The Art of Fresh-Cut French Fries

Let's start with a confession: we are a little obsessive about our french fries. Okay, more than a little. We are deeply, possibly unhealthily obsessed with our french fries. We think about them constantly. We have meetings about them. We have opinions — strong, passionate, borderline unreasonable opinions — about the correct shade of gold, the precise level of crunch, and the exact window of time between "out of the fryer" and "on your tray."

If that sounds intense for a side of fries, well, welcome to Hires Big H. We do it the hard way because the hard way tastes better.

Most restaurants — and we mean the vast majority of them — serve frozen french fries. They come in a bag. You dump them in a fryer. You wait a few minutes. You shake them into a basket. Done. Easy. Fast. And honestly? Totally fine if you don't know what you're missing.

But once you've had a fresh-cut fry — a real, honest-to-goodness, cut-from-an-actual-potato-that-morning fry — you can never go back to the frozen ones. It's like going from instant coffee to a pour-over. The difference isn't subtle. The difference is everything.

The Seven-Step Process: How We Make Fresh-Cut Fries at Hires Big H

We don't just cut potatoes and throw them in hot oil. (We tried that once. Results were... educational.) Our fresh-cut fries go through a seven-step process that's been refined and perfected over decades. Each step matters. Skip one, and you'll notice. Maybe you won't be able to put your finger on exactly what's different, but something will be off. The crunch won't be right. The inside will be too dense. The color will be pale instead of golden.

Seven steps. Every batch. Every day. At every location. Here's exactly how we do it.

Step 1: Whole Potatoes

It starts with whole, real, dirt-was-recently-on-these potatoes. Not potato flakes. Not pre-cut sticks shipped in a vacuum-sealed bag from some processing plant in another state. Whole potatoes. The kind your grandmother would recognize. The kind you could pick up and throw at someone if you were so inclined (please don't throw potatoes at anyone).

We receive deliveries of fresh potatoes regularly, and every batch gets inspected. We're looking for firmness, consistency, and quality. A great fry starts with a great potato. There's no getting around that.

Step 2: The Wash

Potatoes grow in dirt. That's kind of their whole thing. So before we do anything else, every single potato gets thoroughly washed. This isn't a quick rinse under the tap. This is a proper, thorough cleaning to make sure what ends up on your tray is nothing but clean, pure potato goodness.

It's a simple step, but it matters. Everything matters when you're making the best french fries in Utah.

Step 3: The Hand-Cut

Here's where the magic starts. Our team cuts every single potato by hand. Not by machine. By hand. This gives us control over the size and shape of each fry, and it means every batch has that beautiful, slightly irregular look that tells you — before you even take a bite — that a real person made this.

Uniformity is for factory food. Our fries have character. Some are a little thicker. Some are a little thinner. Some have that gorgeous end piece with the skin still on. That's not a flaw. That's authenticity. That's how you know you're eating the real thing.

Step 4: The Hot Water Soak

This is the step that separates the amateurs from the pros. After cutting, our fries go into a hot water soak. Why? Because potatoes are full of starch, and excess starch is the enemy of crispiness.

When you soak fresh-cut potatoes in hot water, the starch leaches out. You can actually see the water turn cloudy — that's all the starch leaving the potato. And once that starch is gone, the fry can achieve something that starchy fries simply cannot: a truly crispy exterior that shatters when you bite into it, giving way to a fluffy, tender interior.

Science! Delicious, delicious science.

Step 5: The Rest and Drain

After soaking, the fries need to rest and drain. You can't throw a wet potato into hot oil unless you want a very exciting (and very dangerous) fireworks show in your kitchen. The excess water needs to come off. The potato needs to settle. Patience.

This is one of those steps where you just have to wait, and waiting is hard when you're surrounded by the smell of fresh-cut potatoes and hot oil. But great fries demand patience. So we wait.

Step 6: The First Fry (The Blanch)

Now we're getting to the good stuff. The drained fries go into oil at a lower temperature for their first fry. This is called blanching, and it's the secret weapon of every great fry cook in the world.

The blanch cooks the inside of the potato. It makes the interior soft, fluffy, and tender. But — and this is crucial — it doesn't brown the outside. Not yet. That comes later. The blanch is about the inside. It's about building the foundation. If you skip this step and go straight to high heat, you get a fry that's brown on the outside and raw in the middle. Nobody wants that.

After the blanch, the fries come out of the oil and rest again. Yes, more resting. More patience. We told you this was a seven-step process. We didn't say it was a fast process.

Step 7: The Final Fry

This is the moment. The fries go back into the oil, but this time at a higher temperature. This is where the exterior transforms. The surface of the fry, now free of excess starch and pre-cooked to fluffy perfection on the inside, hits that high heat and does something magical: it turns golden. Crispy. Crunchy. That gorgeous, deep amber color that makes your mouth water before the fry even reaches your lips.

The final fry is all about the outside. The crunch. The snap. That satisfying resistance when you bite through the exterior, followed by the pillowy softness of the interior. That contrast — crispy outside, fluffy inside — is what separates a truly great fry from every soggy, limp, sad frozen fry you've ever eaten.

And then, the moment they come out of the oil, we hit them with salt. Immediately. Not thirty seconds later. Not after they've been sitting under a heat lamp. Immediately. Because salt sticks best to hot, slightly oily surfaces, and the window between "perfect timing" and "too late" is measured in seconds.

Then we serve them. Right now. While they're at their absolute peak. Because a great fry is a temporary miracle — it's never better than the moment it's ready.

Why We'll Never Switch to Frozen

We get it. Frozen fries would be easier. Way easier. No cutting. No soaking. No draining. No double-frying. Just rip open a bag, dump, fry, serve. We could save time. We could save labor. We could probably save money.

But here's the thing: we're not trying to save money on the food. We're trying to make the best food we possibly can. That's what Don Hale taught us, and it's what three generations of our family have carried forward. Year after year, generation after generation.

When you order fresh-cut fries at Hires Big H, you're not getting "fries." You're getting a seven-step labor of love that starts with a whole potato and ends with something so crispy, so golden, so perfectly seasoned that you'll eat the whole order before your burger even arrives. (Don't worry. We won't judge. We've all done it.)

But Wait, There's More: Cheese Fries and Chili Cheese Fries

As if our fresh-cut fries weren't enough on their own — and let's be honest, they absolutely are enough on their own — we also offer two variations that take an already incredible fry and push it into genuinely unfair territory.

Cheese Fries

Our cheese fries aren't topped with that weird orange liquid that comes from a pump and has never been within fifty miles of an actual cow. No. We use 100% real shredded cheddar cheese, melted over a pile of our fresh-cut fries until it's all gooey and stretchy and absurdly delicious.

Real cheese on real fries. It's such a simple concept, and yet so many places get it wrong. We don't understand it either. Just use real cheese, people. It's not that hard. (Okay, it is a little harder than the pump stuff. But the pump stuff is a crime against fries, so.)

Chili Cheese Fries

And then there are the chili cheese fries. Oh, the chili cheese fries. Fresh-cut fries, 100% real shredded cheddar, and our house-made chili, ladled generously over the whole beautiful mess.

Now, about that chili. Here's a fun fact that we love: Jon Hale — Don's son, second generation, the man who helped build Hires Big H into what it is today — still personally buys the secret chili ingredients. Even in retirement. Even after handing off the daily operations. Jon still sources those ingredients himself because the chili recipe is sacred, and some things are too important to delegate.

We're not going to tell you what's in it. Obviously. That's the whole point of a secret recipe. But we will tell you this: it's rich, it's savory, it's got just enough heat to wake up your taste buds without setting your mouth on fire, and it turns an already legendary pile of fries into something that borders on a religious experience.

The Prices (Because You're Wondering)

A regular order of our Fresh-Cut Fries is $5.10. If you're adding fries to a combo, it's $4.30. For the best fresh-cut fries in Salt Lake City — seven steps, real potatoes, double-fried, seasoned to perfection — that's a pretty incredible deal.

Check out the full menu for our complete fry lineup, including cheese fries and chili cheese fries.

Fresh-Cut Fries: The Hires Big H Way

Let's bring it back to where we started. We are obsessive about our fries. Unreasonably, passionately, maybe-we-need-therapy obsessive. But that obsession is the reason our fries taste the way they do. It's the reason people drive across the Salt Lake Valley to get them. It's the reason regulars who've been coming here since the 1960s still light up when that tray of golden, steaming, perfectly salted fries hits their table.

Seven steps. Real potatoes. No shortcuts. No frozen bags. No compromises.

We do it the hard way. And the hard way tastes incredible.

Come try them for yourself. We've got three locations across the valley, and every single one follows the same seven-step process, the same standards, the same obsessive commitment to the perfect fry. Grab an order on their own, or pair them with one of our fresh-ground burgers and a frosty root beer for the full Hires Big H experience.

Your taste buds will thank you. Your frozen-fry-eating past self will never forgive you. That's a trade we're willing to make.

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