Does anyone use a deep fat fryer?

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I am considering buying one.
Does anyone own one?

Is the food you make with it tasty?

How do you clean it?

I want to make homemade French fries in coconut oil. And arancini which is deep fried balls of risotto rice. And battered vegetables.

I have a small deep fryer, but it's not "fat," it's vegetable oil.
I use it to sear-seal tofu for a variety of recipes - you just can't do it in a pan. The deep frying allows the outside of the tofu to fry up firm evenly and without sticking. The tofu via this method comes out AWESOMELY. The inside is soft and delicate, but the outside is firm and golden and has that fried chip taste.
To clean it you just empty out the old oil and wipe out the interior with paper toweling. The basket can need a bit of a wash just like dishes, with detergent and a sponge. Some people recommend you occasionally fill it with just water and salt and turn that on, to sort of cleanse it out every so often, but I don't think it's really necessary.
I make thin-cut french fries in it too and they turn out awesomely - SO much better for you than commercial ones. You can also make crisps by thin cutting potatoes in a round slice (sometimes with a commercial vegetable peeler if you have one) and frying those off, which is also awesome.
I've made Japanese tempura vegetables in it which is sort of battered, and they turned out great.

I've had several over the years. My big problem with them is that the grease buildup is awfully difficult to clean after a while.

My preference is a wok. But with a wok, you have to be more careful since it doesn't regulate the temperature. On the other hand, it can be used for other things, too. A good wok is even quite decent for making popcorn.

If you use a wok, you have to be real careful. With all the hot oil, it would be very easy for you to do serious, possibly life threatening, damage to yourself or others. When I'm through deep frying in a wok, I have a place where I can move the wok to keep the handle away. I also absolutely refuse to deep fry anything in it if there are any kids around at all. Or more than 1 or 2 other adults.

Last edited by kokopelli on 16 Dec 2017, 4:30 am, edited 1 time in total.

Do you do the french fries starting with raw potatoes or those bought frozen and already cut.

I guess that cutting them thin probably isn't a big problem, but if you do thicker fries like I prefer, it takes a bit more. If you start frying at the normal temperature (350 F), it locks the moisture in and they become soggy really quickly. The preferred way is to cook them first at a lower temperature (like maybe 325 F) for about ten minutes (until they are floating). This cooks the inside of the fries and drives the moisture out. Then raise the temperature to 350 F and finish them to make the outsides crisp.

I think that the frozen fries often have already had the first cooking so all you have to do is finish them off at 350 F.

The absolute best fries I ever cooked, I used a cooking thermometer to get the temperature just right. Those fries were fabulous. Usually, I just eyeball it.

Yeah the thin ones are no problem because they can cook quickly and evenly. For thicker ones, the way you do them is a good way but it does mean more time in the fryer and cooking at low temperatures apparently lets the oil soak in so it's not as healthy. Alternatively for thick chips or scallops, you can partially steam or microwave the potatoes until they're beginning to soften but will still hold shape, then cut and quick fry them. Just blot them well if you steamed the potatoes since if there's water in there obviously the oil will explode.
I don't care for the frozen ones much - they have lots of additives, preservatives and often meat products in there and aren't a very healthy option. I'll eat them occasionally but from-scratch ones are a better option I think.
They you can drown them in salt, vinegar and tomato sauce and undo all your good work.

C2V I am tempted by your description of the crisp tofu. I often eat vegan and have a few vegan family members too. I usually can't stomach the texture of tofu when I cook with it so it sounds like just the thing to deep fry it.

Kokopelli I think a wok could work as long as you have somewhere safe to store it.

Yah, it's so good. A lot of people think they don't like tofu usually because they have tried one variety and didn't like it, so they think that's what all tofu is like, but it isn't. There are variations between brands, there are marinated or not (one I like is a Malaysian peanut satay one) and there are a variety of different forms - you have silken tofu, hard tofu, soft tofu, fried puffs, yuba, inari, marinated or plain - it goes on and on. Plus some people only like it in certain ways - like fried or simmered. The tofu I use to deep fry would be absolutely gross uncooked, but when you fry it it's fab.

Yeah. To me, the big issue with using a wok for deep frying is safety.

One nice thing about a wok is that it is large enough that you aren't tempted to overfill it. Years ago when I was living in an apartment in central Texas, I tried using an ordinary pot for deep frying. That turned out to be a mistake because when I put the fries in, the oil boiled over and onto the stove top and caught fire. I barely got it out without having to call the fire department and the entire apartment stunk from the smoke for a couple of weeks. I never did tell the landlord what I did.

So I'd definitely use a stand-alone deep fryer over a regular pot filled with oil.

For what it's worth, I deep fry less now than ever before. However, I've been very tempted lately to make some tempura vegetables, something that I haven't done in more than 20 years.

When I lived in the Houston area, there were lots of grocery stores with large choices of various sauces that could be used as a dipping sauce for tempura vegetables. One of my favorites was a somewhat sweet sauce made from apricots. Where I live now, the stores are much smaller (the local grocery store building is a total area of less than 5,000 square feet including the storage area at the back) and they just don't carry much in the way of off the wall sauces.