"frying" news and stories

Could America's love affair with the French fry be hitting a rough patch? Inundated with press around obesity and nutrition, people seem to be getting the message -- and forgoing the fries. According to NPD Research Group, French fry consumption dropped by 10 percent last year, as restaurant patrons passed up the potatoes in favor of healthier fare, such as salads. The moment seems ripe for deep-fried alternatives.

Enter the T-Fal ActiFry, a European kitchen gadget that looks (as the Wired blogger Brad Moon pointed out) like the love child of a salad spinner and a deep fryer. Developed three years ago in France (bien sur!), the ActiFry requires merely one tablespoon of oil (make that oil "heart-healthy," as the nice lady in the ActiFry promo suggests) to fry up two pounds of fries. (Compare this to the two-liter bottle of oil you'd need for conventional deep-frying.) The machine spins the potatoes, dispersing the oil lightly and evenly, while using hot air as a heating element. And the ActiFry isn't just for potatoes -- the gadget comes with recipes for an array of deep-fried goodness. Surely this will revolutionize our relationship with deep-fried food! Less oil equals less fat! All hail! ...Right?

Photo: Jessica S. Ralat.

Deep frying improves all. But at the State Fair of Texas in Dallas, fried really hurts. On Opening Day, Slashfood set out to eat all eight of the Big Tex Choice Awards finalists, including the nationally heralded, light and not greasy Deep Fried Butter by Abel Gonzales Jr. (voted Most Creative) and Fernie's Deep Fried Peaches & Cream by Christi Erpillo (voted Best Tasting).

Both fried-food creators have State Fair pedigrees. For several years, each has placed as a finalist or won top prizes. These include Fernie's All-American Fried Grilled Cheese Sandwich in 2008 and Gonzalez's Fried Coke in 2006.

"I go on these kicks where I have to eat the same food, prepared in the same way for weeks," Gonzalez said. "Toast was one of them. I thought, 'What's so great about toast? Not the bread; it's the butter.' "

See the butter after the jump!

Deep-Fried Butter. Photo: State Fair of Texas

Behold the deep-fried butter!

Last week, Slashfood reported that Abel Gonzales planned to best his fried-food record at the State Fair of Texas with a concoction that shuddered even those with the most hardened of arteries -- Deep-Fried Butter.

The dish -- which comes in four flavors: original, garlic, cherry and grape -- took top honors on Monday when fair officials gave it the Most Creative nod in the Big Tex Choice Awards.

"It's similar to having a dinner roll with a lot of butter," Sue Gooding, a spokeswoman for the fair, told us last week. "It's very good."

Spinach empanada with poblano sauce. Photo: Norwichnuts, Flickr.

It may be a little early in the day to be drooling over empanadas, but... wait, who are we kidding? There's never a wrong time to get excited about delicious-looking food.

These golden pockets of fried goodness from Flickr user Norwhichnuts may have us counting the minutes until lunch, when we can hit the streets and seek out something similar, but that doesn't mean we can't spend the morning in awe of the smooth, green poblano sauce, which serves as a colorful hint to the spinach and cheese hiding beneath the perfectly golden, flaky layers of fried pastry dough. Right?

[Via Flickr]

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Photo: Ukanda, Flickr

Deep-fry maestro Abel Gonzales may one day try to conquer what's widely considered the Everest, the four-minute mile and the 56-game hitting streak of fair food: tossed salad. But in the meantime, he's contenting himself with deep-fried butter.

Gonzales, who has twice won top honors in the State Fair of Texas' annual contest for best new midway food, is back this year with deep-fried butter, a dish that's drawing gasps from even the most hard-arteried eaters. The snack will go up against fried peanut-butter-cup macaroons, deep-fried peaches and cream, fried stuffed peppers and fried pork chips with gravy for the Big Tex crown this Monday.

And it comes in four flavors.