Oil or Fat for Chips

Traditional beef dripping for frying potatoes

One of the key elements to frying top class potatoes is the oil which you use. We tested out vegetable oil, ground nut oil, lard and beef dripping This page is the result of those tests.
We have heard that frying chips in goose fat gives excellent results but considering the amount of fat required to cook four portions of chips and the exorbitant cost of goose fat, we decided to give that test a miss.

First, the vegetable oil. It gave good results as far as crispiness of the outer chip concerned and it left the chips with little or no added flavours. If you prefer oil and want your chips "au naturel" then vegetable oil is a good choice.

Ground nut oil also gave the chips good crispiness but the oil did impart some flavour to the chips. We didn't really fancy the taste of ground nuts on our chips so this oil was awarded the thumbs down.

Lard was the next frying medium we used and this gave excellent results. The crispiness of the chips was even slightly better compared to vegetable oil. Like vegetable oil, there was no discernable flavour added to chips when frying in oil.

Lastly we tried out the beef dripping. This gave top quality crispiness just like lard but it also gave the chips a slightly beefy flavour. We rated the taste highly and especially good if you are serving the chips on their own.

So in our tests, beef-dripping came out top as far as taste and crispiness are concerned. But it was a close run contest. That leads us on to the health aspects of beef dripping. It's very high in bad fat content, much higher compared to vegetable oil. That is the generally held view at the time of writing this article. However, a growing number people disagree with the idea that all fat is bad for you. Please read the email sent to us recently which is produced in full at the bottom of this page.

In conclusion then we would go for the vegetable oil on most occasions, with the odd time cooking them in beef-dripping just for the superb taste. Remember this as well, traditionally the British chip was always cooked in beef-dripping because vegetable oil simply was not available.

EMAIL REGARDING FAT AND CHOLESTEROL

Hello from Australia,

Firstly I love your chip website. However I would ask you to reconsider what you say regarding some health issues with cooking in Beef Dripping and Lard. These traditional fats are not as bad as once thought for ones health. In fact many of the so called "healthier" oils are very bad for one's health. Please read the article on the link below. Take time and consider carefully what it says. This is not just one guy saying this there are many, do some reading about it on line:

http://naturalbias.com/busting-the-cholesterol-myths/

Also this website below, by Mary G. Enig, PhD and Sally Fallon, is in much more detail but a wonderful source of information:

http://www.westonaprice.org/The-Skinny-on-Fats.html#summary

I would love to hear what you think about it.

Kindest regards

David

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