Home Fries Recipe – Fried in Beef Tallow

So, my potato-eating life has been infinitely better since I learned the secret to crispy homemade french fries. Since then, I’ve made crispy fries and hash browns many times, usually frying in bacon grease, though occasionally in olive oil and/or coconut oil if we were low on the pig-fat.

Well, recently I made homemade beef stock using the soup bones that we got as part of our cow share. After straining the broth and cooling it in the fridge, there was a gorgeous layer of white tallow on the top. Of COURSE I saved it! And this weekend I experimented with my first beef tallow by making home fries.

I cut my potato into about 1/4” cubes and put them into some ice water… I’m not sure why, but I’ve read that that’s a good idea when making fries or whatnot so I figured I’d give it a try. After a few minutes of icy soak, I rinsed the potatoes in cool water to wash off the starch that had come out into the water, then threw them on a towel to dry.

While the potatoes were drying on the towel, I melted some tallow in my frying pan. When it was hot, I threw in the potatoes (carefully, because some spattering happens at first). When they became translucent, I removed them to a paper-towel-lined bowl to rest for a bit. At this point I also turned off the burner so the fat wouldn’t just sit there being hot for no reason.

After about 5 minutes, I reheated the tallow and tossed the potatoes in again. This is the crisping step… they started turning goldeny brown on the edges, like this:

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And after several minutes, they were the perfect texture – crisp on the outside, hot and creamy on the inside. I sprinkled them with seasoned salt and drained them on a paper towel again before serving them up with our grain-free pancakes. My husband says, “They were really good. They were really crispy and tasty.”

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To recap:

1. Wash and cut your potatoes into chunks.
2. Soak chunks in ice water.
3. Rinse chunks.
4. Dry chunks.
5. Heat tallow.
6. Cook potatoes in tallow until translucent.
7. Let potatoes rest on some paper towels for about 5 minutes. Also turn off the burner.
8. Reheat tallow.
9. Cook potatoes until golden brown and crispy.
10. Season however you like.
11. Drain on paper towel again, or toss in a paper lunch bag to soak up excess fat.
12. Eat the best homemade home fries ever.

Also – this is my first time using tallow and I LOVED it. It had the high smoke point and stability of bacon grease, but with the benefit of being a very clean fat. It basically looked totally clear in the pan, as if I were cooking in water. It smelled slightly beefy as I cooked with it, but the potatoes didn’t take on any beefy flavor. They definitely tasted like potatoes and the seasonings I used, not like leftover steak. I’m definitely looking forward to using tallow in the future!