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McDonald’s French Fries – Copycat Recipe

Learn how to make McDonald’s classic French Fry recipe at home! (And exactly how the restaurant does it!) These fries are golden and crispy on the outside, and soft on the inside! 

There are few secret steps to this recipe: Learn how and why you soak French Fries in a cold brine of sugar water before you double fry them.

A plate of golden french fries on a white plate with a bowl of ketchup for dipping.

You might wonder why anyone would want to go through the trouble of making McDonald’s beloved French Fry recipe at home, which you can just buy some from the dollar menu.

Well, believe it or not, there are 19 ingredients in McDonald’s french fry recipe. One of which is a silicone component used to make silly putty.

(I know. I want my brain to forget that fact too.) 😑

It certainly makes a good argument for making their beloved french fries at home, doesn’t it?

But first, let’s learn a little more about what goes into their process:

What Kind of Potatoes Does McDonald’s Use For French Fries?

McDonald’s uses a variety of non-GMO Russet potatoes, (Ranger Russet, Umatilla Russet, & Russet Burbank) along with Shepody potatoes to make their French Fries.

What Kind of Oil Do They Use?

McDonald’s uses 4 different kinds of oil to make their French Fries: Soybean, hydrogenated soybean, canola and corn.

For this homemade version, we will use vegetable and/or canola oil for the first round of frying. Then we’ll add some vegetable shortening to the mix for the second round of frying.

How McDonald’s Makes Their French Fries

  1. The potatoes are washed and peeled by machines.
  2. Workers hand-cut any imperfections off the potatoes.
  3. The fries shoot through a tube at about 75 MPH through cutting machines.
  4. Optical strips look at every single fry and remove any with a fault.
  5. They are blanched in precisely maintained 170° water for about 15 minutes to allow for a soft interior.
  6. The fries are completely dried.
  7. They are then quickly fried for the 1st time at 400° F.
  8. From here, they go into a freezer at 10°F.
  9. Once frozen, they are shipped to restaurants.
  10. Once at the restaurant, they are fried for a second time, salted, and served.

Fun Fact: McDonald’s goes through 3.5 billion pounds of French Fries every year globally.

To see a video of this process, check out this 2-minute video.


How to Make McDonald’s French Fries at Home:

We don’t have quite the technology that McDonald’s has with its fancy machines, but if you’d like to save time, I recommend this french fry cutter. Of course, you can always just use a knife.

Note: See the recipe card at the bottom of this post for full ingredient amounts.

Create a brine using a combination of cold water, corn syrup, salt, and white vinegar. 

Slice the potatoes into strings just under 1/2 inch thick. Drop into the brine.

A peeled russet potato being cut into shoe strings on a white cutting board with a knife to make french fries.

Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours or as long as overnight.

Drain, rise twice with cold water, then pat them completely dry.

A pot with uncooked french fries soaking in a brine before being dried to make french fries.

Fry in batches at 300°F for about 5 minutes. Remove and set aside on a paper towel.

They will be very soft. (This is a good thing.)

French fries in a dutch oven being fried at 300 degrees and then lifted from the oil with a slotted spoon.

Add vegetable shortening to the oil. Increase heat to 400°F and fry again until the fries are crisp and golden brown. Remove and let drain on paper towels. 

Season immediately with salt and serve!

French fries being fried in a dutch oven until golden and crispy.

Why Soak the Potatoes in a Cold Brine?

Soaking potatoes in cold water helps get rid of the starch, which makes them crispier. The sugar in the brine prevents them from soaking up too much oil when fried, which also makes them crisp.

Soak them for at least 2 hours, or as long as overnight. The longer you can soak them, the better. Store them in the fridge while they soak.


Why Double Fry French Fries?

Frying potatoes twice is the best way to obtain the crispiest result.

The first round of frying cooks and softens the middle of the potato, while the second round crisps up the outside.


How To Store and Reheat Leftovers

Refrigerating:

  • Let any leftover fries cool completely and store them in a Freezer bag in the fridge, removing as much air from the bag as possible.
  • To reheat, bake at 350° F for  about 10 minutes. They reheat very well.

Freezing:

  • Flash freeze them on a baking sheet or plate until solid, 1 hour or so.
  • Store them in a freezer Ziploc bag in the freezer until ready to eat!
  • Reheat in a preheated 350° F oven until warm and crisp, about 15 minutes or so.

Make-Ahead Method

  • Soak the fries as instructed, dry them completely. Fry them in batches at 360° for 5 minutes. Place on a paper towel.
  • Transfer to a plate/tray and flash freeze them for 40 minutes.
  • Transfer to them to a freezer bag and freeze them for up to 3 months.
  • When ready to serve, remove them from the freezer and fry them in batches at 400° until golden brown, about 5 minutes.
  • Transfer to paper towels and season them immediately with salt.

Tools for Making McDonald’s French Fries

(Amazon affiliate links)- Check out all of my kitchen essentials here.

Copycat McDonald's French Fries on a white plate with ketchup.

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A white plate full of homemade McDonald's French Fries and kechup.

McDonald's French Fries - Copycat Recipe

5 from 6 ratings
Learn how to make McDonald's classic French Fry recipe at home! (And exactly how the restaurant does it!) These fries are golden and crispy on the outside, and soft on the inside!

Ingredients

Brine

  • 8 cups cold water
  • ½ cup corn syrup, (can sub 1/3 cup sugar)
  • 3 tablespoons salt
  • 1 teaspoon white vinegar

Fries

  • 6 large Russet potatoes, About 4.5 pounds
  • 1 quart vegetable oil
  • ½ cup vegetable shortening
  • Salt, for seasoning

Instructions

  • Combine the brine ingredients and set aside.
  • Peel and rinse that potatoes.
  • Slice them into strings just under ½ inch. (A french fry potato cutter makes this easy.)
  • Place them in the cold brine as you slice them. Ensure the potatoes are completely submerged. Add more cold water if needed.
  • Cover and place the brine in the fridge for 2 hours or overnight.
  • Drain and rinse them twice with cold water. Pat them completely dry.
  • Preheat oil to 300 degrees. (A dutch oven and oil thermometer is very helpful.)
  • Fry the potatoes in batches for about 5 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon and place on a paper towels. They will be very soft. (This is a good thing.)
  • Add the vegetable shortening and increase the heat to 400 degrees. Fry in batches again until golden brown. (It’s hard to be patient during this part.)
  • Remove and place on paper towels. Season with salt right away and serve!

Notes

How To Store and Reheat Leftovers

Refrigerating:
  • Let any leftover fries cool completely and store them in a Freezer bag in the fridge, removing as much air from the bag as possible.
  • To reheat, bake at 350° F for  about 10 minutes. They reheat very well.
Freezing:
  • Flash freeze them on a baking sheet or plate until solid, 1 hour or so.
  • Store them in a freezer Ziploc bag in the freezer until ready to eat!
  • Reheat in a preheated 350° F oven until warm and crisp, about 15 minutes or so.

Make-Ahead Method

  • Soak the fries as instructed, dry them completely. Fry them in batches at 360° for 5 minutes. Place on a paper towel.
  • Transfer to a plate/tray and flash freeze them for 40 minutes.
  • Transfer to them to a freezer bag and freeze them for up to 3 months.
  • When ready to serve, remove them from the freezer and fry them in batches at 400° until golden brown, about 5 minutes.
  • Transfer to paper towels and season them immediately with salt.

Be sure to try my French Fry Seasoning Recipe next!

Nutrition

Calories: 379kcal, Carbohydrates: 58g, Protein: 7g, Fat: 15g, Saturated Fat: 10g, Sodium: 452mg, Potassium: 1332mg, Fiber: 4g, Sugar: 2g, Vitamin C: 18mg, Calcium: 42mg, Iron: 3mg
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53 comments on “McDonald’s French Fries – Copycat Recipe”

  1. Well they may not taste exactly like McD’s fries but this recipe sure does make a great tasting french fry!

  2. The actual McDonald’s method:

    Before 1990, McDonald’s used to cook the fries in beef tallow. That added a huge amount of flavor, but their method is what
    made the fries so incredible. If you can find a good source for beef tallow, go for it, but you’re probably going to be stuck with regular vegtable oil which works ok, it’s just not as tasty.

    This is the original McDonald’s fries method. I know – I worked there in the 60s-70s and made the fries like this:

    1. Slice the potatoes, skins on, into fries approx 1/4″ square.
    2. Thoroughly wash and then rinse the sliced potatoes to remove excess starch, and allow to drip dry in baskets for at least 1/2 hour.
    3. Blanche the potatoes by frying in hot oil at 325 for approx. 10 minutes. The fries are blanched when you can
    raise them out of the oil and test the surface of a fry with your fingertip scritch scritch scritch. If they’re slightly rough to the
    feel with little bumps, they’re blanched. Remove from oil and hang to drain and cool.
    4. When ready to final-fry, heat oil to 375 and drop the blanched fries. Don’t put in too much as it will drop the oil temp too far but
    if you’re careful and monitor your oil temp, keeping close to 375 you’ll be fine.

    Once they’re nicely browned, about 3-1/2 minutes later, remove from the oil and hang to drain and cool slightly.

    When drained, spread out on a sheet pan and add salt and mix. They’re ready to serve.

  3. Have you tried air frying this recipe with success? 

  4. Hi, I used to work at McDonalds as a way to pay for college. You left out an important ingredient. Before we fried the fires we would lightly coat them in sugar, and then drop them into the grease. Then when they were fried to perfection we would pull them out of the grease and sprinkle salt on them. The sugar is the key ingredient that sets McDonalds fries a part from other fast food restaurants.

    • Hi Jacqueline! I actually do have sugar in the brine that is used in this recipe. (1/2 corn syrup, which can be replaced with 1/3 cup sugar).

    • I’m really curious– how long ago was that? I worked at McDonald’s recently, and we did not do this. We just had frozen fries that went into the fryer. Did you work manufacturing the fries before they were sent to individual locations? Or did you work at a time/place where the fries were made in-store?

    • I tired Sugar Coating on fries. It got Caramelized in Hot Oil

  5. The key step is drying the potatoes. McDonald’s was in San Bernardino which is dry desert air, and the potatoes lost moisture, giving them a unique texture. Ray Kroc was careful to make that dehydration a key part of the potato prep later. I haven’t seen a recipe yet that compensates for the effects of the sun and dry air of SoCal. 

    • Very interesting about Ray Kroc! I agree completely, it’s all about getting the moisture out of the potatoes and getting rid of as much starch as possible.

  6. The McDonald’s french fries have a beef extract on their fries. They have had it since since 1992 when they switched from beef tallow to vegetable oils.
    I suggest everyone to fry their French Fries in either Beef Tallow or good old fashioned Lard. That will give the fries the taste of good old fashioned McDonald’s Pre-1992 French Fries.

  7. The small little town I live in makes the McDonald’s fries the McCains french fry factory makes them and let me tell you the whole town smells exactly like McDonald’s french fries during the McDonald’s run omg talk about making you crave them all the time when they are making those fries lol they buy their potatoes from all the local farmers in the area also now to bad they couldn’t sell the McDonald’s fries right out of the factory like they do with their McCains french fries life would be complete then

  8. You mention McDonald’s blanches in water and then they are fried shipped and fried again at destination. No brine mentioned for McDonald’s in the steps listed. For your recipe you brine , no blanche then fry twice.   So McDonald’s blanches in water , you don’t have that step?  So does the brine you do replace the water blanching? I’m a little confused on the difference in the process  

    • Hi Trich! You’re right, my process doesn’t involve blanching the fries in water because the water bath has to be precisely maintained at 170 degrees for that to work, and there isn’t a simple way of doing this at home, (although a sous vide supreme would make it doable, I imagine that most people don’t have that device). So we implement the bringing step for extra crispy fries, and stick with the double-fry method which ensures a soft interior and crispy exterior! 🙂

  9. I brought one cup of sugar , one cup of corn syrup in 2 cups of water and brought to a boil. Then added the cut fries and brought to a boil again and shut off. Left to soften and adsorb the sugar(s) for about 45 minutes. Then spread out on paper towel and pat dry. Then let sit in the freezer overnight. ( Minimum 4 hrs ) before deep frying once at 350* and pat dry and froze for later. Second deep fry at 300*. Enjoy. 

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