Just now that a large part of the snacking Netherlands has put the frying pan with the garbage, cookbook writer Meneer Wateetons (48) comes with a book entitled About frying – Why frying is the best cooking technique on earth. As if that isn’t a statement in itself, he has put a sticker on the book: F*ck the airfryer.
It will be hard for him that he might step on the souls of a million Dutch people with his sticker. Because that is how many air baking machines market leader Philips alone has sold in its own country in the past ten years. The airfryer is immensely popular and does not seem to share the fate of the slow juicer, the bread maker and pasta machine, the chocolate fountain and the pizzarette: purchased as yet another hip kitchen gadget and, when the fun was over, a permanent stand in the – away in the kitchen cupboard.
‘But it’s actually a hoax, that airfryer,’ says Mister, while he shaves potatoes into wafer-thin slices in his small kitchen. ‘An airfryer is just an oven that blows very hard. A supermarket croquette warmer. It doesn’t have the power of frying. For example, the heat transfer in oil is much higher, so that everything becomes nice and crispy and is ready faster.’ And if Mister Wateetons says that, then Mister Wateetons – ‘I’m a tech nerd’ – has got to the bottom of it.
He already did this with a range of other kitchen techniques about which he wrote a small library. It started in 2010 with his Handbook for the Vinex fighter, an instruction book about catching and preparing game from your own garden and ditch (‘and from the petting zoo’). His pseudonym also dates from that time; the slightly subversive activities described in the book could not be reconciled with his job at the time.
He has now been on a full-time journey of discovery in his own kitchen for years and has written books with almost scientific inspiration about fermenting, charcuterie, sausages, drinks, and smoking food. They are solid workbooks for home cooks and culinary hobbyists to get started in their kitchen or garden shed, although they are also touted on forums for preppers preparing for the day when sausages are no longer available anywhere.
Mister has also thoroughly studied the technique of deep-frying. In the book he elaborates on, among other things, the many frying fats, industrial fries, frying equipment and techniques, breadcrumbs, dough and batter, perfect browning and superior crust formation – about the happiness of the snack board. His recipes vary from gourmands and frikandellen to tempura, fried Bounty’s and dakgangjeong: sweet, fried chicken from Korea.
Fries (south of the country) or fries (rest of the Netherlands) has its own chapter. In addition to the higher fries à la the British top head Heston Blumenthal and the lower ones à la Colonel Sanders, the founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken, he treats all kinds of fries, such as sweet potato and a fermented variant. To show how superior the frying technique is, he makes us his version of a snack that he has called 1000-layer fries.
“I saw this technique on TikTok once and started experimenting with it,” he says after shaving a kilo of potatoes with a mandoline. ‘Delicious. You can’t do this with an airfryer, because then it won’t get a nice brown color and won’t be as crispy.’
That airfryer, just a moment later: ‘It’s a nice mini-oven in which you can heat up snacks, but they get the coloring and crust formation because they have been pre-treated in the factory. For example, it already contains fat, and often a lot of salt, so you cannot say that products from the airfryer are that healthy. Homemade croquettes, kibbeling, oliebollen or tempura are doomed to fail in that thing.’
He didn’t gain an ounce in the year he wrote his chip book. “There’s nothing wrong with eating from the deep fryer as long as you do it in moderation and deep fry the right way.” The most common mistake: ‘Not replacing the grease often enough. Most types of oil need to be replaced after five to eight uses. It mustn’t smoke, become viscous or smell strange.’
For his layer fries he uses the same potatoes as for ‘regular’ fries, such as agrias. ‘Buy fries potatoes from the greengrocer or the supermarket. They are crumbly and low in sugars, so they don’t turn dark too quickly,’ says Meneer and he tosses his potato chips in two beaten eggs with two cloves of crushed garlic, a tablespoon of Parmesan cheese, salt and pepper. “Make sure all the slices separate and are covered.”
Then follows a patient work. He lines a cake tin with parchment paper and begins carefully placing the potato slices in it, almost slice by slice. The tin goes into the oven for over an hour and a half at 150 degrees to pre-cook. In the meantime, Mister gives a brief explanation about cooking fats.
Frying veterans are divided into liquid fat fans and hard fat fans, supporters of oxen white (beef fat) or oil. ‘Ox white is more stable, gives extra flavor and lasts longer, but contains a lot of saturated fat. Peanut oil is a good all-rounder and is quite stable. Sunflower is also fine but vulnerable: it oxidizes quickly and then deteriorates in quality so that you have to replace it after about five uses.’
When the layer cake comes out of the oven, it should cool. Then it is put in the refrigerator overnight with a weight on it to firm up and dry out slightly – ‘drought is the friend of the chip shop’. As weight, Mister uses a second baking tin, same size, filled with water. Because he wants to show the whole process of his 1000-layer fries, he prepared a portion last night and put it in the fridge. The gentleman now carefully takes out the contents: it has become a nice, firm potato cake – he cuts it into thick bars for deep-frying.
After two years of frying for the book, it would not be strange if the grease dripped from the lamps in the Wateetons house, but Mister does it under an awning on his terrace (and has nevertheless managed to keep the neighbors friendly). Because the potato cake has already been pre-cooked in the oven, the rule for golden fries of frying twice expires, ‘although an extra time always increases crunch’.
Five minutes in 175 degree fat is enough for it golden miracle: beautiful deep yellow fries, light brown edges, and crispy lamellae that only fall apart in your mouth – nice mouthfeel – after which the soft and potatoy inside is discussed. Do nothing more. ‘Well,’ says Mister, ‘maybe add a little homemade mayonnaise.’
Baked in air
If more and more people eat from the airfryer at home, they will also want that in a snack bar, thought Jules Paquay from Eindhoven, and he started looking for mega airfryers. They didn’t exist yet. Paquay found a manufacturer who developed a professional airfryer for him. In his snack bar-restaurant Frietaire (from fries and air), which opened in January, there are four large aluminum appliances instead of a deep-frying unit with tubs of red-hot oil and tap-off baskets. De Frietaire is the first airfryer snack bar in the Netherlands ‘and perhaps in the world’.
The airfryers XL ‘are pre-programmed like a washing machine,’ says Paquay. The basket in the machine rotates during baking. Hot air circulates inside at high pressure. A load of 2.5 kilos of fries takes 5 minutes in an oven at 195 degrees. Paquay and his staff only need to operate the touch panel, the fryer indicates when the snack is ready.
The air fryer fries lose about 15 percent of their weight during cooking due to the evaporation of the water, says Paquay, compared to 10 percent during the traditional process. In addition to fries, he serves snacks such as frikandellen, viandellen, kipcorns (also a vegetarian version) and croquettes from the hot air. He receives the fries pre-fried ‘with a coating of oil to make them crispy.’ Advantages of airfrying: no odours, lower energy consumption and no ‘quality-impairing interventions’, says Paquay, because the system is closed.
Is the healthy fries finally a fact? ‘A croquette from an airfryer is still not a healthy product,’ says the Nutrition Center. ‘But the airfryer can be a healthier alternative to deep-frying because it contains less fat when prepared correctly.’ So fewer calories. But beware: in addition to a coating of fat, a layer of sugar is sometimes added to airfryer products to increase the browning and the crisp factor. So the question is what you put in it.
Football fodder
Many football fans will remember the World Cup in 1986, because the Netherlands did not qualify. (Argentina defeated West Germany in the final.) Nevertheless, the Netherlands kept a special souvenir from the tournament in Mexico: the Mexicano. The snack was invented by De Vries Vleessnacks in Dordrecht. The ribbed shape is somewhat reminiscent of pork ribs. In About Frying there is not only a recipe, but also a manual on how to make a ribbed shape with Lego or stirring sticks for paint.