Make french fries yourself: the best tips and tricks

Making fries yourself takes a little longer than deep-frying fries, but it's worth it. The taste of the golden-baked potato pieces is much fresher in the homemade variant and you know the exact ingredients.

Making french fries is really easy

To make french fries yourself, you need about 20 to 30 minutes of preparation time, depending on the number of servings.

• Choose about 150 to 200 grams per serving if the fries are planned as a side dish. As a main meal with salad, you should plan about twice as much.
• Solid potatoes are best suited for French fries that are fried in oil.
• You can also choose slightly floury types for the oven or the hot air fryer.
• Start peeling the potatoes. With "young" potatoes you can leave that alone. Then you benefit from additional healthy fiber and a special taste. Simply wash the potatoes a little more thoroughly before cutting.
• Now cut the potatoes into sticks. This can be done quickly with special french fry cutters, for example. If there is little storage space in the kitchen, simple vegetable cutters are also helpful.
• The fries strips with a wavy cut are particularly attractive. There are also special knives for this. The advantage of the knife: You can individually determine how thick you cut your vegetable pieces at any time.

Work with tricks before cooking

The simplest variant for fries: they start baking right after cutting. This is how you get most of the vitamins and minerals. For the crispy bite and a more even golden tan, however, plan two or three preparation steps.

1. Remove part of the starch on the potatoes. To do this, rinse or blanch the potato sticks. To do this, pour boiling water over your sliced ​​potatoes and let them stand for about 5 minutes.
2. Take the potato pieces out of the water and rinse again with clear water.
3. If you want to cook the potatoes later, you can cover them again with water and a dash of lemon juice and keep them in the fridge.
4. Before you start baking, drain the water and spread the potato strips on a kitchen towel, cover them with a second towel and pat the cracks dry.
5. Tip for hot air fryer and oven: If you now dust the potato wedges with a little rice flour, the fries will be a lot crisper when baked.

Healthier with less fat and less heat

Relatively low-fat variants are possible if you cook the potatoes in the oven or in a hot air fryer. Strictly speaking, both variants are more like "baking" than frying. You do this as follows.

1. Pour about half a to a tablespoon of oil and, if necessary, some salt over the potato wedges. You can mix everything in a sealed can, which you carefully turn and shake.
2. After that you are almost there and finally it goes into the oven or the hot air fryer. In the oven, select around 170 degrees for about 20 minutes.
3. With the hot air fryer you divide the baking into two cooking steps: First 10 minutes at about 120 degrees. Then remove the cooking container briefly, loosen the potatoes a little and turn them over and bake at 180 degrees for about 20 minutes.
4. The temperatures during preparation are important. It is better to choose them lower than too high to limit the formation of the cancer-suspect acrylamide.

Real oil frying

There are french fries eaters who simply do not want to do without the "real french mouthfeel". And that is actually only possible with the preparation in a lot of oil. The disadvantage: the fries are much more greasy. If you don't have a deep fryer and you cook fries in a normal saucepan, you need a good extractor hood.

• Choosing the right frying fat is still important. Choose a fat with a high smoke point and few unsaturated fatty acids. Palm fat, coconut oil or refined, highly heatable oils are best suited for this.
• It will also help real frying to achieve a crisper result if you reduce the potato starch a little beforehand.
• The fine art of baking french fries comes from Belgium. The secret there for the best bite: deep-fry twice. Cook in the first course for about 5 to 7 minutes at 150 degrees. Then drain and let it rest a little. Then bake for a short time at around 180 degrees until golden yellow.

Season at will

You can give your fries a very personal touch with the spice. Whether you season before or after cooking depends on your personal preferences.

• However, the previous treatment is only suitable for salt and makes the entire fries taste more evenly salty. Be careful not to over salt.
• You can develop freely when seasoning. Either you just use pure salt or you can use herbal salt for a little variety.
• If you want a more spicy taste, you can taste it with chilli salt or paprika. There are already ready-made chips and salt mixtures on the market.
• A note of rosemary goes very well with hearty dishes over the potato wedges, especially over baked potatoes.

Have you always wondered where fries come from? Not easy to answer, because there are justifiably discussions on this point. You can read interesting facts about the origin of the popular potato dish in our next practical tip.

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