Easy Home-Made Hash Browns

One thing I’ve missed for a long time is delicious, real hash browns. Can’t get ’em in a restaurant anymore – restaurants all seem to buy frozen, pre-shredded hash browns, and those just don’t taste right.

So for years I’ve tried making my own with no success.

When I was a teenager I worked in a restaurant where we would boil up a huge pot of potatoes and then chill them in the fridge overnight. Then, first thing in the morning, they would get peeled and shredded for the breakfast rush.

Those were the hash browns I’ve always dreamed about, but I’ve never been able to reproduce them.

Until now.

Along with par-boiling, heat is the answer. Oh, and patience. I used to put shredded potatoes in the pan and then freak out because they would immediately start to stick. So then I would turn the heat down, and try to stir them around, but that just creates a mess.

The pan needs to be hot, so you need a cooking oil with a high smoke point. The first oil that really worked for me was avocado oil. It has a smoke point of about 450 degrees. I’ve since used some other oils with success as well but that’s key – a high smoke point oil.

Par boil* the potatoes the night before if you have time and then chill them overnight in the fridge. This somehow removes a lot of the moisture inside a potato. If you don’t have time to par-boil, you might try shredding raw potatoes and then wrap them in paper towels and squeeze the water out to dry them a bit before cooking. I’ve had limited success with this method, but par boiling is more reliable.

*par boiling simply means “partially” boiling. Boil potatoes for only about 13 – 15 minutes after they’ve come to a boil, then remove from the water and allow to cool (preferably for at least 2 hours or overnight in the fridge).

Peel and shred your potatoes right when you’re ready to prepare them.

Put the stove on medium-high, about 350 degrees, and allow the pan to fully heat up. A few drops of water will skitter around when it’s hot enough. If water simply boils away, the pan is not hot enough (see the video below).

Once the pan is hot, add the oil and allow it to heat up as well. It will shimmer and thin out quickly.

Then throw the shredded potatoes on and pat them into a patty, scraping loose edge pieces in to create a nice clean edge.

Then – Take a chill pill!

At this point, the potatoes are a hot sticky mess. Don’t worry about it. Let them sit there while the heat does its thing. This is where I would always mess up and think I needed to do something.

But don’t.

Just let them sit there for about 5 minutes or so and then you’ll see the edges are nicely browning. This also means they won’t be sticking to the pan either.

Once you’re satisfied that they’re evenly browned, pour a little bit of oil on the edge of the pan so it can warm up, and then lift them out with a spatula, get the oil into the center of the pan and flip the hash browns over.

You should be seeing delicious goodness at this point.

Let the other side cook for about 4 -5 minutes.

Cook up some eggs and then serve it all up and enjoy.

And it is certainly more enjoyable with the right equipment. No cheap non-stick pans or plastic utensils here. Check out some quality cookware below:

Product Links

These are some of the items we’ve been cooking with for years and also just more recently. (Note: This post contains affiliate links. We may earn compensation when you click on the links at no additional cost to you.)

All-Clad 12 inch Stainless Steel Frying Pan as shown in the photos and the video linked below.
Stainless Steel Spatula similar to those shown in the video below.
10″ Cast Iron Skillet with Starter Kit a great way to start cooking with Cast Iron. This has quickly become my favorite pan. It’s made in the USA by a small, family owned company (and yes I need to update this post and video below using this pan.)

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So – we hope this was helpful and we would love to know what you think! Leave some feedback in the comment form below.

Or ask a question and we’ll do our best to find an answer.