How To Make Hash Browns Like Gordon Ramsay
Gordon Ramsay knows his way around an American breakfast. We here in the United States might not know "f***-all about good food," as Ramsay said in 2018 at an awards event (via Daily Mail). But in a YouTube video demonstrating his hash browns-and-eggs dish, Ramsay confesses his fondness for American breakfast. "The best breakfasts in the world are always in America," Ramsay says. We won't argue – especially if Ramsay is doing the cooking.
The breakfast Ramsay prepares in the YouTube video involves cracking eggs over cooked hash browns and setting the pan in the oven to bake the eggs over the potatoes. He then completes his dish by topping it with bacon he cooked in olive oil, brown sugar, salt, pepper, and butter. Most Americans figure that bacon fat would supply all the cooking grease needed. And doesn't bacon already have enough salt? We'll set aside Ramsay's bacon-cooking technique to focus on the hash browns. He really has some good advice for this staple breakfast starch.
Good hash browns have two qualities. They hold together nicely, and they're crispy. Ramsay shows us how to make both things happen. He selects waxy potatoes for his hash browns. In the world of potatoes, "waxy" contrasts with "floury." Waxy potatoes are low in starch and high in moisture, so they hold up well when cooked (via Bon Appetit). Varieties on the waxy end of the spectrum include red bliss, new potatoes, pee wee, and fingerlings.
Gordon Ramsay knows how to make hash browns extra crispy
Ramsay likes to combine grated potatoes and onion in his hash browns, to infuse each bite with onion flavor. Grating the potatoes instead of cutting them will result in crispier hash browns. The real key to crispy hash browns, however, is to remove the moisture from your heap of freshly grated potatoes. Ramsay grated his potatoes and onions into a colander and squeezed the mash with his hands. "The more liquid you remove, the crispier your hash browns will be," he says in the video.
Ramsay has a nifty trick for flipping his hash browns, which cover the entire bottom of the pan: Put a plate over the pan, turn the pan upside down, and drop the potatoes onto the plate. Then slide the hash browns straight back into the pan.
Several commenters on YouTube rib Ramsay for opening the video with the Captain Obvious-sounding statement, "The secret of a great hash brown are the potatoes." But watching him flip the hash browns, it becomes clear why waxy potatoes in particular are important. Anyone who has tried to make hash browns with russets knows they would fall apart mid-flip. So thank you, Gordon Ramsay, for teaching us Americans a thing or two about our own breakfast.