I was in a discount shop (as usual) and saw The Joie Healthy Potato Chip Maker for £5.99. It is small and neat, all the parts fit together for storage( although I needed a little masking tape to keep them other). It has 4 pieces, a bowl, a mandolin lid, a hand protector (so you don't slice your fingers on the mandolin lid) and a
cooking rack for the microwave.The mandolin lid goes on the bowl (after removing the cooking rack) you use the hand protector with the potato to slice it into very thin slices. The hand protector prongs are slippy and did not grip the potato well, so I chopped my potato in half and the flat surface gripped the potato better. Do be careful when slicing your vegetables, I had to do it very slowly. One large potato made a lot of crisps (or chips if you live in America) and yes I did peel my potato but that's personal choice.
I put my potato slices into a larger bowl containing hot water with a little salt dissolved in it so they did not discolour, I know other people recommend adding vinegar or lemon, but my potatoes did not seem to need it.
I dried the potato slices as needed on kitchen paper and placed them into the cooking rack. My first batch did stick a little as the potato I sliced was very large so the sliced touched as they cooked, the next batch (after leaving a little time for the microwave to cool) I placed a slice every second slot on the cooking rack, these turned out really well. One tip is to turn the potato slices midway as the outside outed faster the the inside so this made them cook more evenly.
It seemed like a lot of work but as the crisps were fat free and once sliced it only a case of turning on the microwave between doing other things, it was not so bad. Do you good firm potatoes, the not old potatoes you want to use up as the taste really does depend on the quality of your potato. For flavouring I use a little salt and herbs. It is up to you but I think they do need some sort of flavour.I really like this product and need to experiment and see if it will work with other vegetables.
