The Tater Tot Topic

[Toliver]

From CBS Sunday Morning, "In Praise of Tater Tots":

 

 

For those who can't watch the embedded video, here is the URL: https://youtu.be/aCTkNMDkA7U

 

Can I have some Totcho's, please? 

 

[gfweb]

I've had various restaurant/diner takes on tater tots, including totchos. Most were flawed, ruined by undercrisping and watery sauces. 

 

A couple were great...well crisped and not over sauced. I think deep frying is key if a sauce is planned. Maybe the airfryer could do it. 

[Toliver]

31 minutes ago, gfweb said:

I've had various restaurant/diner takes on tater tots, including totchos. Most were flawed, ruined by undercrisping and watery sauces. 

 

A couple were great...well crisped and not over sauced. I think deep frying is key if a sauce is planned. Maybe the airfryer could do it. 

A nice cast iron skillet (with oil) would crisp them up, as well.

I recall after my mom passed we had a group of family and friends come over for breakfast. One friend had never had skillet-fried tots before (always oven-baked at his house ) and I was talking up how crusty and wonderful they get in the cast iron skillet when my asshat oldest brother came into the kitchen to "help" me and stirred the crap out of the tots, obliterating the crusty parts and mushing the soft interiors until you could no longer see individual tots. I was furious with him for doing that and literally threw him out of the kitchen.

There are those who understand The Tot, and those who remain ignorant all their lives. 

[gfweb]

Boring rainy day today.

Fooling around with potatoes and made a pretty good copy of Tater Tots.

Shred russet potato, wring dry, add salt and a few shakes of Wondra flour and onion powder.

Microwave for a minute until the potatoes are gummy

Form into tots and fry.

 

Edited January 1, 2022 by gfweb (log)

[Anna N]

1 hour ago, gfweb said:

Fooling around with potatoes and made a pretty good copy of Tater Tots.

I am betting they were much better than the “real” thing. 

[Shelby]

 I want.

[gfweb]

46 minutes ago, Shelby said:

 I want.

 

Got a potato?

 

[Shelby]

20 hours ago, gfweb said:

 

Got a potato?

 

Yeah, but not the patience or skill lol

[gfweb]

3 hours ago, Shelby said:

Yeah, but not the patience or skill lol

 

You food pix say otherwise.

It really is quick and so brainless I could do it 😉

[AAQuesada]

I'm reminded of this bougie version. I've done it in the past with regular oil to fry and shaping them more like tots and they do come out great. 

 

 

[gfweb]

Out of boredom and hunger I made some more tots today.  I forgot to wring-out the potatoes and they turned out fine.

 

I left a bunch on the counter (after frying)  for a few hours and reheated in the airfryer for a few minutes.

 

Came out perfect...so they can be premade and finished at dinner time.

 

Which is nice.

[Duvel]

5 minutes ago, gfweb said:

I left a bunch on the counter (after frying)  for a few hours and reheated in the airfryer for a few minutes.

 

Came out perfect...so they can be premade and finished at dinner time.

That‘s intriguing. Now, if you could premake and freeze them …

[JoNorvelleWalker]

8 minutes ago, Duvel said:

That‘s intriguing. Now, if you could premake and freeze them …

 

And maybe start a company to sell them.

 

[rotuts]

I think its terrific 

 

that you've found a Culinary Hobby

 

that gives you a fine reward for your effort.

 

however , id suggest this :

 

are your efforts 

 

independently taste tested 

 

( double blind , pick from three , etc )

 

that much better than Fz , of various 

 

Stripes and Colours ?

 

possibly .

 

consider taking your efforts 

 

where no Fz Tot has been :

 

subtle , very slight 

 

"" Mix- Ins ""

 

Picograms would be good 

 

not to mis the point :  Potatoes , Cruchy , Crispy 

 

Delicious 

 

1 ) a tiny bit of exceptional quality Bacon ? w some fat

 

2 ) some snap , from an equally small bit of Green Chili , w heat ?

 

3 ) etc. ?

 

Ore-Ida  nor Tj's makse anything like that

 

nore does Stop&Shop

 

a Dutch Company

 

think Twice Baked Russet Potato

 

but more like a Tot

 

Edited January 29, 2022 by rotuts (log)

[Dave the Cook]

Over in the Camping Princess Style topic, I encouraged Smithy to shallow fry her tots rather than bake them:

It did not go well for her:

As is likely to happen around here, many suggestions followed. Smithy even experienced success:

 

I can't track it down, but I'm sure there was discussion about how a good cook like Smithy could have such trouble with a mere tot. (Maybe that only occurred in our kitchen. And perhaps only with myself.)

 

Then this happened. To me us:

 

 

You can see the tots simply disintegrating. The result:

 

 

Look familiar?

 

But now I have an explanation. Sort of.

 

Once the lockdown took hold, peeps worried about paper goods and staples like flour.  Not in our house. We worried about tots. They became quite scarce. Our preferred brand, which is the store (Publix) brand was not to be had. So we switched to Ore-Ida. That led to the result you see above. Then the supply chain problems eased, and we could get Publix tots. As before, they cooked up just fine. Soon, however. the Supply-Chain Gods cracked down again. This time, no Publix, no Ore-Ida, either (but that was okay with us since they didn't work). We found a third brand, Lamb-Weston, whose offering is called "Super Crispy Tots." Or maybe the brand is Grown in Idaho. The packaging and marketing is confusing. Anyway, it doesn't matter, because, for us, these sucked, too. Then, when we were shopping the other day, there was one lonely bag of Pubix-brand TaterBites (their name). We snatched them up, and that night we fried and consumed perfect tots.  

 

I don't know who makes the Publix product*, but, for shallow frying, it is definitely different and definitely superior. And now I'm guessing, but I think Smithy switched brands between her disappointments and her success. Finally, at least here in Atlanta, tots remain scarce (and even now, they're blaming supply-chain issues). We've taken to stockpiling.

 

* I note that many grocery chains have store-brand product, and many of those are called "TaterBites." I don't know if they're related to what Publix sells, but I do know that Ore-Ida has trademarked the name "Tater Tots," and as far as I can tell neither "Tater Bites" nor "TaterBites" are likewise protected. You may or may not find this either interesting, or perhaps suspicious.

[heidih]

I have not had a tater tot in years but it is a childhood memory. Don't think my son (31) ever had one. But I'll see what the stock is at market tomorrow. I don't think my stepmother has ever had one (92) but she is coming into town in May so maybe we will play around. She would love them properly crispy. she'd probably call them latke bites.

[Smithy]

Fascinating! At this remove I don't remember what brand of tots we were using at any given time, but I'll look for Taterbites or Tater Bites or even TaterBytes (sounds like a computing unit) next time I want to try them. Or maybe I'll try gfweb's version up topic, here. Regardless of which I try, I'll be sure to use the shallow-fry method you pointed out to me, with reinforcement from Toliver fans, a year ago in the posts you linked.

[rotuts]

Tots come out well in a CSO