How To Make Sweet Potato Fries

Hi there, I'm Matt from the Underground Cookery School, and today I am going to do a video cookery lesson for you. Hi there, I am going to show you how to do sweet potato fries. I mean, it is really very simple.

I have got a sweet potato here and all I am going to do is just peel that and take the outer skin off. So, that is now nice and peeled. The next job is just to cut this into chips.

I like to have them sort of reasonably precise, so I am taking the ends off, but what you can then use is odd bits like this - you would just boil them up and make a sweet mashed potato. In fact, I have a 2-year-old daughter, so I will reserve these and do that exactly so that she can have those for her tea later. So now, I am just going to cut these into chips.

So, for my reckoning, I mean that is a pretty perfect chip. Again, you know, you can be as perfect as you want. I am just going to do a few here and with all these bits that I don't use for chips, I can, as I say, always use for something else.

I know it goes without saying, but I shall say it anyway: this is exactly the same recipe as if you were cooking regular chips, only you would be using potatoes instead of the sweet potatoes. So, I have that which I am going to use for my sweet potato mash and I am going to use these just to cook off ordinarily. Now, I have got a deep fat fryer here, however if you do not have one of those at home, you can just use a regular pan with vegetable oil in it and a thermometer.

Now, I have got a thermostat on here and what I am going to do initially is fry these chips off at 120 degrees for about 3 or 4 minutes. You can come back in 3 or 4 minutes and then we are going to crank up the heat, once we have of patted them dry, up to 160 degrees to finish them off to give them that bit of crisp. Now, those have been frying away for about 3 or 4 minutes on 120 degrees.

I am just going to shake off the excess and pat them dry. And whilst I am doing that, I am now going to turn the thermostat up to 160. Now if you were cooking it in a pan of vegetable oil on the hob with a thermometer, you can just crank it up a little bit.

But what I am doing now is, I have got, obviously, some kitchen towel here just to pat these dry. And the way it works if you are cooking to order or if you have got people coming, is you do this bit in advance, and then either the order comes in or you are just about the serve the meal. The temperature has gone up to 160 and at this point you can then give them a quick flash-fry.

If you go to a top restaurant, this is how they will do them. So, the idea is that you get perfectly crisp chips. Also, obviously if you are frying them off at 160, they get lovely and golden on the outside.

So, in they go. Right, they have been sizzling away actually for a bit longer. The sweet potato chips do take a little bit longer, so I would say 3 or 4 minutes on the higher temperature of 160.

Just pat them dry. I am just going to add a little bit of salt to them because I can. And there you have the perfect sweet potato chips.

But as I said, in my opinion, nice and crispy and always cooked twice. .