Name: Double Fried French Fries
Prep time: 5 min
Total time: 1 h
Yield: 4 serving(s)
Ingredients: 4 medium russet potatoes; 1/4 c. white vinegar; 1 tsp. salt, plus more for serving; Peanut oil, for frying

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Eating With Your Eyes

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Dish, French fries, Junk food, Fast food, Food, Fried food, Side dish, Kids' meal, Cuisine, Ingredient, 

(calm electronic music) - I am very excited, because today I am on a journey to make the perfect french fry. It smells really bad! - Why? (crunch) - There is no time when I wouldn't eat a french fry. You could wake me up in the middle of the night and be like, "I made some really good fries," and I'd be like, "Yeah, sure!" I grew up with Steak 'n Shake french fries, which are really skinny and crunchy, but I love all types. I even like bad fries sometimes. If I'm drunk. There's a lot of different ways to make french fries, and I'm gonna try to tackle as many of them as I can, and do some comparing. I've read a lot of conflicting information on the internet about what makes a fry so crunchy. Some say soaking in salt water, some say in vinegar, I've seen a couple of pickle juice posts. One thing that everyone seems to agree on is that Russets are the best potatoes for the job. I've hand-cut into 1/4 inch thick fries, and I've treated them in several different ways. Some were soaked with salt, some were soaked with vinegar, some with pickle brine, and then some in just plain water, and I'm also going to test one that I've just cut fresh. I must explain my sticky note situation. We've had these in the kitchen for as long as I've worked here, so like, two and a half years. I use them almost every day, and somehow we never run out, but I've never seen new ones come in. I love them! It makes everything kind of a joke. It's like whatever you write's the punch line. I am going to heat up some canola oil, and we will start our process of double-frying. The ones that I soaked just straight up in water, they don't have much bend, they're pretty stiff. But the ones I soaked in pickle juice have a really nice amount of bend, and then the ones that I soaked in salt are like, crazy bendy. Even this very thick fry, it's wild. I'm really excited to see the difference. So the first one we're doing is with water. We're gonna do a double-fry method. We start at a low temperature, so like 325. We fry the potatoes until they're soft on the inside, and then we bring the heat up and we fry them again, very hot, and that will create the crispy crust. We're doing the one with salt. (upbeat music) Then the one with vinegar. (upbeat music) And then the one with pickle brine. (upbeat music) They all look about the same. And the control one that I didn't soak at all got a lot darker with those starches on the outside. So now, our second round, we're deep frying to make them crispy so I'm going to jack the temperature up to 375, and we're gonna cook them until crisp, and then give them a taste! And season them with salt, obviously. (happy electronic music) Let's start with water. - Okay. - [Lena] Not crispy on the outside. - Mm-mmm. - The inside is not bad. - Mm, these taste way better than they look like they would taste. - These are with salt. - Okay, yeah, it's crunch. - The crunch is coming. The issue with mine is the potato isn't fluffy. - [June] I think that's a classic look. - It is very classic. The surface of the fry looks really good. - [June] Blistery. - [Lena] Yeah. - [June] Bubbly, like there's air inside. A much nicer crunch too, you kinda hear-- - [Lena] Yeah, mh-hmm.. - [June] A snap. - A crunch. Can you taste the vinegar? - I can't. If you didn't tell me you marinated them in vinegar I wouldn't have, and I probably still can't. - Yeah. - But there is something blander about this compared to this flavor. - Yeah. - It's not quite as potato-y. - Yeah, totally. - Tell me about the control. - I just cut them and put them straight into the fryer, I didn't rinse off the starch-- - No rinse, ahh. - Or anything. And as you can see, they turned a slightly unappealing color. - I think because we didn't wash off any of the starch, it's like all the sugars that are still on there just kind of caramelized very quickly. The inside tastes raw, not in terms of texture, but in terms of taste, like when you undercook your potatoes by three or four minutes. This is what I've been looking forward to. - [Lena] Pickle brine! - I think I'm gonna go for this one. And this one. (Lena laughs) And this one. Look at that! Bubbles on the surface, blisters between the bubbles. - Tastes a lot like pickle! - Even if we don't go forward with this one for your classic potato fry, this needs to be a recipe. - Yeah, it's good. It really does taste like a pickle. - I think we can sell this at Shake Shack. - Oh, yeah, pickle fries! - [June] The vinegar, I think, wins for classic fry. - [Lena] Yeah. - Just overall winner, is the classic. Straight after you take them out of the brine, they're still kinda wet, so they will hold on to the salt better. - [Lena] Yeah. - And then you could pat them dry. Like, you pat these dry-- - Yeah. - Before frying. - Thank you for your advice. I will feed you more fries soon, I'm so sorry. Vinegar is best, we loved it, but it needed a little flavor. People are gonna think I'm psycho for taking notes with red Sharpie. It's just all we have, I'm sorry. I'm excited. But I also have a stomachache. And I need water. Water! (upbeat electronic music) Day two, french fries, super stoked. I'm wearing my lucky tee from my favorite boardwalk fries place in Delaware. Let's get going! We already know that we wanna brine them in vinegar, but I'm trying a couple different methods for adding the salt. Those have been brining in vinegar, a vinegar solution, for half an hour, and I just drain them and dump them out. So we're adding salt to draw out some of the moisture, and then I'm gonna just dab them dry with a paper towel before we fry them. These guys I brined for 20 minutes in the vinegar solution, added some salt to the mix, and then brined it for 10 more minutes. Same brine time, but these just had salt added a little bit later in the brine. We're gonna double-fry both of these, taste them, see which one has better flavor, and then move on to our next test. Let's do it! We're gonna bring it up to 325 for that initial fry, and then we'll hit them again in the 375 oil. (upbeat music) So our first fry is done, they look really good, so I'm gonna bump up the temp to 375 and then we're gonna fry them again. And add a little sea salt. (upbeat music) First fry of the day, 12 o'clock. That's an appropriate time to eat a fry. We're starting with our salt and vinegar brined fries. They look nice, definitely crunchy on the outside. I'm gonna give them a try. Mmm. Already better than, I think, any of the ones we did last time. Nice and creamy on the inside. I'm into it. They're very tender on the inside, which is really nice. That's a good fry. Now we're testing the ones that we sprinkled with salt and then dabbed dry. Also looking, honestly, pretty identical to the other ones. Ooh, very creamy on the inside. Mmm, I think you're gonna like these better. Mmm. - [June] Mmm, I like the potato taste. - Yeah, they're a lot potato-ah, potato-y-er. I think drawing out some of that moisture really helped. This was the one we sprinkled with salt. This was June's idea, 'cause June's such a genius. I think that works. I think I like this method better. I'm gonna stop eating fries now, because I'm so hot and we have to eat so many more. I'm just gonna finish this one. So now that we have our method down, I have three oils I wanna test them in. I'm just gonna start cutting some fries. I have prepped my potatoes, and I'm ready to fry. I have three oils. One we are familiar with, but I'm just frying up a batch so we can compare and contrast. So this is the vegetable oil that we've been frying in, and then I have this pot here for our peanut oil, and when we're done frying both of these, I'll do the last batch with duck fat. Duck fat is super expensive, this jar was $10, so it's definitely a splurge, if you wanna make your fries with this. It smells like fried chicken, a little bit. It does smell a little bit gamey. It's just straight-up duck fat. Ooh, look at it. It looks so intense. - [June] Oh my gosh. - $15 worth of duck fat and like, 40 cents of potatoes. (upbeat music) It smells really bad! It smells like Jello, to me, it smells like gelatin. When you're like, soaking, ugh. To me it smells like gelatin. - Why? - There she is. Help us, please! - [June] You gotta use it now. - Yeah, this says 2020. It's fine, just smells terrible. I mean, they look beautiful, but. Hopefully this smell will have cleared by the time Lauren tastes it so she isn't slayed by the fragrance. It comes from this one. - It smells awful in here. - It smells so bad. - I was so excited for duck fat, too. - I know. - Now I'm like, a little scared. - They still look really good. - Yeah. - But, yeah. - I would just like to note, the fry size is perfect. - Oh, thank you! - I hate super thick fries. - I'm loving hearing everyone's fry preference. These I've technically had before. - Okay. - But. - Yum! - Yeah. - You can hear it! - Yeah! They've definitely got some crunch. - Perfect amount of salt. - Thank you. - They're like a better McDonald's fry, almost. - Thank you! - I love McDonald's fries. (Lena laughs) I love those! - [Lena] So this is peanut oil, which everyone has told me is the best. - I don't know if I taste a significant difference. - Yeah, the surface of these looks a little more blistered, but. - [Lauren] Are these ones less greasy, maybe? - I can't find any major difference. The flavor seems the same. - Mm-hmm. These are the dreaded duck fat. - Ooh. - They're really good. - They are good! (laughs) The crunch on the outside is so nice. - [Lauren] Mm-hmm. - We fried this many fries in $15 worth of duck fat, so. - I would definitely not wanna buy $15 worth of fat. It tastes like, fancier. - Yeah. Yeah. - For sure. - I also feel like I can't even, I couldn't finish a basket of those. - Sure. - The way I could polish off, I mean, they're heavy. But they're good. Verdict? I mean, I think peanut might win by a hair. That's how I feel. - Yeah, I have no opinion. - Yeah. - I don't know. I think I would use either. - Yeah. No, that's good, that's a good... - It's the same temperature and cooking time, right? - Yeah. - But I do agree, these ones seem, whether or not it's that much of a difference of what you fried first, these ones do seem a little bit crispier, so yeah. I'll always go for the crispier ones. - Stay tuned, I'll be bringing you a lot of fries later! - Thank you! - Thank you. (calm electronic music) Once you've patted your fries dry. (calm electronic music) Drain them, and then bring that oil up to 375, and fry them for four minutes more. (calm electronic music) So now we're gonna pop them into a bowl lined with a paper towel, and we're just gonna shake off that excess grease, salt them, plate them, and eat them! (calm electronic music) They're really good, I love the exterior a lot. They get really bubbly and crispy all around the outside. They've got sort of a blistered look to them, which is very appealing. I'm gonna try it without ketchup. Mmm. Ah. Super creamy and smooth on the inside, they're not like those hollow fries that when you bite in, there's nothing on the middle. It's a good fry! I love fries, I just do. Wanna try some fries? - Yeah! - Oh my God. - You made this? - Ketchup and mayo. - I'm gonna get some mayo on it! - Is it good? - Yeah, they look like, like bag fries. - I just keep eating them. The end is not coming, they're fantastic. - Thank you. - If you like fries-- Is it like Five Guys? - They are like Five Guys! (crunch) - Oooh! (calm music)

These double-fried french fries are seriously delicious. Learn how to make them on this week's Insanely Easy!

Ingredients

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Eating With Your Eyes