust accordingly if you're frying at altitude.

>>5588319
>>5588334
Why fry them twice?

>>5588368
always fry your fries twice

>>5588368

That's how you get them crispy on the outside and tender in the center.

The problem is it takes time to cook the interior. So if you cook them once at a low temp the inside gets done but the outside isn't crisp. If you cook them at a high temp the inside will be undercooked when the outside is done. There's several ways to fix that. You can either:
1) parboil first, then fry them (I use this for chunky style fries rather than the long thin ones)
2) double fry, once at a low temp to make the center tender and again at a high temp to crisp
3) put them in COLD oil and then heat. The inside cooks as the oil heats up. I personally don't care for this method since it can make them overly greasy.

>>5588378

Cook's Illustrated sent some cold-start fries out to the lab and they actually contained HALF the fat of your average double-fried fry.

But maybe they're greasy on the outside. I dunno.

>>5588378
3rd option is a great way to prepare fries if you want to give someone heart disease by feeding them to him every day

Cut potatoes into thickness of choice.
Boil for around 10-11 minutes or till tender in water with vinegar at a ratio of 1tbsp of vinegar to 1 quart of water.
Heat oil to around 375+ and fry potatoes for 1 minute.
Freeze the par fried potatoes till frozen.
Then fry till desired crispness.

>>5588385

I haven't read the article you're mentioning but I am curious about it. A potential complication is the type of fries they used. A lot of commercially-prepared fries served at restaurants or pre-frozen for lazy home cooks are coated with starch (or other things) to make them crispier and to stay crispy longer. Those coatings can really soak up oil. So it makes me wonder if they compared something like that to homemade "start from cold"?

OTOH if they did a side-by-side test starting with fresh cut potatoes for both methods then I would be surprised. The conventional wisdom is that you must keep the oil hot so that the steam from the food you're cooking keeps the oil out. My experience when learning to fry certainly confirmed that.

>>5588433

Oh, it wasn't half as much fat, but a third. Still, that's a big difference.

>>5588465
That's not exactly a scientific experiment, now is it? As far as I'm concerned, these results are invalid until they replicate the results, and they're peer reviewed.

>>5588465
>>5588474
Also, the sample size is way too small.

>>5588474

Yeah, I'm waiting on that New American Journal of French Fries subscription.

I trust Cook's Illustrated. They have a food scientist on the staff, they have a good science-y cookbook in their repertoire, their food science explanations have always been on the mark. A little evidence, no matter how lacking in rigor (and I think CI is the last resource to be accused of a lack of rigor), is better than a mountain of conjecture.

>>5588490
I guess I'll have to take this on, just to prove you wrong. Of course, if the evidence leans in your favor, I'll have to admit that I was wrong, because that's SCIENCE!

>>5588493

If you have any evidence in your favor, I'd be glad to see it.

>>5588317
OK, OP, this is a great technique for a single batch of homemade fries.

Simmer the thickly cut russets until they are breaking up at the edges. So, time fifteen minutes, and then start checking them regularly. You don't want to take them too far and have them disintegrate, but you do what them to be breaking up at the edges.

Strain the potatoes. Ruffle up their edges a little bit-- this creates insane crust.

Then, all you have to do is transfer the potatoes to a cold pot, cover them with cold oil, and put the burner on high heat. This is Joel Roubouchon's technique for home-cooked fries, and it fucking works. inb4 broscience about the chips getting too fatty or some bullshit, that's not how it works.

Now, the chips will go through a light cooking phase while the oil comes up to full temp. Eventually, (probably 20 minutes), the oil will reach 350degF. You'll hear the fries frying hard. Now, there is a certain point at which the frying sound slows and eventually stops. Pull them out immediately when this starts to happen. Otherwise, you get a grease-logged, soggy fry that would be a total waste of your time and effort. The fries will be super golden.

Transfer them to a paper toweled bowl and season hard with salt and peper. Or, if you have one, throw them in a paper bag and shake them up with salt and pepper.

These fries are absolutely perfect.

>>5588495
I gotta set up and carry out the experiment first.

>>5588329
What kind of potatoes do you use? Mealy, waxy or something in between?

>>5588510

>>5588317

>>5588510
Post your address, I'll come over and help.

>>5588524
1640 Riverside Dr, Hill Valley, CA

>>5588529
Awesome. I'll be by later.

>>5588534
Did I leave the Delorean there?

>>5588534
Is your name Marty, by any chance? Also, I prefer to be called Doc.

>>5588534

don't for get to bring the rape seed oil for um...cooking the fries?

>>5588329
just stuck these in the oven, I'll let ya know how they come out

>>5588465

Interesting, but it appears that that cold-start fries weren't cooked to the same level of "golden brown" that the double-fries were. Why did they not finish them to the same level of doneness?

>>5588562

It's extremely hard to get double-fried french fries to come out a pale golden color like that.

I would wager that they're equally "done" in terms of flavor, texture, creaminess and every other metric of french fry except for color. But who knows. Mr. Science above is going to show us how it's done.

>>5588587

Well then they could have cooked the double-fried fries longer and gone for an equal, but darker color.

You might be right about them tasting the same though.

>>5588329
>>5588557

soft/10
the ones on the bottom were crispy but these came out pretty creamy overall. taste good, but not the crunchyness I was looking for.

>>5588643

yeah, well, that's what you get for using the oven.

http://www.playingwithfireandwater.com/files/microwave-fries.pdf

>>5588643
You should've spread them out more so there weren't in a pile, also when you're putting on the seasoning it helps to make them a bit fluffy/rough them up a bit like you would if you were doing roast potatoes, it makes them crisp easier.

Also, it might depend on whether you oven is fan assisted or not for the temp and duration they need to be in there. Since I've never had them come out soft unless they're in there too little, it could also be that you didn't use enough oil, unfortunately I just kind slosh it in there and guess, since I've made them enough I usually get the correct amount.

>>5591326
>>5588643
I probably should've said they need to be on a baking tray too, maybe? If you just put the bowl in the oven, that is wrong.

>>5591326
yeah I was using a toaster oven and they were stacked pretty high in a pie pan, so it's much more likely all my fault than the recipes. I might try it again when I have access to a real oven/baking dish