French Fry Diary 743: Wendy's Breakfast

Recently before getting on a plane to back to New Jersey (North Jersey, and those who know know that it matters) for a wedding, The Bride and I had some time, and the hungries for breakfast.  I carted our bags to the gate while The Bride searched for breakfast.  I was quite surprised when she joined me a bit later with a Wendy's bag. 

Honestly I was unaware that Wendy's did breakfast, but after a moment's thought, yeah, of course they did.  It had just never occurred to me to actually go there for breakfast.  And here at the busy Orlando International Airport, I suppose they must do a brisk breakfast business.  Notably breakfast is not listed on many of their websites.  They need to get the word out.

The Bride got an Artisan Egg Sandwich sans egg, essentially a grilled cheese with bacon, which she thought was just okay.  For me she got a biscuit, also just okay, nowhere near Bojangles or even KFC in quality.  The Bride also got breakfast potatoes, which were at the bottom of the bag.  I was both happy and wary. 

I was happy because, duh, I love the favorite fried food, and wary because many fast food breakfast potatoes are notoriously terrible, as is the case at Burger King, Chick-fil-A, and Roy Rogers.  I opened the bag and was pleasantly surprised.

At first glance, Wendy's Seasoned Homestyle Potatoes look similar to Roy's Home Taters.  Flat potato wedges, sometimes halved, and covered with a seasoned light batter, these were so much better that Roy's bland fare.  These were quite tasty and I wanted more when these were finished.  Definitely a thumbs up.  I'm going to have try more Wendy's Breakfast based on this experience. 

French Fry Diary 411: Ore-Ida Grillers

These new for the summer frozen fries from the fine folks at Ore-Ida - Grillers, Golden Thick Cut Potatoes - not only promise to give you that right off the barbecue grill flavor, but can actually be cooked on the grill. While this is no easy trick, it is a tricky statement.

There are directions on the bag for cooking these extra thick crinkle cut natural cut potato slices on the grill, but it's a gas grill, where you can control the temperature. As I have no gas grill, I had to skip this attempt.

As tempting as grill marks on a potato slice are, I baked them instead. The directions were pretty standard, 450 degrees for 14-16 minutes, so I was worried they might not cook through. As I said, these Grillers are very thick, almost a half inch thick. Time will tell, I guess.

I do like one of the two topping suggestions made on the bag. The Jack Daniels BBQ sauce I'm down with, the shredded cheese, bacon bits and sour cream for a loaded baked potato taste, not so much. But that's me, I'm sure it would work for those that dig that. I did get my BBQ sauce out however.

Once done, the slices look very crisp almost crunchy. But that is just on the outside, inside they are soft, hot, and almost mashed potato-like. Most of them are very good but some of the bigger slices have the same problem as a medium rare steak, the middle is raw. But as I said, most of them are well cooked and very good. And the BBQ sauce definitely helped. Good stuff.

French Fry Diary 348: Simply Potatoes Homestyle Slices

I've mentioned it before, one of our Christmas morning traditions is a big breakfast. The potatoey portion of that tradition goes back a long way in my family. One of my father's favorite meals, breakfast or otherwise, was "fried eggs bacon and potatoes", said just like that, as if it was all one word.

This was a breakfast tradition on Sunday mornings. Sometimes there would be pancakes, or sometimes bakery stuff, and later McDonald's, both after church, but for most of the time, it was fried eggs bacon and potatoes. I/m old, and nobody was counting calories or checking cholesterol back then, suffice it to say. I do realize now that my mom would make boiled potatoes for dinner at least once during the week, good for mashing yourself with a fork, but there was an ulterior motive at work. She was making more than enough boiled potatoes in prep for Sunday, when she would slice them up and fry them in the bacon grease. That extra step, boiling the potatoes, was important.

I've never really been able to duplicate my mom's fried potatoes, though I've tried, and I've come close but they're never perfect. Others have also come close. Monticello's on South Street back in the 1980s came very close with their Monti-Fries, but they're not there any more. The next best thing would be the Simply Potatoes Homestyle Slices from Crystal Farms in your grocer's cool section, as opposed to the freezer.

They are already peeled, already sliced, and already cooked. It kinda does almost the same thing as boiling them a couple days earlier and storing them in the fridge. Because they are prepackaged, they will also keep longer, and bonus, they're gluten-free. They are ready to go at a moment's notice into hot bacon grease (or a more healthy substitute if you wish) and become a yummy cholesterol filled memory from childhood. Most of the time that works out pretty well.