Size. Shape. Texture. Saltiness. The French fry's constituent parts are constantly being looked at under the microscope, sparking batsh*t crazy fierce debate about what makes the ideal form. 

You can get your fill at high-end restaurants and fast-casual chains alike, where fries run the gamut from thin to thick,  and curly to waffle-shaped. But risks are always involved: Whenever you order fries, you’re eating someone else’s opinion that may not match your own blueprint. 

So if you’ve ever rolled your eyes at the fat wedges that accompanied your burger when you wanted shoestring, or crunched your way through deep golden fries when you prefer them light and a little soggy, it's time to take matters into your own hands. After all, the greatest side dish on the planet has an ingredient list you can count on three greasy fingers. When you make French fries in your own home, you can turn your opinions into reality, modifying the final product at every point—from the purchase of a good spud to the choice of the right dipping condiment.  

In a perfect fry, "the crust should be very, very brittle and the inside should be very, very creamy,” says Ned Baldwin, whose restaurant Houseman serves malty, salty fries that are a current frontrunner for best in the business. But of course, that’s his take.

To master the fry, though, you need technique—and a bit of patience.

“It’s boiling, frying, freezing, and frying,” says Baldwin. 

There are variations on the method, depending on the results you want. But ultimately most of the best fries—including our favorite fast-food varieties—are made using some play on the twice-fried technique that traces its roots back to old Europe.

“In Belgium, they figured it out hundreds of years ago,” said Omer Shorshi, co-owner of Pommes Frites. “We try to keep it that way.”

Instead of subscribing to one ideology, we tapped Shorshi, Baldwin, and Mile End’s Noah Bermanoff—all fry masters with different approaches.

Here's the ultimate guide to making French fries at home. 

Every fry starts with a potato. You’ll want regular old russets because of their high starch and low sugar content, but you also want a potato with flavor. If you can find a locally grown, low-sugar, high-starch potato, you'll be rewarded with taste. "We want the flavor of the potatoes in the fries,” Shorshi says. But, while waxy potato breeds abound, starchier ones can be hard to find, so you'll likely have to chance it at the supermarket. The other buying problem you'll run into is that not every russet potato is alike: depending on how long ago they were harvested and the temperature at which you store them, they'll behave differently in the fryer.  (A potato stored at cooler temperatures or in the fridge will convert its starches to sugar, which means it will brown more quickly.) 

Most chefs peel the skin from the potatoes before frying. But just because it’s convention doesn’t mean it’s necessary, says Bernamoff, who skips the step since it adds a little extra texture and nutrition. Plus, it’s easier. “The idea of peeling many hundreds of pounds of potatoes every week just to cut them off and fry them, I’m like…why?” he says.

If you do take off the skin, put the peeled potatoes into a bowl filled with water so they don’t brown as you work.

At home, the knife is your pro tool for turning oval potatoes into rectangular fries. Most chefs want a fry with a thickness of ¼ to 1/3 of an inch. Any thinner and you don’t get the prized, two-pronged texture: creamy inside, crunchy outside. You can go thicker if you want, carving out wedges or diner-style rectangles. You don’t have to be perfectionist about getting each fry exactly even—there will be some rounded edges and sharp tips. But the more precise you are, the more evenly your fries will cook. First, make one long slice on the skinny side, so that the potato can balance flat on the cutting board, with the wider part parallel to the board. Then, slice down to create slices of the width you want. Pile up two slices at a time, and cut sticks of the same width. Return the cut fries to the bowl of water.

Every expert we talked to soaks their fries. “It helps to take out a lot of the starch,” explains Shorshi. That translates into fries are creamy and smooth, rather than fluffy. Once you’ve cut your fries, put them back into a bowl full of water and leave them in the fridge overnight (or, at the very least, for a few hours).

Baldwin adds in one more step here: boiling the soaked fries. He puts them in a pot of cold water with a dash of vinegar, then brings them up just to a relaxed kind of boil. He lets them cook until they’re just past the raw stage. “When you bite in, you want them to be almost edible,” he says. Don’t overcook—they’ll turn to mush. Scoop the fries from the water with a big slotted spoon, then let them cool in the fridge until chilled. This allows you to keep the first fry (see below) appropriately brief, while still ending up with a creamy fry.

Pick a neutral oil that can stand up to high heat. Sunflower is a favorite, though it’s pricy. Shorshi mixes it with soy; Bernamoff with canola and grapeseed. You’ll want enough to fill your pot halfway full (any more than that and it’ll splatter). 

Here’s where restaurant chefs do have a key advantage: professional electric deep fryers. Frying well relies on having the oil stay at the correct, high temperature throughout, so your outside crisps without burning at the same time as your fry’s inside cooks through. That’s harder to do in a pot on a stove with a flame that just doesn’t get that hot—so hard that Shorshi has switched to the oven at home for his kids. “We call them fries,” he said. “But they’re really roasted potatoes.”

But you don’t have to resort to roasting. Simply keep batches small, Shorshi says, and choose a heavy pot, like a Le Creuset Dutch Oven, which will hold the heat. A thermometer is essential. The goal of the first fry is to develop a crust on the fry—that’s it. “It’s a bare sear,” says Baldwin. “They’re leathery and smooth and sandpapery.”

“You’re not trying to achieve color,” explains Bernamoff. “You’re trying to get an even cook. The best way to see if it’s ready is to grab it and take a little bit. It should be just past the threshold of having some resistance—not like snapping a raw carrot.” By the time you do this twice, you’ll have a sixth sense for when the fry is done the first time around, he says.

But, there is some debate. At Pommes Frites, Shorshi keeps the temperature lower for fry number one, as does Bernamoff, who uses oil at 285°F. At Houseman, “we boil them at the same temperature,” Baldwin says—330°F to 350°F. His idea is to develop the thinnest of crusts on each fry, so they don’t stick together during the next step—freezing.

Afterwards, drain the fries on paper towel-lined baking sheet. Cool to room temperature, then freeze them. “Starches break down—there’s some science stuff behind that I should be able to articulate but I can’t,” says Baldwin. Twelve hours is enough for the magic to happen.  (But not every chef goes the freezing route, so you can skip it if you’re in a rush; fries won’t be quite as creamy in that case.)

The second fry is a lot more straightforward than the first. Get the oil to just above 350°F, then plunge in your fries. If frozen, you can thaw them—or not. Watch the temperature, making sure it doesn’t dip too low, since a low temp means greasy fries. When the fries look appropriately golden to you—it’ll take around five minutes—scoop them out with your big slotted spoon, drain on paper towels, and salt immediately. 

There are just two rules here: “Use lots of salt,” says Baldwin. “And salt when they’re hot, so they stick.” A fine-grained salt may have better luck coating your fries than a coarser one.

To make waffle fries, crinkle fries, curly fries, or cottage fries, you’ll need the right cutting equipment—and you probably don’t have it. If one of these shapes is your dream fry, you have a couple options. If you own an adjustable mandolin, you might be able to cut satisfactory waffle or cottage fries using a ridged blade; just make sure you can extend the width to about one-quarter inch so you’re not turning out potato chips. If you’ve gotten into spiralizing vegetables, you can use that same gadget to turn potatoes into curly fries. It will feel like cheating, but here’s a secret you should know: the packages of fries in the freezer section of your grocery store have been through all the pre-cooking steps, so if it’s crinkle fries you can’t do without, buy them frozen and fry them up. You’ll be skipping most of the preliminary steps and still ending up with fresh, crispy fries, even if they aren’t fully homemade.

“Fries have always been good friends of condiments,” Bernamoff summarizes. “So any flavor you like in a condiment will probably go well in a fry.”

Though he engineered Mile End’s fries to hold up under gravy and cheese curds, when he’s not serving poutine, Bernamoff chooses ketchup—Heinz only. Baldwin agrees.

“Heinz is the one true ketchup,” he says.

Of course if you want to beyond ketchup, there are other paths that beckon. A simple cheese sauce is one go-to; a classic poutine, using from-scratch gravy and cheese curds, or a modified one, with tomato sauce and mozzarella curds, is another option. (Just don’t overthink your poutine toppings. “I don’t think it was intended to be a gastronomic pursuit,” says Bernamoff. “It’s hockey-rink food.”) At Pommes Frites, there are dozens of sauces, many of them mayonnaise tweaked with flavors. “We try to target every palate,” Shorshi says.