Lo, and it was tasty

Despite being part-Irish and therefore genetically hard-wired to crave potatoes every third meal, I have rarely ventured beyond your basic baked spud when making my own taters.

However, I had vowed this year to come up with the perfect home fries, because sometimes there is nothing more meet and right than a steaming plate of crispy-tender potatoes. It's hard to figure out what I love best about home fries: the pleasing crackle of pan-fried skin as your teeth crunch down? The faintly salty tingle and melting, starchy taste of a perfectly cooked inner fry? The insane amount of carbohydrates rocketing around the bloodstream afterward? It's like asking me to choose between Scharffen Berger's 62% semisweet, 70% bittersweet and 80% extra dark. They're all delicious, each in its own way.

But back to potatoes: my platonic ideal for home fries is Crepes on Cole, a lovely creperie in the heart of Cole Valley on the corner of Cole and Carl. I loved living in Cole Valley, I love this restaurant, and I loved the potatoes. I haven't the words to describe the kaleidescope of textures and flavors the geniuses behind the grill could conjure with a few minutes' cooking. I'd try to paint a better verbal picture, but my eyes are filling with tears of longing for a basic crepe with spinach and the fries, and the screen's getting blurry.

ANYWAY. Last night, I conducted my first home fries experiment. The steps were as follows:

1. Slice russet baking potato using our mandoline.
2. Toss slices with about 1/2 tbsp olive oil, plus salt and pepper.
3. Lay out on baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
4. Bake for 25 minutes at 350 degrees.
5. Note with some surprise that potatoes skipped oven fry step and turned into home-made potato chips.
6. Nosh with relish.

I refuse to see this as a failure. The chips were crisp, delicious and not at all greasy, and I have the feeling that setting the mandoline to slice more thickly will yield actual baked fries. But if you ever wanted to know how to DIY your own potato chips ... well, now you do.

However, I will not be attempting to reverse-engineer the Cheeto, the Dorito, or the Funyon. Some things are better left to soulless professionals. I will be tackling the Cook's Illustrated version of oven-baked fries next, before moving on to the stop-top version. And catching up on my food porn Hannah's food weblog, as it's one of the reasons I've come around to the idea that preparing the food can be as rewarding as eating it.

Comments

[Emily]

Oh, the Cook's Illustrated Oven-Baked Fries are soooooo good... especially with some lemon aioli or Trader Joe's unsweetened ketchup. You're in for a treat. They're good. Really good. Like crack, almost.

[mike]

Try the Greek-Style Garlic-Lemon Potatoes (I've let my CI online membership lapse, so no link): those are slices of lemony heaven.

The charter issue of Cook's Country has a whole mess of potato dishes, too.

[Val]

If you've got a George Forman grill, another good thing to do is take a waxy potato (I use Yukon Golds), slice it thin, then lay the slices between the grill plates. Grill the bejebus out of them, and convince yourself they are healthy non-fat chips. Which they are--and tasty too! The first time I did this, I made what I thought would be enough for two as a side dish. After consuming the entire first batch all by myself, I had to prep twice that amount to have enough for my husband when he came home.

[hannah]

My favorite home-fried-esque fries are actually shallow fried twice as per Marcella Hazan. You get oil super, super, super hot, and fry the little potato cubes until they just start to brown. Remove them from the oil, let them cool, and then reheat the oil super super hot again and fry til crisp. The perfect crisp outside/tender inside potato.