Homemade Fair Fries - Update

"He Said"...


I cut a bunch of fries cooked some and froze what I didn't need. I thought I could just put them strait into the oil from the freezer but boy was I wrong. Flavor was okay but they were soggy limp excuses for fries.

I have some left in the freezer so I am going to try again. When I put the frozen fries (a lot of them) into the 320 degree oil the temp dropped 100 degrees or so. The oil temp did not recover before it was time to take them out. This is definitely a "person of interest" in my soggy fry mystery. Next time I will try heating the oil a bit more before dropping the frozen fries in and I'll also cook smaller batches. If anyone has any suggestions here I'd be more than happy to hear them!

Hash Browns!

"He Said"...

Alright. Hash Browns, good ones, have been elusive to me. Almost as much as trying to make Carrabba's Chicken Parmesan and General Tsao's Chicken. I've tried all sorts of recipes for hash browns and none of them resemble the type of shredded potato hash browns you get at a coney island greasy spoon type restaurant. G has tried some "fancy" recipes with eggs and such in with the potatoes while I have stuck to just plain old potato recipes. All have come up short.

Last week I tried my hand again using a Pampered Chef mandolin to shred the potatoes. It shredded them fast and easy but the consistency was like cheap shredded cheese. The potatoes were very thin. I cooked them in a bit of bacon fat (I know I know... But my family is a bunch of hillbillies okay!). They were edible but nothing to write a blog about. Then yesterday I found an old stand up shredder way back in the back of our cupboard. This one had much bigger holes so I gave it another try and IT WORKED! These shredded potatoes were like little tubes instead of ribbons.

Here's what I did:

1. I washed 3-5 small to medium sized russet potatoes. (I did not peel)
2. I shredded them by hand with the biggest hole shredder I could find.
3. I washed and washed and washed until my water was clear. (3-4 times)
4. I left the potatoes in the water and threw in some ice cubes too.
5. I heated a heavy cast iron skillet medium low and threw in 1/3 to 1/2 stick of butter.
6. I had to turn the heat down to keep the butter from burning.
7. I dried the potatoes with a paper towel. I tried to get as much water off of them as possible (I learned from the home made fries flying hot oil trick!)
8. Put the potatoes in the skillet so that they are 2-3" deep all around the pan.
9. Let them cook. I checked them after 5 minutes or so with a fork just lifting up a little to see how brown they were. I would guess it took about 10 mins. You must resist the urge to flip until they are golden brown and crunchy!
10. Flip'm. Don't stir, just flip. Use a spatula to flip them in sections trying to disturb them as little as possible.
11. Let'm cook again until the second side is golden brown. This side will cook much faster and may require a little more butter.
12. EAT!

My Notes:
The heavier cut of potatoes, ice bath, and lots of butter did the trick. I still can't determine how much the ice bath helps but at this point it's a superstition so I keep doing it! Last week I had what looked like a pretty good batch going but I stirred them thinking more of them would get brown and I would have hash browns that were more crunchy. WRONG! The moisture in the potatoes ended up steaming the already crispy ones and I ended up with a soggy mess. So from now on I will resist the temptation to "stir fry" hash browns. I also pushed really hard while cutting the potatoes. My thought was that I might be able to force more potato into the holes of the shredder. I don't know if this worked or not but do it with an open hand because shredders make short work of knuckles too!

Oh baby look at the size of the holes on this shredder!

Results:
These hash browns were the best yet! I let them cook a little too long after the flip and should have added a little more butter. They burnt a tiny bit but were still very good. Nice crunch and nice buttery potato flavor! Now all I have to do is remember to take pictures!

Homemade Fair Fries!

"He Said"...

I've never been happy with the way home made french fries turned out. Soggy, burnt before they got crispy, something always happened that made me just want to throw them away and stick with Ore-ida. G and I went to Penn Station Subs a while back and their fries reset my standards for fries. Most restaurants serve the frozen pre-cooked fries that they just throw in the fryer and thaw/brown. Those usually are very crisp and crunchy but light on flavor. Penn Station makes "homemade" style fries and I believe they even cut them in the stores. The flavor was awesome especially with malt vinegar so I thought heck I'll try again. That's my stick my nose up in the air a bit wanna-be-food connoisseur /wanna-be-chef reason for making fries. The real reason, I had 30-45 mins to get dinner ready and I didn't have any frozen fries!

I did a quick search of my mentor and friend (I watch his TV shows okay?!) Emeril Lagasse's french fry recipes and I decided on this one. Plain and simple. (About 2/3 the way down the page).

I've taken a knife skills class but my ability to get consistent size/shape fries by hand is non-existent and we don't have a real fry cutter so I improvised. G bought the Vidalia Chop Wizard from Amazon a while back and I thought hey, I could use the insert by itself without the base or handle to make consistent sized fries! So that's what I did. I took the little green insert out and pushed it down through my already washed potatoes. I left the skins on for that extra flavor. (I'm lying. I was lazy and time was short.) It worked like a charm!

Here are my variations to the recipe:

1. I left the skins on the russet potatoes.
2. I didn't have time to pack them in ice and let them sit for the full 30 mins. They got 15 if they were lucky.
3. I also didn't dry them very well. I would highly recommend following his advice on this one. Hot oil is HOT and it burns! G isn't a fan of oil splatters in her kitchen either. :(
4. I committed a mortal sin by skipping the Essence too.
5. I used vegetable oil instead of peanut oil.

My Notes:
This is the first time that I ever blanched (two step frying) potatoes first. I think this and maybe to a lesser degree the ice bath really made a huge difference in the way these fries turned out. I tried a few fries after the first trip in the oil at 320 degrees and they were cooked through but soft and a bit soggy (like all my other experiences had been) they also had really good flavor at this point. I put them on a cooling rack covered with paper towel and let them cool down. After 5-10 minutes they went back in the oil at 350 degrees and this time they came out with good color and bit of crunch. I hit them with the salt right after coming out of the oil while they were still wet. These fries were not like the frozen fry variety or fast food type but more like fair fries.

Results:
The fries were inhaled by my family of chicks! Everyone loved them and wished I had made more (or not eaten so many as I was cooking). Fantastic recipe that didn't take much time at all. This will likely replace frozen fries in our house (unless I am especially lazy!)

Calzones!

"He Said"...

I've always loved calzones. Way back a long long time ago in a city far far away... Okay back to reality... In Greenville Ohio there was a little Italian restaurant near the plant that I worked at. I can't remember the name and I just tried Googling Italian Greenville Ohio and nothing came up near where I thought it was. Anyway the family that owned this place made awesome calzones. You could get anything you wanted in them and they were huge! The unofficial rule in the company that I worked for was that the person on travel always took the others in the group out to lunch and without fail this little Italian place was the destination of choice.

Anyhow... It's been years and years since I've had a calzone. Tonight lil G and I decided to make some. I searched on RecipeZaar for a calzone recipe just looking for a how to on how much I could get away with stuffing inside and how to properly seal the dough and a rough cooking time. I came across this recipe and the dough sounded really good so I followed this one to the letter except for choosing our own toppings. (I love broccoli on pizza and in calzones!) This turned out awesome! We made three small ones and they were really good. A tad over cooked at 35-40 minutes so watch that. The dough has an awesome taste and has now become the official household dough recipe! Give it a try it didn't take more than 30 minutes to get everything ready (not including rise time. Since we don't have a bread machine I used the stand mixer and let it rise for 30 mins. Could have gone 60 if I had time.) We also used G's homemade pizza sauce. I'll ask her to post that recipe too. Very good and very quick.

Awesome stuff!

BBQ Shredded Chicken

"He Said"...

Tonight G made some pressure cooker'd (is that really a word? It is at 11:30 at night!) chicken breasts. I cut one half of a breast up into very small pieces and threw it into a zipper bag with some buffalo sauce, salt, and pepper. Shook it and then put it on some homemade pizza dough with ranch dressing and more buffalo sauce mixed together as the sauce. Some mozzarella and cojack cheese (I know I know... I wanted cheddar but G wanted cojack.) In the oven on the baking stone (that always burns me!) at 500 preheated for 30 mins degrees and 8 minutes later dinner is ready! Pretty good stuff.

But the real reason for this post was the BBQ shredded chicken I made with the left over chicken breasts. I found this recipe on RecipeZaar.com. It looked easy so lil G and I made the BBQ sauce. She loved it! That little stinker sat down and ate a bowl of nothing but BBQ chicken after it was done! This sauce is super sweet with just a touch of spice from the crushed red pepper. This would be a good BBQ sauce to make in a pinch but nothing so far compares with Sweet Baby Rays.

Honey Mustard Dressing

"She Said"...

If you like Honey Mustard Dressing this is an easy and awesome homemade version! The best thing is that it only has four ingredients that are most likely already in your refrigerator.

INGREDIENTS:

1/4 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon prepared mustard (yellow mustard)
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 tablespoon lemon juice

DIRECTIONS:

In a small bowl, whisk together the mayonnaise, mustard, honey and lemon juice. Store covered in the refrigerator. This recipe is easily doubled.


Next I would like to try my hand at Ceasar Dressing but I am still afraid of using a raw egg.

Cheddar Cheese Baked Potato Soup

"She Said"...

Now that the weather is cooling down I like to make soup for lunch. I make it for lunch because J isn't a huge fan of soups. This soup however was given a thumbs up by J. He said it tastes like a loaded baked potato! You can't beat that! This recipe is courtesy of Sandra Lee from Food Network.

INGREDIENTS:

2 to 3 baking potatoes
2 (10oz) cans Cheddar Cheese Soup
2 1/2 cups low-sodium Chicken stock
1/4 cup real bacon pieces (or diced ham)
Sour cream, for garnish
Green onion, finely chopped, optional for garnish

DIRECTIONS:

Microwave baking potatoes for 7 to 8 minutes on high. I use the baked potato sensor on my microwave. Carefully remove from microwave using oven mitts. They will be HOT! (Duh, they were just microwaved!) Set aside until cool enough to touch.

When potato is cool, cut inot 1/2 inch cubes.

Add Cheese soup, chicken stock, and bacon or ham pieces to a medium pan. Bring to a simmer, stirring occasionally over medium high heat. Add potato and continue to heat soup for 5 minutes.

Ladle soup into bowls and garnish with a dollop of sour cream and a few chopped green onions.

Enjoy!!!