A TikToker has made everyone reconsider a common cooking instruction they may have been doing wrong their whole life.
You’ve been desiring fries all day, but with the cost of living crisis, instead of buying or ordering some, you dig through your freezer and find an old bag of frozen fries at the bottom.
You tear open the pack, pour some potato rectangles on a baking tray—perhaps a bit extra for good measure—and place them in the oven.
Into the heating chamber they go, to become crisp, fluffy, and golden. You set an alarm on your phone to remember to ‘turn halfway through cooking,’ but the real question is: have you been interpreting this instruction correctly?
Prepare to view your oven fries in a whole new light:
TikToker Bea, who goes by @beahaving, posted a video on 14 February showing her checking on her oven fries midway through cooking.
In the video, Bea takes the fries out of the oven, laid on a baking tray, and uses her fingers to turn each fry individually.
Her caption reads: “This is the first time I considered that this isn’t what the bag means by turn halfway through cooking.”
But what exactly do the instructions mean by ‘turn halfway through cooking’?
Other TikTokers have joined Bea’s post to share their thoughts on the matter.
One user said: “I always just shook the pan around??”
Another added: “I don’t do anything it says on the bag, I just put it in the oven really high and leave it until I sense it might be ready.”
A third commented: “I got an air fryer to avoid this. Just give it an unnecessarily aggressive shake.”
Finally, a fourth user realized the true meaning of the instructions: “Wait, are we supposed to turn the tray????????”
Despite one user fairly pointing out, ‘Ok but why would it say flip instead of ‘rotate pan,’ the instructions indeed mean you should rotate the pan or tray your food is on instead of the food itself.
Why?
Because certain parts of the oven may be hotter than others. Heat sources located at the bottom in electric or gas ovens can lead to uneven heat distribution. That’s why your fries sometimes come out extra toasted on one end of the tray but look slightly undercooked towards the front.
While this tip is useful for achieving the perfect fries, users aren’t thrilled about the realization. One person said: “I’m so mad rn are you serious how did I not realise.”
Same TikToker, same.