Homemade french fries - tastier, more natural and cheaper than McDonald's. How to cook french fries at home

According to this recipe, you can cook potatoes "like in McDonald's". Although it is a little laborious, the potatoes turn out to be correct, with a crispy crust and a tender middle.

And it is not just words. After experimenting a lot with deep fried potatoes, I can confidently say that this is the most suitable recipe.

Potato
Vegetable oil
Salt
Garlic (optional)

I do not specify the number of ingredients, it all depends on your needs. One serving of french fries is about 1-2 potatoes (depending on size). Vegetable oil is used refined. Salts for cooking can be put more than usual, about 1 tbsp. spoon for half a liter of water. Garlic - 1-2 cloves. Added purely for flavor. If you don't like the garlic flavor, don't put it in.

Required accessories:

Pot for cooking - any, in it we just scald the potatoes
Frying pan - a deep fryer is better, but a tall frying pan will do
Knife (or peeler and vegetable cutter) - for peeling and cutting potatoes
Colander - for washing and pre-drying the slices
Towel - to absorb moisture during final drying
Paper towels - to get rid of excess oil
Skimmer - for removing potatoes from deep fat

We clean the potatoes. Cut into slices about 1 cm wide. You can make the slices corrugated with a special vegetable cutter, like mine. But still, their thickness should be at least 1 cm. It is this size that will allow you to make real french fries, with a crispy crust, but soft inside.

We wash the slices with cold water in a colander, removing starch from their surface.

Put the potatoes in a saucepan for cooking, add finely chopped garlic and salt.

Fill with cold water and put on the stove.

As soon as the water boils, drain it and rinse the potatoes with cold water.

Lay out on a towel until completely dry.

Heat vegetable oil for frying in a frying pan. We fry the slices. If the deep fryer is small, cook in several stages.

The potatoes are undercooked. It should be hardened on top, but pale. Approximately like this.

We spread the slices on paper napkins and leave for about 1 hour. It is necessary that the potatoes are completely cooled and the crust is dry.

Fry potatoes again. Now until ready, until golden brown. Place on paper towels and sprinkle with salt.

Ready french fries are served immediately. It doesn't have to be hot, it can be cold. But preferably not later than 1 hour after preparation. No matter how much you would like to fry french fries for the future, but after standing, it significantly loses its taste and becomes soft.

French fries cooked according to this recipe are most like the ones they make in fast food restaurants.

And this is facilitated by several culinary techniques, which I will discuss in more detail.
1) Cutting into cubes about 1 cm thick - this is the size that will allow a crispy crust to form, and the middle to be completely cooked.
2) Washing the sliced ​​potatoes with plenty of water will prevent the slices from sticking together.
3) Boiling in salt water with garlic will improve the taste of the potatoes. It also helps a little to create a crispy crust. This process can be skipped.
4) Drying before frying is needed so that the boiling oil does not splash, and again for a crispy crust.
5) Double frying with a cooling break is the main technique for getting crispy french fries.
6) Laying out on paper towels will help get rid of the oil remaining on the slices.

It is believed that fried potatoes contributed to the rise of McDonald's even more than the hamburgers themselves. This opinion is reinforced by the fact that today 4 out of 5 visitors to this fast food place order french fries for lunch and dinner.

I've always wondered what the secret of this dish is? After all, everyone who tried to create something similar at home, for sure, failed. I once heard that McDonald's potatoes are so delicious because they supposedly have sugar added to them. But it turned out that everything is much more complicated.

The famous French fried potato (as it was originally called in the USA) is the result of a long search. In the first 10 years of the company's existence, McDonald's System Inc. spent more than three million dollars on improving the quality of french fries!

From the very beginning, McDonald's has used only one variety of potato, the Idaho Russet No. 1. It was most suitable for french fries due to its oblong shape and high solids content.

At first, all research on the process of cooking french fries consisted only of observing how potatoes were fried in restaurants and trying to determine the optimal temperature and frying time. But it soon became clear that this seemingly simple task is more difficult than studying the secrets of the atomic nucleus.

Even frying potatoes of the same variety, obtained from the same supplier, the company's specialists could not get stable results. Chefs have noticed that some batches of potatoes are fried through, while others, under the same conditions, turn golden on the outside, but remain undercooked on the inside.

Investigating the processes occurring in potatoes during storage, the McDonald's laboratory, originally equipped in the basement of one of the restaurants, found the following. Those potatoes that were stored underground for a longer time fried much better than those that were put into cooking immediately after delivery.

By now, everyone in the fast food industry knows that potatoes should be stored for almost three weeks before frying, so that most of the sugar in them is converted to starch. Otherwise, the sugar will quickly turn the potatoes golden and look ready even before they are well fried from the inside.

They set out to analyze solids to find out what levels of solids make a crisp, and ultimately concluded that McDonald's should accept potatoes with at least 21% solids.

Over time, in their pursuit of excellence, McDonald's experts have reached the network of food suppliers. They got farmers to grow potatoes differently to meet the high demands of McDonald's, buying companies started building new, state-of-the-art storage facilities with automatic temperature control and processing potatoes differently.

In fact, the corporation "McDonald's" has changed the entire system of growing and processing potatoes in the United States! True, not all french fry improvements have been related to raw materials. Deeper changes have taken place in the roasting process itself.

One day, in a diner of another chain, where they served sausages with potatoes, the founder of McDonald's, Ray Kroc, spied on a different technology for frying potatoes. Whereas at McDonald's the fries took about five minutes, at the Chicago diner he went to, the process was split into two stages.

The potatoes were blanched in the morning for about three minutes, and upon receipt of the order they were fried for another two minutes. Convinced that this method made the potatoes crispier and also served customers faster, Kroc introduced the new system to McDonald's as well.

Following the example of the same Chicago diner, to achieve friability, they began to add beef fat-based combi fat to deep fat (yeah, that's where the dog rummaged!).

The supplier even developed a special kind of blender for McDonald's, calling it "Formula 47", reminiscent of those 47 cents that then (in the late 50s) cost at McDonald's a purely American snack from a hamburger for 15 cents, french fries for 12 and a cocktail for 20 cents.

However, this was not enough to satisfy the desire of McDonald's management for excellence, and the experiments continued. In the laboratory, they tried to establish what happens to potatoes when they are fully fried?

Temperature sensors were installed in the brazier and the potato slices themselves. Potatoes were fried with dyes, and then cut into pieces and examined under a microscope, etc.

After about a year (!) of research, a discovery was made that finally made it possible to obtain stable results and automate the process of cooking potatoes.

Every time a cold and wet potato is thrown into a roasting pan with melted fat at 325 degrees Fahrenheit (162.8 degrees Celsius), the temperature drops sharply, but each time to a different level.

Potatoes always have time to fry when the temperature of the deep-fryer rises by three degrees Fahrenheit (1.7 Celsius) compared to the level to which it has dropped.

This discovery allowed the introduction of automatic temperature control. A "potato computer" was placed in each fryer - an electrical sensor that determined when the temperature would rise by three degrees and signaled that the potatoes were ready.

A modified version of this sensor is used in all fryers today, and not only for frying potatoes, but also for preparing other fried dishes: from Chicken McNuggets to fish fillets.

Ray Kroc, founder of the company, said: "Competitors could trade in the same hamburgers as ours, and we had nothing to counter them, but french fries were our signature, exceptional dish, because you can not find an equal to it in quality. This, one might say, is the result of our love and care."

Many decades have passed, the secret of french fries has been revealed. The technology of its production is known to everyone in the fast food industry. Anyone can buy the necessary equipment, the Interstate company sells the combiner not only to McDonald's, but also to other chains: Burger King, Wendys, Hardys, KFC, etc.

But I still don’t understand why such delicious fried french fries as in McDonald’s are still not found anywhere else?

Of course you want french fries. The cashier may not even ask. Let's face it, no McDonald's meal is complete without these delicious sticks.

And for the record, the world famous french fries were only added to the menu retroactively. They were replaced with plain old chips in 1949, nine years after the world's first McDonald's opened its doors to business in California.

So, you understand that this yummy is bad for you, don't you? Before you turn your back on the screen so we don't have time to ruin other delicious meals for you, read this: there are many fast food menu items that are much more unhealthy (we'll mention some of them later in this article).

Suspect: Large McDonald's French Fries (153 grams)

Detective: Dr. Christopher Ochner (Research Fellow at the New York Obesity Research Center at St. Luke Roosevelt's Clinic) is familiar with the McDonald's menu. A few years ago, Ochner, who has a Ph.D. in clinical psychology, conducted his own Super Size Me diet experiment in which he ate one meal at a fast food restaurant every day for two months during the study. Its results have not yet been published.

Label: 500 kilocalories, 25 grams fat, 63 g carbohydrates, 350 mg sodium, 6 g fiber, 6 g protein

Ingredients: potato, vegetable oil (rapeseed oil, hydrogenated soybean oil, natural beef flavor [wheat and dairy]*, citric acid [preservative]), dextrose, sodium pyrophosphate (to maintain color), salt, and dimethylpolysiloxane. The oil used for frying also contains tert-butyl hydroquinone.

* Natural Beef Flavor contains hydrolyzed wheat and milk as raw ingredients.

Under the microscope:

Vegetable oil

In order to make french fries, you need to deep-fry them, in other words, spoil the healthy carbohydrates with something fatty. McDonald's potatoes are dipped in the oil bath twice.

Producers cut and boil the potatoes and possibly roast them before freezing them and then send them to restaurants to roast them again, Ochner said. Here's what's in the fryer:

1. Rapeseed oil is a common vegetable oil that is generally considered “harmless” compared to others in this category, but it is still high in calories and therefore promotes weight gain if consumed in excess. It is difficult to say what percentage this is in comparison with less useful and too fatty oils. Because canola oil is a bit more expensive, Ochner suggests that McDonald's uses less of the healthier oils and more of others like corn and soy.
2. Hydrogenated soybean oil. When conventional soybean oil goes through the hydrogenation process, its unsaturated fats become saturated, which in turn simplifies the cooking process and helps preserve the volume of the potatoes. The downside is that these fats become trans fats, which are strongly associated with heart disease. You'd think that the recent mandatory call to remove trans fats from all foods has caused McDonald's to rethink its recipe. Nope. Ochner says the FDA's definition of "zero trans fat per serving" means less than 1 gram per tablespoon and that McDonald's has found a loophole and still continues to use relatively low amounts of trans fat. fat in your deep fat.
3. Natural beef flavor. About 50 years ago, McDonald's cooked french fries in beef tallow. When he switched to vegetable oil, so that the french fries would not lose their famous flavor, he decided to add natural beef flavor to the oil. Hydrolyzed wheat and milk are used as initial ingredients for flavoring. Surprisingly enough, these potatoes are not vegetarian. In 2002, McDonald's paid $10 million to members of the vegetarian Hindu community who sued the chain for revealing how the food was cooked.
4. Lemon acid. This common preservative is considered safe, but there's something troubling about how it affects food. If you remember 2004 and Morgan Spurlock's Super Size Me documentaries, then you remember that McDonald's french fries can last for months without spoiling and looking like they were bought yesterday.
5. tert-butyl hydroquinone. This super-powerful preservative, found in many dishes, helps citric acid turn dead potatoes into zombies. Although it is also considered safe, animal studies have linked it to stomach ulcers and DNA damage.

Dextrose

Dextrose, another name for sugar, is the third ingredient - besides potatoes and butter - used to make french fries. Why are there sweets?

Well, it's simple: sugar makes it taste better and is also addictive. A recent study shows that it is easier for the body to convert food sugar into body fat than it is to convert food fat into body fat. So sugar can be worse than fat.

Sodium dihydrogen pyrophosphate

This preservative is the reason McDonald's french fries stay fresh golden brown instead of turning black when stored in a jar for two months.

This same ingredient is often found in ready-made cakes, puddings, waffles, pancakes, and baking mixes, as well as chilled pastries, flavored milk, cured meats, potato products, and canned fish.

Dimethylpolysiloxane

What is the defoamer doing here? Strangely enough, this silicone is there for a reason: McDonald's manufacturers probably add a small amount to the water in which potatoes are boiled before frying and freezing.

This most likely helps to speed up the cooking process (foam does not splash over the edge) and reduces cleaning time. There is no evidence that this substance is harmful, but would you like it to be?

Verdict: This all sounds pretty dubious, right? Despite all the potentially dangerous ingredients hidden in french fries, Ochner says the saturated fat found in such foods is the most dangerous part of the composition.

However, there are many other menu items at McDonald's (and other fast food restaurants) that are worse than french fries for their calorie and fat content alone. Some foods to avoid: McDonald's bacon and cheese burger, which has 820 calories and 41 grams of fat; chicken pie from KFC, which contains 790 kcal and 45 grams of fat; and the Burger King Double Burger, which has 830 calories and 50 grams of fat.

Verdict: McDonald's french fries contain questionable ingredients, high amounts of fat, and minimal amounts of nutrients (proteins, vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants).

However, we understand that some of you may still be finding the cashiers song “Would you like French fries?” very tempting. We hope this information can encourage you to eat less french fries, or at least choose a smaller portion.

By simply ordering a small portion instead of a large one, you can avoid 270 calories, 14 grams of fat, 2 grams of saturated fat, and 34 grams of carbohydrates.

Do you want your french fries to be just as crispy and delicious? like McDonald's? Try this amazing recipe!

In order to cook french fries at home, we need:

• potatoes - 0.5 kg
• vegetable oil - 1 liter
• salt - to taste or 0.5 tbsp without top

The first secret to making delicious french fries is to cut them properly. To do this, we take a large potato tuber and divide it into 1 cm plates, and then cut these plates into 1 cm wide cubes.

Now we put our potatoes for a short time in very cold water (it is possible with ice). And then the potatoes need to be very well wiped dry with a clean kitchen towel.

Second secret cooking french fries- it needs to be fried twice: the first time in not very hot oil, but for a long time - 7 minutes. And the second time in very hot oil, but quickly - 2 minutes.

So for the first time we put the potatoes in deep fat not hot (somewhere around 150-160 degrees). It is better to fry potatoes in small portions.

And the third secret of cooking delicious potatoes fries like in mcdonalds- as soon as you pulled the potatoes out of the oil after the first frying, you need to blot them very well with paper towels so that the oil in which the potatoes were fried does not soak. Before the second fry, the potatoes should cool for at least 10 minutes.

And now we throw the potatoes into hot deep fat (the oil can even smoke a little) and fry for about 2 minutes. We take out our potatoes on a paper towel. Now you can finally salt it. Eat with your favorite sauce.

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Caesar Roll from McDonald's

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6 Comments to “French fries like in McDonald's”

It is better to choose large potatoes, rinse and peel, then chop, preferably on a special shredder, or simply cut into long slices 0.5 - 1.0 cm thick. Put it on a towel and let it dry well, excess moisture can ruin your mood and appearance - the potatoes in hot oil will start to “shoot” and you risk getting a severe burn and pretty dirty clothes with oil splashes.

The easiest way to cook fries is in a special deep fryer - in household appliance stores there is a large selection of such devices. If there is no deep fryer, take a deep pan and pour vegetable oil into it so that one tab of potatoes is completely covered with oil. Dried potatoes are carefully placed in heated oil and “boiled” until golden brown. With the help of a slotted spoon, the finished potatoes are laid out in a colander or on a napkin to allow excess oil to drain, sprinkled with salt to taste. Can be served, for example, with barbecue sauce or plain ketchup.

You can save on oil. To do this, cut into strips and dried potatoes, it is necessary in small quantities, not in a “slide” but in one layer, to fry in a very hot frying pan with a small amount of oil until a crisp appears.

Immediately you just need to put on a big fire then it will crunch.

"like in McDonald's" - Why is this phrase in the title? Then add “patented fries flavor” and flavor enhancer to the composition ...

Wouldn't it be easier to just call the recipe "deep-fried potatoes", which it is?

and no fryer?

Try it in a frying pan with a lot of oil, and over high heat, I think it will work, good luck))

Everything worked out. the recipe is super, only when you cook in a frying pan the potatoes do not crunch.