Skillet fried potatoes.
Damn I wish I could get them right, but I seem destined for failure. I have been trying for years, with only less than moderate success and never constancy at even that level.
My grandma was from a poor German farm family as a kid And that meant fried potatoes. Most breakfasts, and a lot of dinners. Most of her meals, There it was literally on the back burner; a cast iron skillet with potatoes cut in some manner. Sometimes waxy, sometimes starchy, sometime big, sometimes small, sometimes sliced, sometimes cubed, sometimes wedges. Sometimes in bacon grease, sometimes shortening, sometime butter, sometimes olive oil. Sometimes alone, sometimes onions, or garlic, or green pepper or chilis. Sometimes only salt an pepper, sometimes rosemary, sometimes thyme, sometimes a dozen different spices. And I never paid any freaking attention. It was so boring and seemed so simple, throw fat in pan, throw randomly cut potatoes in pan, move pan around once in a while, throw in other stuff, when everything else is done dump into serving bowl. Yummy, creamy center, crispy, crunchy brown crust so good, so easy.
Except it is not easy. It is the hardest thing I have ever tried to do in a kitchen. Raw mealy center? that easy. Pile of pale, limp, greasy starch? Also easy. Hard, Carbonized, black shell around potato dust? easiest of all. Luke cold, uninteresting chunks that finish 20 minutes after the rest of the meal? No sweat.
Every type of pan, failure. Every internet expert’s double top secret method, disappointment.
This thread is not to solicit advice on pan potatoes. This thread is to join me wallowing in misery about the stuff you can’t get right.
