How to Cut Potatoes Without Sticking to the Knife
Most potatoes need a little knife work before they cook and eat; Unless you’re baking whole legs to eat with a juicy steak, slicing and dicing is only part of the process. The essence of slicing potatoes is simple: place the potatoes on a cutting board and push or slide a knife through it. Repeat as needed until the potato pieces are the right size and shape.
If you’ve ever sliced potatoes before, you may have noticed that the leg segments tend to stick to the knife blade. It’s not a big tragedy, but it’s annoying. Fortunately, Kenji Lopez Alt has a very elegant solution.
Kenji can show you how to do this in the short video you see above this paragraph, but in short, the secret, as with many things, is the wrist. Instead of pushing the knife blade through the soil and up to the cutting board – the “normal” way, with the potato wedges sticking to the blade, Kenji pulls the knife through the potatoes from front to back.
I hate to spoil the ending, but the potato wedges don’t stick to Kenji’s knife and I think that’s good. This step makes the task of chopping potatoes a little faster and a little less annoying, and there are more than enough annoying things going on in the world today.
Once you’ve sliced, diced, or diced, you’re ready to fry, boil, broil, or mash. You can also make a small casserole if you have heavy cream. Whichever way you choose to cook your prepared potatoes, you can do it with smug satisfaction, knowing that you cut them right. (You can also tell your friends that they are doing it “wrong,” which is honestly fun.)