Improve Your Chips by Reducing Excess Starch!

Potatoes, those underground tubers grown on the roots of the potato plant, are the basis for popular foods like french fries, potato chips, and potato flour. 

When fresh, potatoes have a high water content but are primarily composed of carbohydrates, especially starch, making up around 66-90% of their dry weight. They also contain small amounts of protein and fibre but very little fat. 

When you peel a potato, you'll notice a sticky white coating on its surface – that's the potato starch leaking out. Peeling increases the potato's surface area, revealing more starch, and the same happens when you cut them into chips. 

To achieve crispier and better-looking chips, it's essential to reduce excess starch. Here's how you can do it: 

1. Rinse the sliced potatoes under cold water to wash away much of the surface starch. 
2. Repeat the rinsing process three times or until the water runs clear, especially if you've cut the potatoes into chips. 
3. Use the orange or blue chipping baskets to simplify the process of de-starching your chips. 

By removing excess starch, you prevent the chips from clumping together during frying and maintain the oil quality. Sugar won't build up in the oil if the starch is adequately reduced. 

If you have a batch of high-starch potatoes and can't use them immediately, you can follow this method: de-starch the chips as mentioned above and then fill the barrel with hot water, leaving them for half an hour. Rinse and proceed with your standard method. 

Additional Tips

Cleaning and Maintenance:Wash down your potato room with Ceres Natural Degreaser. It effectively breaks down starches and neutralizes them, preventing drain blockages and keeping your barrels and chipping baskets in excellent condition.

Extra Benefit: The Natural Degreaser can also neutralize the Chip Potato Preparation formula, freshening the room after processing.

For optimum results, treat your chips with Ceres Chip Preparation Formula to prevent spoilage when they're out of the water. 

As for frying, the choice is yours. You can blanch, cook them straight through, or even crinkle-cut. Although this guide won't instantly create the best chips, it's certainly a step closer. For more guidance on preparing chips from freshly peeled potatoes, you can refer to a separate guide.