Chef shares 'super cheap' ingredient to getting crispy roast potatoes every time
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Celebrity chef Mike Reid has revealed the secret to achieving a "really crunchy" roast potato - and it's all about a sprinkle of potato starch. During Channel 5's The Christmas Taste Test Restaurant, food critics hailed Aldi's roast potatoes as "perfect", beating competitors Lidl and Morrisons.
Giving an insight into how the supermarkets craft their acclaimed spuds, Mike credited the use of fats and potato starch as key ingredients. "The beauty of these supermarket potatoes is they all use a type of animal fat to add that sense of luxury," he shared.
"Morrisons use a goose fat, Lidl use a duck fat, and Aldi's got probably the king of all fats for me, the Wagyu.". According to Mike, cooking in these fats not only imparts a "a real sense of richness" but also adds a "nuttiness" and buttery flavour, crucial for achieving that perfect crispy edge when roasting.
But the real game-changer? Potato starch. Mike insists that this "super cheap" ingredient is the trick to "really crunchy" roasties. "So you just toss it through and then you're left with a gorgeous potato that's coated in the potato starch," he explained during a demonstration.
"What that's going to do when it cooks is, it's going to absorb the oil and the fats and go super crispy on the outside. "It's a really nice cheap way of getting that really crunchy potato every time.". In another segment on the show, Mike divulged a simple yet effective tip for cooking pigs in blankets.
