What is the best French Fry shape? - Answering Opinionated Food Questions

hey everyone so after making over 250 or probably 300 videos over the past couple years about cooking i've definitely started to gather some opinions or preferences on either foods that i like or techniques that i use over other techniques so i asked my instagram followers to send me in a bunch of questions you know kind of spicy opinionated questions and i picked out a bunch of them to answer in this q a that'd be a fun topic and if you are wondering if i'm just making a q a to you know make easy content yes that is the case i'm actually in the process of moving back to the east coast so this will be one of if not the last videos filmed in this kitchen i'll definitely look back on this place with a lot of fondness but with that being said let's hop right in i'll have everything timestamped below if you guys want to jump around to various questions let's start with hanzo which they asked what's your favorite and least favorite kitchen task so for me i think my favorite kitchen task is actually just prepping stuff i really like dicing or slicing things um one of the things that i've just kind of enjoyed just because i feel like it's a very i don't have to think about it and i can just kind of get in a groove so that's probably my favorite task my least favorite task would definitely be cleaning like a a pan or a or a grill or like a or a wire rack that maybe got like food on it and it's really stuck on there or it's like annoying to get to for example like sometimes this thing this is like an aluminum wire rack sometimes i've had a minute you can see like i've got little bits and pieces in there so that's really annoying when those things happen um so to that i would say very specific like annoying cleaning off items question number two it comes from arturo and he asked what is your favorite vegetarian or vegan dish so for me the poblano con queso taco is probably one of my all-time favorites if you guys haven't seen that video check it out so easy so delicious you know you can whip it up in no time i also like some vegetarian and vegan dishes from indian cuisine so vegetable korma done that on the channel before um sog paneer is another lund i absolutely love and then actually some thai curries like coconut curries with vegetables also really really good vegetarian or vegan dishes so hopefully we can do some more of those on the channel as well i've definitely got some other dishes that i can't think of right now but those are the ones that are coming to mind next up reggie ask what is your opinion on the best french fry shape so this is a good question cause i think i would have to say either crinkle cut or waffle fries and that's because they're thick so you get the potato bite but you also get tons of crispy edges you know the crinkles like they create those little edges and then the waffle fries also naturally are going to create all those crispy edges so those are probably my two favorite i would say maybe a close second is like the the mcdonald's just like the thin crispy boys um steak french fries so-so um and then like i guess potato wedges which are kind of steak fries is probably a little bit lower down on the list but yeah i think crinkle cut or waffle fries are probably my go-to fry shape next on the list russ asks can you break down your oil usage when to use you know avocado or olive oil or vegetable oil and this is a pretty good question so for me i'm probably a little bit more simplified than most people so i really only use olive oil and peanut oil so for me i use peanut oil for most of my applications so anytime i need a neutral oil um i'm grabbing peanut oil for you know sauteing vegetables or whatever a lot of people may substitute in vegetable or canola oil here but i keep peanut i actually don't even have canola or vegetable because i can use this for deep frying as well it's higher saturated fat which helps crisps up things really nicely and it is a neutral taste like this doesn't smell like peanuts or anything um even though it is peanut oil but if you are allergic obviously then you can't use this um and then that's my number one oil for peanut or for fried and then olive oil is something that i use when i want to get the flavor of it so maybe it's in a raw edition um you know sprinkling over salads using it in vinaigrettes um you know over making a little dip for bread or if i'm using it in more italian cooking they typically rely on olive oil to sweat down vegetables and things of that nature that's kind of when i'm using olive oil but i really keep just these two on hand and then i have like sesame oil maybe some flavoring oils that i'll add just like a little drizzle of because that provides the flavor of you know whatever it was flavored by but outside of that it's really just these two okay next up i had a couple questions regarding um soothing first up i'll go over reverse searing versus souven for steaks and curl asked is this seems like two extremely similar ways of meat coming up to temp and yeah they one 1 000 are they're both looking to achieve this similar thing which is slowly bringing whatever piece of meat you're cooking up to a certain temperature um the big differences between them are sous-vis in a bag so that moisture is going to be trapped in with the meat um versus reverse searing such as a steak it's out in the oven it's open so it's going to dry off the surface area which could help with better browning um kind of the big differences between the two from a practicality standpoint or obviously you have to buy a sous-vide machine and then for the reverse here you just need an oven which most you know everyone's kitchen has an oven but if you do have maybe if you're cooking for a larger crowd or maybe a a family i could see sue b being much more practical um just because you know you can set it on your counter it's not taking up oven space if you have another dish going on i mean because like when you're reverse searing the the steak is taking up the oven for you know maybe an hour or more at like you know 200 degrees so it's like you can't really cook anything else in there while you're using it so that's when souven may be really good and then also restaurants use it a ton because you know exactly for that same reason the practicality the functionality they can have it sitting in baths on the counter they don't have to worry about it you know it's i mean i would assume it probably uses less electricity i don't actually know that for sure but i can definitely see the benefits of souven it kind of just it depends on your situation but again it's a way to control temperature primarily so i wouldn't say it's over hyped it's just does every home kitchen need to use it all the time or is it super helpful to have as a home cook i would say probably not um you know i have one i don't use it all the time but i recognize it definitely does have some benefits so you kind of have to evaluate it on a case-by-case basis for souving next up chris rob asks what are some overlooked ingredients that can really enhance your cooking so in my opinion it's primarily like sauces or oils that you're adding kind of afterwards or at the table so one thing that i've been adding a lot of is i have this jar i actually think i just finished it a jar of like peppers in oil so sometimes i don't even use the peppers themselves but i'll drizzle over just some of the oil and it has and carries those flavors it's a little spicy you know this could be like chili oil in chinese queen or if you've seen like lao gan ma or chili crisp those are becoming super popular so oils like flavored oils sesame oil ingredients like that super helpful and then any type of acid in general i mean you guys have seen me use pickled onion liquid pickled onions itself a little spritz of lemon or lime and those additions really added at the end of a dish can really amplify it and take something from you know this is good to like whoa this is really really good it kind of helps cleanse the palate makes it a little bit more interesting so kind of those different flavored oils and then your acids are two ingredients that i say are often often overlooked when cooking at home all right middle eats or obi ask what's the one piece of kitchen equipment that you'd tell your younger self to buy sooner this one is so easy for me and it's they're right here sharp knives and then secondarily a way to keep those knives sharpened which for me is going to be wet stones which this is probably the real piece of equipment that i would say i i can't express how much of having a really sharp knife makes a difference in the kitchen not only is your prep just gonna be easier but it literally makes it fun like i think i mentioned in the first question that i actually really do enjoy prepping vegetables um and i think people who say they don't like prepping stuff or they say it takes a lot of time are people who have not used the sharp knife that was properly cared for and can just slice through things like a breeze looking back i mean even in some of my videos from early back maybe a year or two ago before i kind of got into knives and how to keep knife sharp i like cringe at those videos because i know that feeling of basically mashing an onion versus truly slicing it um so i can't express how much getting a quality knife and then getting a way to keep that sharp whether you use wet stones you know there's a variety of ways that you can keep things sharp even just a honing rod will help keep everything lasting a lot longer so definitely a sharp knife and a way to keep that thing sharp it's i can't express that much more mr sunny lee asks smash vs normal patties so to this i'm a smash patty guy i love smash burgers you guys know this um i guess the big difference is like if i'm making them inside i'm making a smash burger basically every single time you can get super thin and crispy edges so it's tons of browning in there and then you can slide the cheese in between you know your your patties so then you get that kind of gooey and like chewy mouth feel plus it just has that kind of nostalgia factor of like if you're going out to you know a fast food place you can replicate that even better in your own home um for normal patties i guess kind of the cons for them are yes it's going to be tougher to get you know that nice browning and that crust on the outside but you can you know you can cook them to medium or medium rare which kind of changes up the flavor profile makes it a little bit more anxious when you're biting through it and then also they make them really good for grilling you know if you're doing a grill grate you can't smash a smash patty on a grill grate you know it'll flip right through so if i am grilling outside on like a charcoal grill i would say normal patties you know because those normal patties they're going to get that charcoal flavor on there but for me if i'm making them inside it's smash burgers like 99 of the time uh next question wash myself as grilled cheese with mayo or butter so i am team mayo as you guys know um i think it leads to better browning i don't think it gives it a weird taste um actually one thing i have done with my grilled cheeses is spread them in a very thin layer of mail to get the nice brown in and then after they're actually off you can just give it a nice light rub with some butter a stick of butter and then it gets that buttery flavor if that's what you're going for but yeah overall i am team mayo for you know grilling up breads and things like that i think it just gives much better and more even browning um and nice and crispy and that's really what i'm looking for all right next on the list we have a spicy one is gordon ramsay's cooking overrated so gordon's interest when i don't think he's a bad chef or anything i think objectively he knows how to make very good food i think that's clearly evident or else he would not have gotten popular you know wouldn't open restaurants and things like that um i think where gordon is overrated is the applicability to his content to like home cooks you know a lot of the times even if it's like a quick dinner it's like 20 ingredients you're like i don't have half of these in my kitchen you know so i think the applicability to the home cook is definitely overrated it's it's more about the entertainment rather than you know i'm gonna look up a gordon ramsay recipe and make this um and then another thing i would like to see you know i don't watch his stuff hardly ever but um him like learning stuff i feel like a lot of times it's just like i made this um and he'll like say things but like won't give you kind of you know sources or like where he learned it from you know maybe i'm just overlooking that fact but yeah i think the the applicability of gordon to the home cook is the portion that's overrated um overall you know i think he's a good cook but yeah that's my thoughts on that next up cine ask thoughts on culinary school would you go if you could so for me i've loved cooking from a quite an early age but i never thought about going to culinary school and now i wouldn't um either go to culinary school you know i think it'd be cool to like be a fly on the wall in the classes you know maybe do it as like a part-time thing like just go in and whatever just to learn things and see what it's like um but i think if you're getting into food i mean you know there's tons of ways that you can get into food and get to where you want to be without going to you know culinary school and this is kind of what i think too in just college in general or or things like that like you don't have to go get a signified degree to get to places you want to go and i know a lot of people can probably speak much better on this than i can i know um molly baz for example she never went to culinary school but she's a great example of someone who has made it in the food industry without that and i think she's spoken on that before that you don't need to um you know it could definitely help depending on kind of what your trajectory is but i think you should have a very clear notion of what you're looking to get out of culinary school before you actually decide to go don't kind of you know say hey i'm just going to go to culinary school and figure it out on the way i would try to have a pretty clear path and then if culinary school helps you get there then i think it's worthwhile otherwise i would say no like figure out how to make food work for you if that's working in bakeries restaurant whatever get the experience that you want to get out of it or if you're someone like me you know home cook i just wanted to be self-taught i wanted to learn stuff kind of on my own and experiment things so i think there's many ways to do it i don't think culinary school is necessary but um yeah i mean i wouldn't go but at the end of the day that's all up to you all right this is a question that i like from eric granado if you order more than two toppings you like toppings not pizza same with burgers so this is a good question that i have definitely been swinging and kind of thinking about for the past time so right now when i make pizzas like i do them pretty simply so if you guys saw like the the weeknight pizza it's like a garlicky um spicy weeknight sauce with just cheese extra garlic and things like that or you know if i'm doing like meat on a pizza it's like pepperonis and just um onions or maybe some other kind of interesting thing because i think pizza can get really lost when you are just throwing a ton of stuff on and there is a time and place for that type of pizza right like if you're just trying to finish out stuff in your fridge it's like throw all these vegetables on throw cheeses throw meats throw a chicken and you're kind of just like making a large meal out of it um but over time i've started to become much more intentional kind of like what eric is is getting at here with what i'm putting on my pizza because i want all the components to shine and i want those toppings that i do put on i want them to be very noticeable i want the garlic to really come through and then i maybe wanted that to play with you know roasted red peppers or something like that so if you're making pizza next time think about the toppings you want to throw on there and then this is the same with burgers as he mentioned i don't like burgers with lots of toppings a pretty simple you know give me two patties cheese give me pickled onions lettuce maybe a little bit of sauce to help bring that all together make it moist and stuff but i don't want things like i don't want onion rings on my burger i don't want like a bunch of like curly straw fries i don't want like tons of avocado or or things of that nature so this is something that i do agree with less toppings the better let the burger shine let the pizza shine on its own and then use those toppings to just amplify it and make it a little bit more interesting than it would be without them so tren skillet asks the one does pineapple belong on pizza so you can put whatever you want on your pizza but for me it does not belong on pizza i think in general warm pineapple applications on just about anything i'm not a fan of i don't like them on burgers i don't like warm pineapple i don't really like grilled pineapple i just something about warm pineapple i'm just not down with um i'll eat cold pineapple you know just straight up or obviously maybe in salsas or things like that it can be interesting or a little maybe mixed with herbs and whatnot but yeah i'm not a i'm not a warm pineapple person i just any dish where i have worn pineapple on it and be like i wish the pineapple wasn't here so i think i just got like two or three questions left but the mighty morphin flower ask it seems like you place a big emphasis on adaptability in your recipes why so this is something that i like to kind of focus on and kind of show connections between recipes like if you want to make something healthier you want to make something fattier you want to make something faster you want to make something that works for you and your schedule because i think that's really the problem that we're trying to solve as people that cook at home you know you need to figure out what foods fit into your life or else and how they fit in or else you're not gonna end up cooking at home if you don't kind of see those pathways you're gonna you're gonna order out you're gonna do whatever but once you realize that you know for example like pizza dough i showed how it fit into my schedule on a particular night but you could also started that like the day before you could have done it as your lead at your leisure to make it fit your schedule the best way that it can and then you know also making things you know maybe a little bit lower calorie or just figuring out those various way that you can pool on the strings of like a base recipe and kind of make it your own to fit your schedule your needs i think that's the that's the problem as like a home cook that you really need to solve so that's why i always place a big emphasis on that and kind of show you and maybe show you a direction to go and then you can kind of take it from there um however you want to so the last two questions are kind of related to appliances uh first up shay high mass are insta-pots and airfryer is worthwhile and i don't personally have an instapot or an air fryer but i think one thousand percent they can be right for a lot of people's home kitchens um this kind of goes back to the prior question where you know insta-pots they reduce the time amount that you need to spend on various dishes same with air fryers you don't need to preheat the oven you can also make smaller amounts which is really good for maybe one to four people and things like that nature um that being said like all the stuff you can do in an insta pot or an air fryer you can do with your oven you know if your oven's got convection setting that's the same technology going on there instapots they speed up time with you know putting things under pressure and whatnot but if you have the time again you can do all the same things but i think that's what ties in to that prior question like i was saying is you need to figure out kind of what works for you and your kitchen do insta-pots and air fryers help you cook more or make cheaper meals healthier meals whatever it is they fit your lifestyle to fit your schedule and 1 000 if they fit and they help you like i'm all on board so yeah i would say totally they're worthwhile just kind of depends on your situation and then last up we have rank your appliances from thomas so i really don't have many appliances at all i think i have i've got a vitamix i have another small food processor i have a kettle um and then i have an immersion blender let me i think that's literally it so three of those are blending things um if i could only pick one of those blending things it would 1000 percent be the vitamix just because that gives you the highest variability and also can create some really like smooth purees and things like that it's probably the most useful but obviously that's just a lot bigger um so you generally need to do larger quantities of things and then i mean my electric kettle i guess i just use for like coffee and things like that or like for boiling pasta water um i'm trying to think i don't think [Music] i don't think i really have any other appliances um the microwave i guess i so i have a microwave again it's like outside of my kitchen i don't use it that often um but yeah i mean for me like i i would rather have oh a suv machine too so sous vide again i kind of talked on that earlier not something i use all the time use it from time to time um but yeah for me i kind of like less appliances um just because i don't like clutter and either have to store them inside places so i like to keep my counters clean of appliances and whatnot but yeah i don't think i really have many more appliances than that um but with that being said that's gonna wrap up the q a guys hopefully you have enjoyed um thanks again for everything over the past like 14 months it's literally been crazy um things i'm not sure video schedule it might take a week or two to get kind of back into the flow of things once i move back to the east coast but i've got some cool content coming uh really cool stuff probably in the next like five to six months and then after that we've got some big plans um for this channel so hopefully you guys are enjoying the ride with me hopefully you guys are learning something as always you know follow the socials just follow along see what we're going on we'll keep cooking cool things want to get back into some more regional um dishes and exploring some more cuisines and techniques and things like that so thanks for listening along i'll catch you guys all in the next one peace

Channel: Ethan Chlebowski

Views: 160,031

Keywords: Ethan Chlebowski, mayo or butter on grilled cheese, mayo grilled cheese, gordon ramsay, q&a ethan chlebowski, ethan chlebowski q&a, smash burger vs hamburger, too many pizza toppings, pineapple on pizza, airfryer review, instapot review, is culinary school worth it, is sous vide worth it, is sous vide overrated, ethan c, favorite vegan dish, favorite vegetarian dish, whats the best french fry shape, best french fry, french fry shapes, french fries

Id: ic7As7iDSeo

Length: 22min 56sec (1376 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 19 2021