Description
Who cares to buy vegan chips from the store when you can make them at home with your favorite green and root vegetables. There are endless options in veggies, and you can opt for homemade veggie chips.
After so many failed attempts at making the perfect crispy and crunchy chips from vegetables, I mastered the art of making a variety of them at home. Some steps that you need to consider while making chips. Honestly, I was in favor of buying the chips from the store and always thought, “Why to make chips at home with cutting, slicing, baking, and flipping in between when you can buy them at stores?”. It all changed on a random Saturday when I went to the supermarket and wanted to buy some vegetarian chips and got the bag filled with 80% air, followed by traces of chips for 9$. To that day, I experimented with my favorite veggies and made homemade chips that were worth all my efforts. I will guide you through all the mistakes that I made in the past that yielded damp and drenched chips. I will share the success tips of these perfect crisp chips.
There are two types of chips that you can make out of vegetables: One is made with root vegetables and the other from greens. They are both so yummy and delicious.
Ingredients
- 1 yam, thinly sliced
- 1 beetroot, thinly sliced
- 1 carrot, Thinly sliced
- 1sweet potato, thinly sliced
- 2 tablespoons Olive oil
Instructions
First Batch of Sweet Potatoes and Yam
- Slice the Veggies: Wash and peel sweet potatoes and yams with a peeler. Slice these veggies into thin slices with a mandoline or a food processor. Soak the yams and sweet potatoes in water for 10-20 minutes to help them release starch into water.
- Rinse and Pat Dry: Rinse the sweet potatoes and yam. Pat the soaked veggies dry with the help of a kitchen towel.
- Season: Season the sliced veggies with olive oil and salt. Stir them until they are fully coated.
- Arrange on Rack and Bake: Arrange them in a single layer on a cooling rack lined with parchment paper. Make sure no slices overlap and touch each other smoothly and evenly. Bake at 200F for 30 minutes, and enjoy.
2nd Batch of Carrots and Beets
- Slice the Beets and Carrots: Wash and peel the beets and carrots with a peeler. Slice them into thin slices with a mandoline or food processor.
- Pat them dry: Arrange the beets and carrots on kitchen paper and pat them dry until most of the moisture is absorbed.
- Season: Season the sliced veggies with olive oil and salt. Stir them until they are fully coated.
- Arrange on Rack: Arrange them in a single layer on a cooling rack lined with parchment paper. Make sure no slices overlap and touch each other smoothly and evenly during baking.
- Bake: Bake at 200F for 30 minutes, then increase the temperature to 220F and bake for another 30 minutes and enjoy.
Notes
- Starch in Potatoes and Sweet Potatoes: Almost all the root vegetables have starch in them because they are the source of starch for the whole plant. The amylose and amylopectin in starch hold the moisture content. As long as the vegetable has a lot of starch, we will not get rid of moisture, and it will not produce a crispy texture. Our main purpose is to remove most of the starch from sweet potatoes, potatoes, yam, taro, or any starchy root vegetable. I usually soak the starchy vegetable slices in water for 15-20 minutes. Soaking this long makes the water cloudy or milky because the starch dissolves in water.
- You Can Slice with a Food Processor: A food processor can slice vegetables. Just attach the slicing attachment to the food processor and make slices in no time. It is not just the food processor; your cutting skills can also help you slice them over the cutting board (in case you are confident in your ninja cutting skills).
- The Thinner, The Crispier: The thinner the slices, the crispier the chips will be. The slices should be between 1.6 mm (1/16 inch) and 3mm (1/8 inch) thick. The ideal thickness is 1/16 inch.
- Use a rack with parchment paper. I would not recommend using foil or waxed surfaces such as baking sheets; they trap water, and veggies steam rather than crisp up.
- Arrange the veggie slices in a single layer without crowding them. Crowding and overlapping the chips will result in more vapours surrounding them so that they will steam rather than crisp up. If necessary, bake them in batches for the perfect crispy chips.
- I separate the beets and carrots because they are not soaked like potatoes and yams. Moreover, I make them in separate batches and handle them separately because beets stain a lot, and you don’t want to stain your kitchen towel.
- Use Different Seasonings: You can use your favorite seasonings like pepper, paprika, dried oregano, or garlic powder for the flavor.
- Cool the chips before serving because the air helps them lose their remaining moisture and makes them even crispier.
- Prep Time: 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 30 minutes
- Category: Snacks
- Cuisine: American