>> Hilah: Hey dudes!
I am Hilah, and today on Hilah Cooking we are making fish and chips, super-crispy, the
crispiest fish and chips you will ever eat, just like they serve in Ye Olde England, just
like probably Sherlock Holmes ate except definitely better because I am making them and I am making
them with love dammit!
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[Extra Crispy Fish and Chips Recipe]
>> Hilah: We are going to start with the chips part, and I’ve got some russet potatoes
here that I cut up about this size.
I like them about as thick as my finger and about twice as wide, but that’s a little
bit, you know, it’s up to you.
Some people like them bigger like steak fries, but I think that’s a little too much, so
they’ve been soaking in cold water for about 30 minutes, and now I’m just going to dry
them off on a clean towel.
The soak in the water helps make them really crispy because it draws out of some of the
excess starch on the surface, okay, so then just sort of kind of the same trick that you
use like if you’re making potato latkes and stuff like that.
I just want to roll it up in the towel and give it a little squish, just to get all the
water off, good deal, okay, and we kind of just set those aside for now and make our
fish fry batter.
For that I’ve got some flour and some baking powder, salt and pepper.
I am gonna add a little bit of cayenne pepper, totally optional and a little bit of dill,
and honestly you don’t really taste this, it just looks really pretty in the final product,
but you could totally skip it, or if you wanted to add any other spices of your choosing,
that’s fine.
Maybe some curry powder would even be a fun little variation, and I’ve just got some
plain old soda water.
You could use beer, but I am using soda water, and this is sort of like a tempura batter
in that it’s just basically water and flour and then we’re going to add in a couple
of ice cubes.
Some recipes you’ll see add egg to the batter, but I think that that makes it a little bit
chewy.
I like this because it’s definitely very light and crisp and that’s what I like and
my fish and chips, but I guess that’s a personal preference.
That looks about right, and then we’re just going to add in a couple of ice cubes.
That’s going to help keep it cool, and we can set this aside while our oil heats, waiting
for our oil to heat up to 330, so I’ll let you guys know when that happens okay, so you
just sit tight.
So our oil is hot at about 330, and our potatoes are dry, so we can go ahead and do the first
fry, and this first time we’re just trying to cook the potatoes.
We’re not really trying to brown them, so we’re just gonna put in the potatoes, and
let them cook for about two minutes or until like the, all the sizzling kind of subsides
a little bit, and don’t overload it too much just because you don’t want to temperature,
so maybe a handful of potatoes at a time; not that you could use your hands to put things
in boiling oil.
A couple of minutes later you could see our oil for the potatoes is not quite as furiously
boiling as it was when we first dropped them in, and the potatoes are soft.
They are little, getting a little brown, but this isn't the crisping step yet, so we’re
just gonna let them drain here, and then turn oil back up to let it get up to like 365 or
so, and then we’ll do the fish and the second fry of the potatoes.
Oils hot up to 365.
I’ve got some fish that I cut up just a little bit bigger than the, the potato pieces.
I am using a barramundi which is an Australian fish that I am new to but somebody recommended
it on Instagram, so thanks bud!
I really like it, but you can use anything, dogfish is very traditional, but cod is also
good.
When I was in New Zealand, the fish shop would have like five or six different types every
day that just whatever was in fresh, and you could take your pick, so just dip your little
fish, and I am going to use my fingers.
Do as I say not as I do.
Don’t use your fingers.
Danger, and again, you don’t want to overload it, so just fry a couple of pieces at a time.
Bloop!
And these will be ready when the fish kind of starts to float and the breading is nice
and brown, and again, kind of waiting for that oil sizzle to subside.
Okay, so the sizzling has subsided, and they are nice and brown.
Drain a little bit there, and then these are so, so hot.
I am gonna let them cool for here just a minute while I do this second fry on these potatoes
and it’ll be fine like, the fish will still be plenty hot by that time these potatoes
are done.
Just let them go for about a minute until they look really nice and brown and the oil
again is up to about 365, and the potatoes are done!
Super-brown and crisp.
I am so excited about this you guys.
Way more excited than I should be for health purposes.
All right, and then while everything is still hot, we want to sprinkle it with a little
more salt.
You can also use the same batter, the fish batter, to do like fried mushrooms or zucchini
slices.
I have even done eggplant chunks.
It’s all delightful.
All right.
Now usually these are served with malt vinegar, but my skanky old grocery store doesn't carry
it, so I’ve got some tartar sauce that I made up with some homemade aioli.
I’ll put the recipe in a link to that and the aioli will be up next Thursday, or this
coming Thursday, or whatever, sometime in the future, and I am going to do a little
bit of a lemon squeeze though.
It’s so crispy.
Oh my God!
Can you hear that?
That crunch.
Oh my God!
I am so excited!
[crunch] Mmmmmmmmmm.
My God!
It’s so crunchy and so moist and just perfectly cooked.
Wow!
This is better than any fish and chips that you will ever buy in a restaurant or a bar
or a pub or anywhere.
I promise you.
So, I hope you try this recipe, and if you have any questions or comments, leave them
below, and I’ll respond as soon as I can, and remember if you ever take any pictures
of any of the food that you make from my recipes, you can always put them on Instagram, hashtag
Hilah Cooking, and it will go straight to the website, or you can post them on Facebook
or the new Google+ community for Hilah Cooking, so thank you for watching, and I hope you
have a great day, and have some fish and chips dudes because it’s good for you!
Not really.
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