Hot Chips / French Fries

I’ve been craving chips lately. Just good old plain salty chips. Maybe it’s a sign that I need more salt in my diet  – or maybe its just a sign I love chips!  Either way, I decided that it would be the next food that I would learn how to make.

There are a lot of good recipes out there for home made chips with exotic flavours of herbs and spices but, honestly, what is wrong with the good old salty chips that I grew up eating? I love salty chips that you eat at the beach, that you have with fish and chips, that you get at restaurants. Just the normal, good old chips – or ‘french fries’ as everywhere outside of Australia seems to call them.

The recipe below turned out to be a big success – they were exactly what I wanted. I don’t even feel AS guilty eating them because they aren’t fried in grease and oil. They are just baked in the oven with oil and salt.

Ingredients:

• 2 large potatoes
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 2 teaspoons salt

Method:

Step 1:Preheat oven to 180°C . Lay out a baking sheet on a baking tray (you may need two baking trays depending on the size of your potatoes).

Step 2: Rinse the potatoes very well under water – you want to get rid of as much of the dirt off of them as you can.

Step 3: Cut off any deformities/growths that your potatoes might have. From here cut the top and bottom off your potatoes (this will give your chips the perfect french fry look).

Step 4: Stand the potato on one end and slice the potato down lengthways in the thickness that you want your chips/fries cut (about 2 cm thick).

Step 5: From here, cut those slices into french fry sticks using the same measurement of 2cm thick. *Note try to keep the same thickness that you cut in Step 4 as you do in this Step so that your french fries look prettier. Repeat Step 4 and Step 5 with remaining potato/s.

Step 6: Once you have cut all the chips, place the sticks into a bowl and add the olive oil and 1 teaspoon salt and toss until the chips are completely covered.

Step 7: Lay out the chips evenly on the baking paper – make sure that the chips do not cover each other and are lying flat. Sprinkle another teaspoon of salt over the fries. Note* do not overcrowd the baking tray as this will result in the chips baking unevenly and affect the end result of good chips.

Step 8: Bake for 20 minutes.

Step 9: Flip the fries over and bake for another 8 – 15 minutes or until the chips are crispy. It is a total of 28 – 35 minutes of total baking (or longer if you cut your chips thicker).

Step 10: Take the french fries out of the oven, place in a bowl and serve. You may want to sprinkle extra salt onto the chips at this stage but that is personal preference.

Steps 3+4: Cut the top and bottom off the potato and slice the potato down lengthways.

Step 4: Cut potato lengthways.

Step 5: Cut those potato slices into french fry sticks.

Step 6: Add oil and salt to chips.

I know everyone eats their chips differently, but I am a chips and tomato sauce girl – and you won’t find a better combo than that to increase your salt intake.

So enjoy this somewhat healthy version of chips/fries. You’ve put the ‘hard’ work in and ‘burnt’ off a few meagre calories getting them ready or however you want to justify them! Or, in my opinion, who cares, they are chips, they are to ENJOY, so enjoy every second of them :).

Theoretically this is just enough for two people, ‘theoretically’. Personally I reckon it depends on how big the chips are and how much you want chips. I love chips.

Enjoy them! 🙂

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