Short Order Home Fries

A diner breakfast simply isn’t complete without a side of crusty, deeply browned home fries. Diner cooks start off with roasted or boiled potatoes and use plenty of fat on a broad griddle top to generate those great-tasting potatoes. Is there a way of replicating those home fries at home? Here’s what we discovered:

Test Kitchen Discoveries

• Use medium-starch or waxy potatoes so that they retain their shape through cooking. Our favorites include Yukon Gold, all-purpose, and red potatoes.
• Parcook the cubed potatoes--tossed with butter--in the microwave before frying them.
• Sauté the onions separately and stir them into the potatoes just before serving. Cooking the onions with the potatoes detrimentally affects the crust.
• Flavor the potatoes simply with garlic salt to allow their flavor to come through clearly.