A simple form of cutting potatoes

Straw. Raw large potatoes are cut into thin slices, placed one on top of the other and chopped crosswise into strips 4–5 cm long, with a cross-section of 0.2X0.2 cm. They are used for deep-frying (in a large amount of fat).

Whetstones. Raw potatoes are cut into slices 0.7–10 cm thick and cut into sticks 3–4 cm long. Used for frying, preparing borscht (except naval and Siberian borscht), pickle soup, soups with pasta and other dishes.

Cubes. The potatoes are first cut into slices, cut into sticks, and then cut into cubes. Depending on the purpose, the cubes are cut into sections (in cm): large – 2–2.5, medium – 1–1.5, small – 0.3–0.5. Raw potatoes are cut into large cubes for stewing and making soups; medium – for preparing the “potatoes in milk” dish and for stewing; boiled potatoes are cut into small cubes for garnishing cold dishes and for salads.

Slices. Raw potatoes (small ones) are cut in half and cut into slices along the radius, which are used to prepare pickles, stews, braised beef, and deep-frying.

Slices. Small or medium-sized boiled potatoes are cut in half lengthwise, then in half again and chopped crosswise into slices 1–2 mm thick. Large tubers are cut lengthwise into cubes and chopped crosswise into slices. The slices are used to make salads and vinaigrettes.

Circles. Boiled or raw potatoes are trimmed into a cylinder shape, then cut crosswise into thin circles 1.5–2 mm thick. Raw potato slices are used for frying, and boiled ones are used for baking fish and meat.

Barrels. Medium-sized potatoes are cut on two opposite sides, then peeled, shaped into a barrel, and used boiled as a side dish.

Garlics. Raw potatoes are first peeled into barrels, then cut lengthwise into several pieces. A small notch is made along the edge of each part. Used for making soups.

Balloons. Balls of various sizes are cut out of raw potatoes using special grooves or the grinding technique is used. Large balls are used for deep frying, medium balls are used for deep frying and boiled as a side dish for cold dishes.

Shavings. Cut the raw potatoes on two opposite sides so that you get a cylinder 2–3 cm high, trim it around the circumference, cut off a ribbon 2–2.5 mm thick and 25–30 cm long. Then give this ribbon the shape of a bow and tie it with thread . Used for deep frying.

Spiral. Using a special tool, the potatoes are cut into a spiral. Used for deep frying.

Jerusalem artichoke and sweet potato are processed and cut like potatoes.

Shaped potato cutting carried out manually on cutting boards made of hardwood using carving knives, notches, small and medium chef's knives.

TO complex(curly) cutting forms include: barrels, pears, garlic, balls, spirals, shavings (Fig. 4). In this case, potatoes are cut manually using the grinding method. To obtain complex shapes, you can use special tools (Fig. 5).

Rice. 4 Shapes for cutting vegetables:

1 – barrels; 2 – garlic; 3 – pears; 4 – spirati; 5 – balls.

Rice. 5 Tools for cutting vegetables into shapes

Shredding boards are used to chop vegetables.

Prepared semi-finished vegetable products in wooden tubs, legs, and baskets are delivered to the hot shop.

When organizing the work of a vegetable shop, strict adherence to labor protection and safety regulations is necessary.

Basic rules of occupational health and safety.

Ø Only workers who know their structure and have undergone special training may be allowed to operate the machine.

Perhaps the most popular dish on Russian tables was and remains fried potatoes. One of the main conditions for preparing this dish is the correct cutting of root vegetables. Every housewife has her own secrets on how to cut potatoes for frying. If you are not yet familiar with them, then our material will be very useful.

Cubes or cubes: options for cutting potatoes

Nutritionists, gastroenterologists, and adherents of healthy eating loudly insist that fried potatoes are a very dangerous dish for our stomach. They categorically do not recommend that anyone indulge in such a delicacy, especially people with digestive tract problems.

But then a time-worn phrase comes to the mind of an ordinary person: “The forbidden fruit is always sweet and captivating.” So why, if you want, then you can’t? It’s very possible, but not always and necessarily in moderation. And in these rare moments, you should also think about what kind of potatoes you want to cook. Perhaps fry in a frying pan or simmer in a large amount of sunflower oil? Or maybe bake it in the oven with spices? Although this option is difficult to classify as truly fried potatoes.

How to properly cut potatoes for frying will depend on the chosen method of preparing the dish. There are only three options:

• cubes;
• straws;
• cubes.

These cutting techniques are quite simple and even a child can do it, as long as he doesn’t hurt his fingers. Let's consider each option separately.

Comfortable stripes

So, let's figure out how to cut potatoes into strips for frying:

• We rinse the root vegetables under running cool water. If the potatoes have eye sockets, it is better to do this with a brush.
• Then we peel the potatoes and place the tubers sideways on a cutting board.

• Cut a slice of potato at least 1 cm thick.

• Then turn the circle over onto the board flat and cut into strips equal to the thickness of the slice.

• Wash the straw thoroughly in a bowl of water. This will remove excess starch from the vegetable.

• Place the potatoes in a heated frying pan with sunflower oil.

This option allows you to achieve deep frying of the potatoes and is ideal for cooking deep-fried dishes in a large amount of sunflower oil. In this case, a dish called “fried potatoes” will miraculously be renamed into overseas “french fries.”

Simple blocks

This method of cutting potatoes also does not require special skills or manual dexterity. All you need is a cutting board, a sharp knife and peeled potatoes. Then proceed according to the instructions:

• Place the peeled tubers on a cutting board and press with your fingers to the side of the center.

• Cut the potatoes into 4 equal parts with two movements of the knife - lengthwise and crosswise.

• Now cut each quarter into two parts again so that neat crescents come out.

• Rinse the potatoes in a bowl of water, dry them and start frying.

Potatoes cut into cubes turn out very tasty if you fry them in a frying pan with oil and spices. Quite often, “Country Style Potatoes” are also prepared from crescent pieces.

Favorite cubes

The simplest and most understandable cutting method for everyone is neat squares. This is the kind of potato that housewives add to soups and salads. But it turns out no less tasty when fried.

The easiest and fastest way to cut slices of raw vegetables is to use a special device - a square vegetable cutter. Fortunately, today there are plenty of such devices. They come in the form of a removable attachment on a plate or jar, are part of a manual food processor, and are also represented by a special tetrahedral grater with a pointed edge.

Using such devices is quite simple:

• Using a knife, cut off the bottom so that the tubers can be placed in a vertical position on the table.

• Place the vegetable slicer on top with the sharp edge on the vegetable pulp.

• Admire the result.

Perhaps the only drawback of this method is that it is impossible to regulate the thickness and length of the bars. And the length of the straw depends only on the pressure of the hand. So if physical strength is not enough, the vegetable cutting method is not suitable for you. But don't worry, there are other options.

Sleight of hand - and no vegetable cutters

Even though potatoes are mostly round in shape, they can easily be cut into neat, thin strips using a sharp kitchen knife. True, this method is quite labor-intensive, and the process itself will take a lot of time. But the finished result is worth it. Shall we try?

So, let's do the following:

• Wash and peel the potatoes as you did before.
• Trim the ends of the tubers so that they are flat on all sides.

• Don't forget to remove the parts from the base too. The result should be a perfectly even rectangle.

• Now cut the pulp into thin slices. Each cut should be no thicker than 4 millimeters.

• Place the slices flat on a cutting board and cut crosswise into thin strips.

• The perfectly smooth and thin straw is ready. It can be seasoned and baked in the oven.

Such thin slices are suitable for making salads, although it is better to boil the potatoes first, and also as an Indian side dish with hot spices. But it’s unlikely that you’ll be able to fry such straws. Thin strips will quickly boil, and as a result, instead of fried potatoes, there will be vegetable porridge in the pan. Although this is a matter of taste.

Cutting potatoes like at McDonald's

Fragrant and crispy French fries with garlic sauce... Just the thought of them awakens your appetite. Of course, you can not bother yourself too much and just buy ready-made frozen potatoes in the supermarket. But who knows what kind of tubers they are, how long they are stored there and what they are made of?

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It’s much healthier and tastier when you cook French fries at home. Moreover, the technique is very simple:

• Traditionally, we wash and peel the potato tubers. It is desirable that each of them be almost equal in length and oblong in shape.

• Cut each potato in half. Then we divide the resulting parts in half again in the longitudinal direction.
• We cut each strip into 4 parts.

• While we are cutting a new batch, we place the already prepared potatoes in a bowl of water. This way there will be less starch, and the potatoes themselves will not have time to turn black.

Now you can look for a suitable recipe for making French fries in the oven, slow cooker, microwave, or just in a frying pan. By the way, it will be very tasty if you roll the potatoes in olive oil with spices and crushed garlic before frying.

"Country-style potatoes"

Don't like French fries? Then perhaps you will like spicy country-style potatoes. This simple dish is now served even in the most fashionable restaurants.

To prepare such potatoes, you will need to find and buy tubers in the store as young as possible. Choose those vegetables whose peel in your opinion is the thinnest, smoothest and without burrs. By the way, there should be no green spots on the root crop. Often they are direct witnesses to the content of pesticides and other inedible chemicals.

In general, when the purchasing and selection process is complete, your actions should be as follows:

• Using a soft brush or an ordinary clean, preferably a new kitchen sponge, thoroughly wash the potatoes from dust and dirt.
• Without peeling the skin, cut the tubers into halves.

• Now the resulting pieces need to be cut in half again.

• Shape each quarter to the desired size. Usually it is enough to make just one transverse incision.

• These are the resulting potato slices.

• But the work doesn't end there. Place potato wedges in a flat-bottomed bowl and cover with cold water.

• Let the straw lie there for 5-7 minutes. This will help rid the potatoes of excess and unnecessary starch.
• Then transfer the slices to a paper towel.

• After all the water has drained and been absorbed into the napkin, the potato straws are ready for further use.

Planting potatoes in sections is one of the most controversial issues in potato growing, and the conclusions of different studies are contradictory. In Holland and other European countries with a damp, cool climate, tubers are not cut, but in the USA and Canada, 95% of potatoes are planted in halves. Japanese farmers cut the slices purchased from their foreign colleagues into two parts, receiving 4 units of planting material from one tuber. At a summer cottage, it is advisable to cut potatoes for planting only if there is a shortage of seed tubers, and it is important to follow the technology.

Attention! Not all varieties tolerate making tubers well; for example, for “Scarb” and “Red Scarlet” cutting is undesirable, since it slows down the development of plants and reduces yield. You need to know in advance whether the selected variety is suitable for planting in parts.

1. Rejection of tubers. Do not cut sick or too small potatoes. In the first case, there is a high risk of infecting healthy tubers, in the second, there will be too few nutrients left for the development of the bush in unfavorable conditions. The slice should not be less than 25-30 grams and have at least 2-3 eyes. Outwardly healthy potatoes, but with signs of spoilage of the pulp, are rejected.

2. Cutting time. You can divide the tubers from autumn until planting. In autumn, potatoes quickly create protective tissue (wound periderm) at the cut site, which is similar in properties to the peel, although different in appearance. When cutting in the spring, a protective layer is also created, but its ability to resist infection is much lower.

Cutting potatoes in the fall is dangerous because you can lose all the seed material because of one infected tuber. If there is no well-ventilated storage and it is not possible to monitor the potatoes every day, this procedure should be postponed until spring or the time of planting in the ground.

It is better to cut potatoes for planting before germination to create the same starting conditions for both halves, but if you do this too early, the tubers will lose a lot of moisture.

For the first 15 days, until a protective crust forms, the cut halves should be stored separately from each other at room temperature away from sunlight with good ventilation and a relative humidity of 90-95%. Then the planting material can be transferred to the cellar.

It is advisable for beginning potato growers to divide the tubers 3-4 days before planting or 4-5 hours before planting in the ground.

3. Cutting method. It can be longitudinal or transverse. From the point of view of growing technology, cutting a tuber lengthwise is easier, since there is no need for sorting, but the sprouts on the umbilical cord (the place where the potato was attached to the parent bush) will not develop as actively, and besides, not every variety has a sufficient number of eyes (at least 2- 3) on each half.

It is better to cut the potatoes crosswise. It is important to remember that sprouts from the top of the tuber develop earlier than from the umbilical cord. If you plant the slices mixed up, the bushes from the crown will sprout earlier, taking nutrients from the “neighboring” one from the umbilical cord. Therefore, during cutting, the slices are sorted and then planted in separate rows.

Large tubers can be cut into 4 parts, but the less nutrients the sprout has left, the greater the danger that the potatoes will not germinate under unfavorable conditions or will be very weak.

When cutting, the main thing is not to touch the “eyes” (the places where the sprouts appear), otherwise the entrances will not appear!

4. Disinfection. Before starting, it is advisable to disinfect the containers, racks and the room itself with a five percent solution of copper sulfate. Only stainless steel knives are suitable for slicing potatoes. Rubber gloves are used to protect hands.

To prevent infection from one tuber from being transmitted to another, after each cut the blade is disinfected in a manganese solution (200 mg of potassium permanganate per 200 ml of water). An alternative method is to hold the knife close to the flame of the burner, hold it there for a couple of seconds, then cool the blade.

To reduce the likelihood of infection, slow down the evaporation of liquid and accelerate the formation of a protective film, the tubers at the cut sites are treated with special substances. Wood ash is considered the most effective remedy; if it is unavailable, dry cement is used. The substance is poured into a bowl and the cut of the potato is dipped. After 3 hours you can start planting. Cement is a chemically neutral substance that does not harm the soil.

5. Planting scheme. Sliced ​​potatoes are planted with a cut to the top to a depth of 6-10 cm at a soil temperature of at least +10 °C. The planting interval and row spacing are standard; these parameters depend on the variety. Otherwise, cultivation does not differ from the traditional method.

Students from a British university conducted a real study on the topic of cooking potatoes. They figured out how to quickly and correctly cut it into four parts, so that later there would be no problems with frying. It turned out that there is a more effective way than simply running a knife horizontally and vertically across a vegetable, as almost everyone in the world does.

Hospitality management students at the University of Essex have found a new way to cut potatoes before frying or baking. They did the actual research and used knowledge from a trigonometry course to come up with a curious but logical discovery: Cutting potatoes into the typical four pieces doesn't cook as well as cutting them into triangles, if the latter are produced in a special way. This, of course, is not an experiment from the “” series, but it is also a very useful activity.

You don't have to be a scientist yourself to understand their method. Everything becomes logical when looking at the drawings with marks - although it doesn’t hurt to know the basics of geometry. As an example, a potato 5 centimeters long and 11.5 centimeters wide was taken, which was first cut into four parts using the standard method - students claim that even British chefs use it.

Two movements with the knife, horizontally and vertically, and in the end we get four relatively equal pieces. Now the math comes into play: the total area of ​​the internal surfaces of the potato that will be fried is 26 π. Each piece in length and width will be half the size of a whole potato.

Let's remember this number and cut the potato again - also into four parts, but in this example the vegetable will be cut into triangles. They all come from the same part of the potato, and essentially the students suggest simply cutting the potato in half and then cutting each half diagonally at an angle close to 30 degrees.

The results should be clear from the previous picture, but the numbers say much more. With an alternative cutting method, the cook receives a new straight line - a diagonal. And it radically changes the size of the fried surface of the potatoes - now they are long and thin pieces. And the total area of ​​the internal surfaces of the potato is now 52.9 π.

The difference in the total areas of the surfaces to be fried (don't forget about the outer surface of the potato) is even greater - with the alternative method, 65 percent more parts of the potato will come into contact with the pan.

The students' research was inspired by a video recipe from the famous British chef and host of his own cooking show, Heston Blumenthal. In it, the cook, like many others, cut potatoes in the traditional way, but the students did not like his method. In a video response, they urge Heston to test their discovery in practice and review the recipe. And for the celebrity to be noticed by the students, they tagged him on social networks.

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