hash brown help
I don’t know what it is about hash browns but I just can’t cook them. I can make mashed potatoes, baked potatoes, oven fries, french fries, potato chips, potatoes agratin….but I cannot make any kind of potatoes that require the use of a skillet. I must not have been born with that gene. No matter what I’ve done, the potatoes come out underdone, overdone or stuck to the pan. I cannot explain it but I want desperately to change it.
It’s frustrating because I love hash browns, my husband loves hash browns, our kids love hash browns but I can never ever get them right. And really? how hard can it be? potatoes, salt, and some oil? And like I said, it isn’t just hash browns it’s any time I try to cook potatoes in a skillet. So this means no skillet potatoes or country potaotes or ground beef and potatoes (one of my husband’s favorite things to eat)…it’s a sad sad fact.
So, anyone out there have any tips or ideas to share that might help me in my quest to learn how to cook potatoes in a skillet?
Hmmmm… Need some more information about the potatoes you are trying to cook. Have you baked the potatoes and let them cool before you shred them in the shredder?
Or are these fresh potatoes? As a rule of thumb for potatoes lyonnaise (one of MY favorites) or hash browns is that I always, without a doubt, bake a mess of potatoes first, let them cool to room temperature, and then put them in the fridge overnight. If you bake them and put them in the fridge right away, the converted sugars in the potatoes will make them almost slimy because they are cooled too fast.
THEN I peel them (the skin comes off pretty easily by hand if they are cold) and cut out any brown spots from root sprouts that you didn’t see before you cooked them.
I then shred them on the coarse side of the shredder, and keep them cool before I put them in the hot oil. Cool spuds hot oil = yummy goodness.
The GOOD part about baking them FIRST is that no matter what, even if your outsides are nice and crispy and the middles are not, it WILL be fully cooked.
Hope that helps!
Bubz