Twice Cooked Chips On Camp

 Last year my youngest asked at the last minute if he could come on a camp with me, initially l was against it as l had lots planned but ultimately decided that a slightly more glampy agenda would mean he got a few days of fresh air.

One of the showpiece things we did were some twice-cooked chips in a Dutch oven, the results can be seen above. I used to think it was a pretentious thing to make chips sound better on a menu but it is actually a viable cooking method, and here's how you do it over a fire and indeed at home.

Freshly prepare your chips just as you need them which will prevent them going brown. I personally prefer a nice chunky chip that will withstand the rigours of the cooking procedures.

You need to half fill a Dutch oven with Sunflower oil (or similar) and then bank up some established embers about a quarter of the way up the side of the Dutchie.

Use a potato offcut or runty chip to test to see if the oil is hot enough. I popped mine on a de-barked piece of Hazel and you can see that the oil is bubbling vigourously around it which means it is hot enough.

Never drop the chipped potatoes in, place them to prevent oil splashing up and don't be tempted to place large amounts in in one go as it will bring the temperature of the oil down markedly.

After around four or five minutes you can pull the now cooked potato pieces out and dab them with kitchen roll. You should be able to slide the point of a sharp knife in easily. Note the difference between the cooked pieces on the left and the as yet uncooked ones on the right.

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Once you have done the first fry on all your chips it's time to ramp the heat up.  Go for closer to half way up the Dutchie with coals and maybe even place a few on the lid too. This won't take long. It is worth mentioning that as you are heating oil you should take great care generally but also stay with the Dutch oven due to the risk of the oil catching light.

You can place the lid partially or fully on and as the chips are pre-cooked this second round of frying is as much to do with how the chips look visually as it is with timings. They can brown really quickly or take 8-10 minutes...It depends on several variables such as the heat of the oil etc.

Again you can see the difference between the once and twice-cooked chips. Note the improvised chopsticks on the right which I used to pull the chips out of the oil.

 

And the finished results. One shot is an improvised Birch bark cone with a liberal sprinkling of salt and pepper/ Alexanders seed and vinegar, the other is with a pimped up supermarket Shashlick curry for a satisfying camp tea.