Frozen fries, tater tots, onion rings

[gfweb]

12 minutes ago, JoNorvelleWalker said:

Lacking a pu pu platter I find day old Alexia fries make a fine accompaniment to my mai tai.

 

cold?

[JoNorvelleWalker]

4 minutes ago, gfweb said:

cold?

 

Ambient, currently 26C.  Who would eat cold fries?

 

[gfweb]

20 minutes ago, JoNorvelleWalker said:

 

Ambient, currently 26C.  Who would eat cold fries?

 

 

Perhaps with enough salt and pimenton...

 

 

[Chimayo Joe]

Just a small update.  
 

Two more that I've liked are Grown in Idaho Hand Cut Fries and Ore-Ida Extra Crispy Crinkles. For the oven,  I'm finding that fries that have some starch crisping additives turn out better.  Too much of that and it begins to affect the taste.  
 

One that I did not like is O Organics Crinkle Cut.  They missed on texture and flavor. Maybe these would be better cooked a different way.

 

I'm buying an air fryer later today.  I've found enough fries that I like even cooked in the oven that I'm not motivated to keep trying new ones, and I still have partial packages in the freezer of about eight of the fries (and a couple of onion rings) I've already tried.  I suspect that by the time I get through playing with the air fryer I will be burned out on fries.  I'm not sure if I've ever bought any regular tater tots other than Ore-Ida.  Maybe I'll try a few other brands of those. Maybe. And maybe not anytime soon.

[JoNorvelleWalker]

Feeling not up to much of anything tonight, I air fried some Alexia in the anova.  Tasty enough but not to be confused with deep frying in hot oil.

 

[MetsFan5]

Fries are much better in an air fryer than the oven imo. 

[JoNorvelleWalker]

2 hours ago, MetsFan5 said:

Fries are much better in an air fryer than the oven imo. 

 

Anova does have an air fry function.

 

[Chimayo Joe]

First cooks in my air fryer were Alexia House Cut Fries and Grown in Idaho Hand Cut Fries.  Both turned out considerably better than when I cooked them in the oven.  I still preferred the Grown in Idaho Hand Cut.  I think those Alexia fries don't contain enough oil to cook as well in the oven or air fryer.  After cooking, the tray was pretty dry with the Alexia fries, but there were a lot of oil splatters with the Grown in Idaho fries.  The Grown in Idaho are saltier. They also have a starchy crisping ingredient on them which feels somewhat like salt and makes me think they're going to be even saltier than they are when I pick them up.  I liked the Alexia Yukon Select fries better in the oven than I did the Alexia House Cut in the oven, so I'm interested to see how those do in the air fryer.

[Katie Meadow]

I finally made the Cascadian Farms spud puppies for a late night snack.  They are perhaps a bit smaller than  the Alexia tots, and therefore have more crunchy exterior to the amount of soft potato. For some that might be a plus. When very hot they are okay, but when they cool down, which they do quickly, they don't have a lot of flavor. They are very plain, and not salty, which would be fine with me if they had a really nice potato flavor, but somehow I wasn't wowed. I think I prefer the Alexia, which are peppery.  I've never seen a tater tot cart, but I would certainly have bought them on the street when navigating a New York winter.

[Chimayo Joe]

Air fryer mania continues for me.  I've had six versions of tater tots since the last time I posted on the thread.

 

Alexia Yukon Select Puffs are my favorite of the six.  For me they've had the best combination of texture (exterior & interior) and flavor.  They're not heavily seasoned, so some people might find them a bit bland.  With ketchup I think they're fine, and that's how I tend to eat tater tots.

 

Cascadian Farm Spud Puppies are okay.  I was expecting better.  They're unusual in that they start out more brown than any other tater tots I've had.  Interior texture seemed a little odd to me.  I agree with Katie that they're not that flavorful.

Alexia Crispy Seasoned Potato Puffs have a lot of flavor.  I think these are the Alexia puffs Katie was talking about.  They're not what I'm looking for in a tater tot most of the time, but I could see myself buying them again for a change of pace. With pepper, garlic, sour cream, and chives, these are the most seasoned of the tater tots I had.  Texture of these was good.

 

Kroger Tater Bites were second most seasoned of the six.  I thought they were pretty good, both flavor and texture.  Might be a good choice for people who find the Alexia seasoned puffs too seasoned and the other tater tots not seasoned enough.

 

O Organics Potato Puffs were just bland. Too bland even for ketchup to save them.

 

Ore-Ida Golden Tater Tots were the only ones that weren't new to me.  They were pretty much as I had remembered them being.  Okay with ketchup but rather mediocre.

I'd like to try these but don't know when or if that's going to happen.

Signature Select Tater Puffs (Safeway store brand that has been out-of-stock everytime I've looked for them)

Grown in Idaho Super Crispy Tots (I don't think any of my local supermarkets carry these)

Ore-Ida Extra Crispy Tater Tots (stores here carry just about every Ore-Ida product but I've never seen these)

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

[Katie Meadow]

@Chimayo JoeI've not seen the Alexia Yukon Select Puffs but I'm going to look for them. I agree that the Alexia Crispy Seasoned have more flavor than  is needed. I have no nostalgia about tater tots. I never tasted one until I was 73 years old! And it will have to be a cold day in hell for me to ever make them from scratch. Hot tots and a glass of rye makes an excellent snack for a chilly evening in front of the TV.. Not a ketchup person myself, but I could see a smoked paprika aioli for dipping. That's my condiment of choice with fries. But I'm happy without any dip.

[MetsFan5]

@Chimayo Joedont bother with the Ore Ida extra crispy anything. It’s genuinely disgusting. They basically double up on the breading, fall apart when cooked and make a mess that isn’t at all worth it. 

[Chimayo Joe]

2 hours ago, MetsFan5 said:

@Chimayo Joedont bother with the Ore Ida extra crispy anything. It’s genuinely disgusting. They basically double up on the breading, fall apart when cooked and make a mess that isn’t at all worth it. 

Hmmmm.  Thanks for the warning, but I've had Ore-Ida Extra Crispy Fast Food Fries and Extra Crispy Crinkles and thought they were pretty good.  Those didn't seem too heavily coated and didn't fall apart.  Maybe whatever Ore-Ida uses doesn't work as well with tater tots? Ore-Ida makes something called Crispers (crinkle cut) which I've avoided because the photo on the package makes me think those would be too coated for me.  Grown in Idaho went too far with the coating on their Super Crispy Crinkle Cut Fries, but so far that's been the only one I've tried that has had enough of that to bother me.