Leading Fast Food Chain’s Small Fry Order: 230 calories, 11 grams fat

Leading Frozen French Fries: 130 calories, 3.5 grams fat

Chasing Supermom’s Fries: 120 calories, 0 grams fat

Enticed? With my husband and I trying to eat healthier, I knew I was going to have to find substitutes for some of our not so nutritious favorites…french fries was near the top of the list. While the frozen french fries you can buy at the grocery store are a huge improvement over the fast food fries, I wanted to try to find a way to make them myself. What resulted were super tasty, super easy, and super cheap french fries! I literally used 2 potatoes out of a huge bag that cost next to nothing. (Potatoes are one of the best values for your money at the grocery store!) While I will concede that these don’t taste like fast food fries (and I am not going to give in to my desire to buy a fryer, no matter how much Paula Deen makes me want to..), they taste a lot like the frozen shoe string fries I buy often at the store.

Ready to make home-made un-fried french fries that taste every bit as good as the frozen kind? Here we go!

Ingredients

One  medium potato per person – *I like to use Yukon Gold potatoes for just about everything, except Irish Sundaes.

Cooking spray

coarse salt -*If you don’t have this, regular salt, or seasoned salt work too! You can actually play around with these, and use things like garlic salt, or regular salt and rosemary….play with them!

That’s it folks!

To Prepare

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

2. Slice your potatoes in half. Then, turn the potato on the side (so the flat part is out, not down), and make several cuts. (I found it to be easier not to cut all the way through the potato.

3. Turn the potato back over (flat side down) and make small vertical cuts. This will result in nice skinny shoestrings. (You can cut your potatoes any which way you want. I’ve done quartered and used garlic powder instead of salt, and that was awesome too! The shoestrings just make me FEEL like I’m eating real fast food fries.)

4. Spray your 9×13 pan generously with cooking spray. Add the potatoes and mix around to coat with the spray. You can spray the actual potatoes as well, just to make sure they get a nice coating. (Don’t be stingy..they WILL stick to your pan if you don’t get enough spray!)

(Don’t mind my head…These were the first pics I took with my new ipad, and I’m still getting the hang of not shooting with a big fancy camera…BUT, this gives you an idea of size, etc.)

5. Sprinkle the potatoes with salt (or garlic salt, season salt, rosemary, etc…) I use about a teaspoon for the 2 potatoes, but salt is such a personal thing…Do what YOU like. (You may need to play around with your salt. The first time I made these, I was a bit heavy-handed and my husband asked if we had any cholesterol medicine.) =)

6. Roast the potatoes for about 15-20 minutes, and then check on them. Move them around with a wooden spatula, and try one for crispiness. If they aren’t done enough for you, put them back in for another few minutes, but keep a watchful eye. McDonalds doesn’t serve black fries, so burning them won’t help your diet…

Enjoy these healthier, but still super tasty fries!