French Fries with Dipping Sauces

For the fries:
Peel the potatoes. Cut each potato in half lengthwise. Then cut each half section in half again lengthwise. The cut each section into about 4 strips.

Put the strips of potatoes into a bowl of cold water for at least 5 minutes to rinse off the starch. If you want to cut the potatoes ahead of time, they can be kept in water for up to a day.

While the potatoes are soaking in the water you can make the sauces.

For the Hot Pepper Ketchup Sauce:
Put the ketchup in a small bowl. Dice ½ of a jalapeno. If you like things spicy hot you may want to leave in the seeds. Add the diced jalapeno and black pepper in with the ketchup. Mix together and set aside.

For the Chipotle Sauce (adapted from The Pioneer Woman Cooks):
Put the mayonnaise in a small bowl and add the adobo sauce. Mix and set aside.

For the Baked Potato Topping Sauce:
Add the sour cream to a small bowl. Dice the chive section from the green onion and add it to the sour cream along with the pepper, salt, crumbled blue cheese, buttermilk (or regular milk) and the diced garlic (optional). Mix and set aside.

Cooking the French fries:

Drain the water off of the potatoes and put them on a paper towel. Pat them completely dry with a paper towel.

Add the oil to a frying pan. The quantity of oil to use depends on the diameter of your pan. The oil should sit in the pan about an inch high. Heat the oil on medium heat.

Add the strips of potatoes to the hot oil, making sure not to crowd them in the pan.

Using tongs move the potatoes around a bit as they are cooking so they cook evenly on all sides.

In this recipe I just fry the potatoes once until they are a light golden color. This may take about 5 minutes.

(Another option is to fry them twice; the first time, cook them about 4 minutes until they are cooked through but are a light color. Then remove them from the oil onto a paper towel. Then, right before serving, put them back into the hot oil and cook them a second time for about 4 minutes until they are crispy and a light golden color).

As you’re frying the potatoes, have a plate ready that has a paper towel on it. As the French fries are done cooking, remove them from the hot oil and put them on the paper towel to absorb the excess oil.

As soon as the French fries are removed from the hot oil, sprinkle them with the seasoned salt and serve as soon as possible.

The inspiration for this chipotle sauce was from a recipe by The PioneerWoman called “Chipotle Steak Salad”.