French Fry Diary 62: Short Hills Restaurant & Deli

I visited the Short Hills Restaurant & Deli in Cherry Hill NJ for dinner with family recently. It was the first time I’d been there since a fire gutted the place a few years back. I was impressed by how everything had been restored almost perfectly, and even better. But you don’t care about that stuff, you want to know about the favorite fried food, right?

Short Hills has a variety of potato products – potato skins, shredded breakfast potato home fries, many different flavors of Herr’s potato chips, even sweet potato fries, all with the standard toppings – but the French fries are something else.

The Short Hills fries are natural cuts, thinner than regular cuts but not quite shoestrings, neither crispy nor soggy but just right. They lack salt but you can apply that yourself to your pleasure. The best part is the presentation – in a wax paper cone, Belgian style. How can you go wrong with that? A tasty treat well worth the trip, check them out. Recommended.

French Fry Diary 61: Apple Peeler Machine

Checking out the Irish Hog the other day I came across the blog of The Spiteful Chef. There I came upon the entry about apple peeler machines.

It sparked my interest as I just got rid of one of these things at a yard sale. I could never get the darned thing to work. Yes, it leads you to believe it can peel apples, and potatoes, among other things, with ease – but I couldn’t do it. It makes me wonder if maybe I gave up too quick on it. The possibility of homemade spiral-cut potatoes is almost enough of an incentive to get another one...

French Fry Diary 60: The Irish Hog

For a little while now it has seemed like This Is Why You’re Fat hasn’t really been trying. When we get entries like the perfectly delectable and nearly harmless chocolate-cover potato chip, I would think it’s time to re-access the website and its mission statement.

However, this week they have redeemed themselves with the Irish Hog. This work of cholesterol-death-art is a deep-fried spiral-cut potato encasing a strip of deep-fried bacon, served with brown sugar BBQ sauce. And artery-clogger or not, it looks delicious, Health Nazis be damned.

It looks like This Is Why You're Fat is back on track, back on the fat track, that is, and that's a good thing.

Picture courtesy of The Spiteful Chef.

Potato Dumplings

Another great recipe from the Just Potatoes Yahoo! group. This one's a terrific idea with Thanksgiving coming up.

Potato Dumplings

4 medium potatoes, boiled
1/2 cup sifted flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
2 T grated onion with juice
1/2 cup dried bread crumbs
1 1/2 tsp melted butter
1 egg, slightly beaten
2 quarts boiling water
1/2 tsp salt

Rice the potatoes. Sift together flour, baking powder, salt and pepper. Combine riced
potatoes, flour mixture, onion, bread crumbs, butter and egg.

Mix well. Shape into 12 small balls and dredge lightly with flour. Chill. Drop dumplings into boiling salted water. Cover and boil 15 minutes. Serve. Enjoy.

I Got Fries on It

“I Got Fries on It” by Big Cheese, a song parody of “I Got Five on It” by Luniz. Niiice.

Truffled Fingerling Smashed Potatoes

From CHOW:

Truffled Fingerling Smashed Potatoes Recipe

Chef Garces folds truffle oil into smashed potatoes to make them even more irresistible.

What to buy: Fingerling potatoes are white potatoes with a thin skin. They can be found in gourmet grocery stores and at farmers’ markets. If you can’t find them, use Yukon Gold potatoes instead.

Truffle oil can be found at gourmet grocery stores.

This recipe was featured as part of our Suckling Pig for the Holidays menu.

INGREDIENTS

* 5 pounds fingerling potatoes
* 8 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 stick)
* 1 cup heavy cream
* 1/4 cup white truffle oil
* 4 teaspoons kosher salt
* 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Place potatoes in a large pot, add water to cover the potatoes by 2 inches, salt well (the water should taste like seawater), and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to low and simmer potatoes until fork tender, about 15 to 20 minutes.

2. Drain potatoes, return to the pot along with butter, and cook over low heat until butter is melted. Using a hand-held potato masher, smash potatoes until butter is incorporated, leaving some lumps. Add cream, truffle oil, salt, and pepper and fold together. Taste and adjust seasoning as desired.

Difficulty: Easy

TIME/SERVINGS

Total: 1 hr
Active: 10 mins
Makes: 10 to 12 servings

French Fry Diary 59: Alexia Crunchy Snacks Waffle Fries

The package may look misleading, but I got this bag off the grocery shelf, not the freezer aisle. Alexia is known for their frozen potato funchies but now they are moving into a different snack territory, the potato chip-ish variety.

The full name of my purchase is a mouthful – Natural Alexia Crunchy Snacks Waffle Fries Naturally Flavored Bold & Spicy BBQ. Wow. And that’s not counting where they have the words “potato snack” way down at the bottom of the bag, as if they were hiding the fact this was in fact a potato product.

The package has a hefty price for a five-ounce serving bag, $3.49. But one would think that it might be worth it, or at least worth it for the Health Nazis, cuz they have “25% less fat than regular chips” and no trans fat.

The shame is that it’s not all good news. These aren’t good. There is an after-taste that will stay with you for hours and require near constant hydration to recover from. That might be a problem with the very strong bbq spices employed. The waffle chips themselves, almost identical in shape to Chick-fil-A’s famous waffle fries, have a solid if dry potato taste – reminiscent of home-made microwave potato chips. This variety however was a bit too strong for me.

Alexia has several varieties of these non-frozen potato snacks, so perhaps the others might be pretty good, but for me, this one is a fail.

Orange Night Out

From the folks at Whataburger:

"11/10/09 - Orange Night Out

It never ceases to amaze us how many dedicated fans there are of Whataburger. Well, here's a great chance for you to prove yourself as part of that crowd. On Tuesday, November 10th from 5-8 pm, we invite you to get decked out in orange from head to toe for an Orange Night Out. So dress up, dine in, show us how much orange spirit you have and get a Free Whataburger."

And don’t forget to get some fries to go with that free burger. Mmmm... fries...

Food Wishes - How to Make Crispy French Fries

The folks at Food Wishes show us in a quick YouTube video how to make crispy (don't break your cheek bone) French fries...



An excellent example of par-frying, one of the best kept secrets of good fries. Mmmm... fries...

Veterans Day at Applebee’s

Details can be found here. And don’t forget to get some fries with your meal. Mmmm... fries...