How to Make Perfect Thin and Crisp French Fries (2010)

http://aht.seriouseats.com/archives/2010/05/the-burger-lab-how-to-make-perfect-mcdonalds-style-french-fries.html?daysago=1300

by shawndumas • 13 years ago

193 73 13 years ago

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zaroth• 13 years ago

Gotta love a) this guy's passion for fries, b) that McDonalds gave away their secret recipe (blanching) without which Kenji seemed to be totally stuck, and c) the vinegar trick to make it easier for us to do back at home.

He doesn't mention what's he using to cut the fries?

sjtrny• 13 years ago

It's hardly a secret. In fact one of the worlds most renowned chefs, Heston Blumenthal, openly describes the practice.

bostik3• 13 years ago

I'm actually in the middle of The Fat Duck Cookbook. Blumenthal's recipe for top-notch pub chips (large and slightly bulky, not thin like fries) even goes by the name "triple-cooked chips".

In the TV series, In Search of Perfection, he goes the extra mile to figure out a way to reproduce the recipe in reasonably well equipped home kitchens. One of the many tricks is that having salt in the blanching water is mandatory. It helps to create the porous surface. His recipe is so good I can make delicious chips at home even without access to a temperature controlled fat fryer.

(Incidentally, Jamie Oliver blanches whole skinned potatoes before roasting them in the oven. I've tried that too and it does make a big difference to how they come up.)

But the vinegar trick was something I hadn't heard before. I'll have to give it a try, because it would seem to give some extra leeway with timing. For a home cook, that is an important factor.

eps• 13 years ago

I'm sure his book is awesome, but blanching and parboiling are such rudimentary cooking techniques that they are described in virtually every cooking book that's not just a recipe collection.

xdissent• 13 years ago

I use this to cut my fries: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00004RDFH/ref=oh_details_o...

I don't blanch them, I first soak them, dry them, then deep fry them twice per Alton Brown's guidance: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/chips-and-fis...

They're perfect.

dmunoz• 13 years ago

As sjtrny already mentioned, it's not a secret and Kenji would not have been stuck not knowing it. What he found interesting was that "McDonald's does indeed use a double fry method, but it's far from the traditional one." It's indeed interesting the method McDonald's has ended up with. I blanched many potatoes as a young lad working in a restaurant. Interestingly, the local farmers who we sourced our potatoes from often came in for lunch and requested single fried fries (unblanched). They were certainly a lot different, mostly not as crispy a crust.

bostik has also already mentioned that Heston Blumenthal covers a method in detail in the fish and chips episode of his In Search of Perfection series. I've only gone all the way with this method once, but it is fairly close to what we did at the restaurant, only we never froze our fries, only refrigerated them. It does make nicer fries than simply double frying, but not by a wide margin.

Fries are a bit of an ongoing project for me. I'm trying to find some reasonable method to have nice baked fries. What I get so far is serviceable, but not nearly as nice as frying them.

Edit: I forgot to add the second reason I wanted to make this post: Kenji has an ongoing series on Serious Eats called The Food Lab. He takes the same semi-scientific approach to certain dishes as in the submitted article. Another good post in the series is on dry-aging beef at home [0]. American's Test Kitchen [1] tends to do the same thing, but they only really share the final result with a few tidbits on their process of discovery.

[0] http://www.seriouseats.com/2013/03/the-food-lab-complete-gui...

[1] http://www.americastestkitchen.com/

dirtyaura• 13 years ago

Have you tried Blumenthal's roast potatoes from In search for perfection? Same goal as in fries, crispy outerior and fluffy interior. No frier needed and they are just - well - perfect and relatively easy to make for a Blumenthal's recipe. My wife was totally in awe when I made them the first time.

DanBC3• 13 years ago

A number of mandoline slicers will do this.

Be careful, it's ridiculously easy to slice way fingertips with these.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Selkin-Borner-V1-Slicer-White/dp/B00...

etc etc etc.

beedogs• 13 years ago

Really weird; I just made these last night and the post shows up here today. They're delicious, by the way.

treenyc2• 13 years ago

Now can someone PLEASE post the recipe for KFC batter.

I walked into a KFC and ask to buy a bag of batter, it is how funny they turned very serious all the sudden and asked me to leave to store.

I mean I just want to use it on real organic chicken. Anyone???

chestnut-tree2• 13 years ago

"Now can someone PLEASE post the recipe for KFC batter."

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2009/jul...

treenyc2• 13 years ago

oh chestnut-tree, I love you! I will look to make this in Denmark at some point.

DanBC3• 13 years ago

But they use 12 secret spices!

DigitalTurk3• 13 years ago

McDonald's french fries are great. At their best, they are everything a french fry should be: salty, crisp, light, and not greasy.

Funny. I tend to think of super thin fries as an American thing. Fries from McDonald's, in particular, taste like cardboard to me.

Then again, I'm Belgian.

riffraff• 13 years ago

I am italian living in hungary and I never considered McD fries "amazing". I have never met anyone who didn't prefer home made ones/random shop one's either.

So, last time this article came up on HN I generously filed it under "maybe fries in fast food chains in the US are different than fries in US fast food chains everywhere else".

malaporte• 13 years ago

I think they are. I'm a Canadian living in France, and I pretty much hate McDonalds here. Fries are soggy and not salted enough, burgers are completely messed up, and the service is impressively slow. I tried several places, it's all more of the same.

Everytime I go back to a McDonalds in Canada I find the food just tastes better. It's still fast food, but I'm enjoying it so much more.

DigitalTurk3• 13 years ago

I don't remember McDonald's fries tasting better in the US than in Europe, but then I don't go to McDonald's all that often. (I do grant that there are subtle differences between McDonald's restaurants in different regions.)

There's actually a second type of American fries that I think is somewhat better than the ones at McDonald's. They're called Cajun fries [1]. They're made in an oven and are a bit spicy. You can get them at cheap fast food places like Checkers or fancier hamburger places like Five Guys.

[1] http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/rachael-ray/cajun-oven-fr...!

chestnut-tree2• 13 years ago

"Then again, I'm Belgian."

If you can access this 30 min radio programme from the BBC about chips (from June 2010), you might find it interesting. It features a segment on Belgian fries

"In Belgium the oven chip hasn't caught on. Instead friterie shops proliferate, and Belgians take their chips very seriously. How the potato arrived in Europe remains contentious, but the Belgians are confident that it was them, and not the French, who invented the "French" fry. Ray Kershaw visited the Friet Museum in Bruges established to celebrate their national fry with director Eddie Van Belle."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00sqkgb (segment starts at 18:33 seconds)

reirob• 13 years ago

Maybe it was some French-speaking Belgians who invented the French fries ;-)

Just a wink to the ridiculous conflict that goes on between French-speaking-Belgians and the Dutch-speaking-Belgians, now for years.

rhizome31• 13 years ago

Just to clarify on this crucial topic, note that us people of France do not claim to have invented french fries and we find it odd that American people call them french. We generally also see it as a Belgian speciality.

toolslive• 13 years ago

What happened is that at the end of WW2, the Americans learned about the fries in Belgium, but since the people spoke French, believed to be in France.

Anyway, in Belgium people still use beef fat for the perfect fries.

bsaul• 13 years ago

To "french" is a verb meaning to "slice". Probably the original expression was french(ed) frie(d potatoe)s.

jaggederest• 13 years ago

Confirmed, an American who has made the trip to Belgium, the fries in your country are ridiculously superior to anything we get here, except certain places that specialize in them, where they occasionally manage to achieve par with Belgian frites.

stinos• 13 years ago

Exactly. The article was almost annoying as it talks about "perfect" fries like everybody on the whole planet has the same taste. There aren't many things more subjective than taste. Just saying a fry should be salty in order the perfect is already a mistake. Not everybody likes that taste. Which is why you get asked specifically if you want salt or not. At least in Belgium, where we like to enjoy the one and only true superior real fries. Lol.

Anyway, still appreciate the article, it just started with the wrong premises.

chaz• 13 years ago

Talk to anyone about food, and everyone will have a different opinion of what/who/where the "perfect" is: the perfect pizza, the perfect burger, the perfect sushi, the perfect pie, the perfect ____. Everyone obviously has different tastes and it's universally acknowledged to be a subjective, if not contentious, topic.

If nothing else, I appreciate that the author laid out his criteria for selection, and didn't just jump straight into it.

maxerickson• 13 years ago

It literally starts off with the sentence "I'm gonna come right out and say something that I'm sure you won't all openly agree with".

That's a pretty decent acknowledgement that other perspectives exist.

raldi• 13 years ago

Other than the thickness, what are some of the differences between the fries you like and the ones at McDonald's?

jkn• 13 years ago

One difference would be that Belgian fries are traditionally fried in beef fat, which changes the taste quite a bit.

kbutler• 13 years ago

The author acknowledges that other types of fries are also great, but this article is about the perfect "thin and crispy" fry, rather than the perfect thicker style fry.

"my thick-cut pub-style fries are super-potatoey and fantastic, and when I'm in the mood for them, my seasoned steak fries can't be beat, but for thin, super-crisp fries..."

The "taste like cardboard" is probably because McDonalds no longer fries in beef tallow.

coldtea• 13 years ago

I'm European too, and I also wondered what was he going on about. I mean, McDonalds fries "great"? "Everything a fry should be"?

I've had lots of wonderful french fries in the US -- and none was in a McDonalds (or Burger King, or Jack in The Box, or Arbies, or ...).

apunic• 13 years ago

I find it remarkable that the bigwigs have discovered a way to create a frozen fry that even a one armed eyeless chimp has trouble screwing up.

I find it in general remarkable that McDonalds' business processes seem to be so foolproof that any one armed eyeless chimp is able to create BigMacs, Hamburgers and any other McDonalds dish always and anywhere in the world with the same high quality.

venomsnake• 13 years ago

Obligatory joel article.

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000024.html

darkxanthos2• 13 years ago

Now that I've had personal experience with FogBugz (from FogCreek) I heavily discount Joel's wisdom.

tombrossman• 13 years ago

For anyone interested in a broader look at the science of cooking I strongly recommend 'How to read a french fry' by Russ Parsons. It explains equally important factors like the need for natural soaps (surfactants) in the oil as it breaks down, for that perfect color. If you've ever tried to fry something until golden brown in a perfectly clean pot using new oil you've run up against this. The food is still white when it's done and cooking it until brown means overcooking it. You have to save a bit of the old oil to mix in with the new stuff.

It's an easy read with recipes for several dishes and the book can serve as a really solid base for understanding how to be a much better cook.

DanBC3• 13 years ago

This article takes a while to get to the good bits, which are:

triple cooking (blanch, cool fry, hot fry) and the sciencey stuff about sugars and starches.

I love the batches and notes about temperature. This is something I need to start doing so I can recreate the sucessful cooking I do.

What I'd have liked to see more of was a discussion of different types of potato, and different treatment of the oil.

nicklovescode• 13 years ago

Two other recipes by the awesome chefs at ChefSteps

Thick: http://www.chefsteps.com/activities/thick-cut-french-fries

Thin: http://www.chefsteps.com/classes/science-of-poutine/#/thin-c...

disclaimer: I'm working on a project with ChefSteps

sampo• 13 years ago

Here are Heston Blumenthal's triple-cooked chips: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIiQbeVHgX0

dhughes• 13 years ago

I watch all Heston's videos he seems like he makes fantastic food, I think he shows how to make really good food sometimes in a different way not pretentious but fun.

Theodores4• 13 years ago

One thing that McDonalds do is add the salt to the fries for you. This seems a little bit odd if you have been used to buying 'chips' from a British Fish and Chip shop.

However the 'salt' they add isn't just salt. It is a mix of sugar and salt. This does work wonders for making them taste really nice, it works well with regular 'chips' too. Yet it is tantamount to deception, unless you are in the know you would never imagine that McDonalds fries are sugar coated.

JoeAltmaier• 13 years ago

Urban legend, I believe.

Theodores4• 13 years ago

Cite sources?

I have none either. However I asked a chef I worked with why his chips tasted so good. He said that it was the sugar in the salt that made the difference, a trick he learned at a British McDonalds. Hearsay true, however sugar in the salt does actually work, as it should given our tastes: sugar/salt/fat = yum!

ceejayoz2• 13 years ago

http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/5283/are-mcdonal...

Theodores4• 13 years ago

I did not claim they cooked them in sugar. Just added sugar to the salt.

lnanek2• 13 years ago

It's a pretty common trick to ask them for no salt fries so they make a fresh batch for you...

dylnclrk• 13 years ago

I'll concede that Kenji (the food lab author) definitely has a hacker-ish point of view when it comes to cooking, but I feel like we may be diluting the content of HN with a french fry recipe. Maybe everyone just loves fries?

Oh and for the record, I'm a huge Food Lab fan and have been a regular reader for some time... But I think that this Cook's Illustrated recipe beats Kenji's fries (and it's way easier too): http://deep-fried.food.com/recipe/easier-french-fries-cold-o...

tptacek3• 13 years ago

If you like this but want to see how you might take it a step further:

http://www.cookingissues.com/2010/05/12/the-quest-for-french...

I believe Kenji Lopez-Alt, the author of the Serious Eats article, is the "Former Cooks Illustrated Test Cook" quoted at the end of Dave Arnold's article.

(Everything at Cooking Issues is amazing, especially Dave Arnold's weekly podcast; also, you can get Pectinex Ultra SPL from Modernist Pantry online).

batbomb• 13 years ago

did you order your searzall?

tptacek3• 13 years ago

Yep. Of course. They radically underpriced the thing.

stephen• 13 years ago

Gah! I am just now seeing this...looks really awesome.

mattmaroon• 13 years ago

I just got some SPL shipped to me today. I have a theory on how to make lime juice clarification easier, but will be making some French Fries too.

jonnathanson2• 13 years ago

To me, the most interesting part of this article was the quest to obtain the frozen fries in the first place. I'm amazed a McDonald's manager gave them out.

Corporations like McDonald's rely on trade secrets: things that can't necessarily be patented, or which might be placed in danger by being patented. (Applying for a patent makes a recipe public record, and the lifetime of the patent is finite.) The secret recipe for Coke, or in this case the secrets behind McD's fries, are worth billions of dollars.

For all the McD's manager knew, Grant might have been a rival doing some corporate espionage. Or he might have been a government inspector of some sort. It sounds farfetched. But many people in store management in retail and fast food are very aware of these possibilities, and they're trained to err on the side of extreme caution.

Kenji isn't lying when he says the employee/manager in question could get fired for having given these out. Trade secrets in multi-billion-dollar corporations are a fascinating subject: they're often tied to the most seemingly minute details, and they're guarded as carefully as gold.

yetanotherphd• 13 years ago

I doubt McDonalds really cares that much about their trade secrets.

Even though I love McDonalds fries (you can almost taste the oppression and cultural hegemony), perfectly emulating McDonald's fries is always going to be a tiny niche. No competitor is going to want their fries to be exactly the same as in McDonalds since brands want to position themselves as interesting and unique.

That said, I don't really like the deception he (and his agents) practiced, but it seems like a minor sin in the scheme of things.

jonnathanson2• 13 years ago

They have about $1.7 billion in intangible assets on their balance sheet, of which trade secrets are not necessarily delineated but are a significant component.

I have no real idea if the fries are a trade secret; that much is pure speculation. But my point was more that I wouldn't be surprised if the fries were a trade secret, as such is the norm for large food companies. You'd be surprised at the level of granularity involved in food company trade secrets. It's not so much about protecting the quality of McDonald's fries; it's about protecting the properties of those fries that permit logistics at McDonalds-level scale: fries that are designed a certain way as to always cook consistently despite freezing, transportation across complex supply lines, inconsistent on-site storage and preparation, etc. It's not a huge stretch to call McD's fries a product of engineering as much as nature.

Source: http://www.aboutmcdonalds.com/mcd/investors/sec_filings.html

How to Make Perfect Thin and Crisp French Fries (2010)

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