Yesterday morning, a friend and I drove up the coast to Malibu — a drive I figured (correctly) would take less than Forever on a morn when everyone was home watching the Rose Parade. Our destination was one of my favorite restaurants…the Paradise Cove Beach Cafe. I recommend it but I also recommend not going without a reservation and not going when there's going to be heading-for-work or heading-home traffic on the Pacific Coast Highway. The place has great food, including the best clam chowder I've ever had anywhere.
Do me a favor. Since I just wrote that, do not write to tell me where to get even better clam chowder somewhere I'm not likely to ever be. Any time I post anything like that, I get all these e-mails that, first of all, want to correct me like I've made some sort of factual error; like someplace I've never been really has the best clam chowder I've ever had anywhere. And it doesn't do a whole lot of good to write and tell me, "You want really good clam chowder? Next time you're in the Republic of Botswana…"
Among the many delightful things to consume at the Beach Cafe are anything that comes with french fries. Theirs excel in quality and quantity. The pile that came with my fried shrimp contained about as many as your average McDonald's fries up in a month…and yes, I'm exaggerating for comedic effect but that's what we sometimes do here since this blog was started centuries ago. Among the leftovers I brought home, I had a helluva lot of fries.
I've tried reheating french-fried potatoes in the microwave and it leaves them as limp as…well, for some reason this morning, I can only think of dick jokes. But microwaving fries doesn't work so well.
So I tried something I'd read about on that all-seeing, all-knowing source of information (some of it even correct)…the Internet! I sprayed a non-stick skillet with canola oil and put it over medium heat. When it was medium hot, I dumped in some fries, swished them around with a spatula for five minutes and…like the proverbial Phoenix, they rose from the dead. I didn't know you could do that but now I know…and so do you.