Why You Should Think Twice Before Spiralizing Potatoes

Spiralizing vegetables has become a booming trend over recent years. Spiralized vegetables such as courgette have been rebranded as 'courgetti spaghetti' and for the carb-conscious among us, this has been an ingenious brainwave. According to The Guardian, Marks & Spencer's sales of the courgette, a kitchen tool that turns those veggies into fun noodle shapes like ribbons and curls, went up by as much as 20% once this technique became common knowledge.

It is not just courgette that can benefit from the spiralizer treatment either. Vegetables such as carrots, beetroot, turnips, cucumber, and squash can all be sliced up in this fashion, cutting down on the need to painstakingly cut your vegetables julienne style. Veggies such as carrots and cucumbers can be spiralized for salads, and others make great spaghetti or noodle alternatives like zucchini which are often called zoodles, sweet potato, and kohlrabi. These can be lightly sauteed before adding the sauce of your choice.

So, with all these alternatives, are there any vegetables that definitely shouldn't be spiralized?

While sweet potatoes make a great noodle or spaghetti alternative, white potatoes do not. Executive chef Seizan Dreux Ellis of Cafe Gratitude in Southern California tells All Recipes to "avoid veggies or fruits that are mushy or can't be eaten raw," and he specifically mentions white potatoes as they have a high possibility of breaking down when passed through a spiralizer.

So what can you do if you have your heart set on using white potatoes? In South Korea, there is a fantastic dish made with white potatoes. It's called tornado potatoes and is served as a popular street snack. Travelvui compares them to a cross between a curly fry and a potato chip. To make these delicious snacks, skewer a potato and cut it down to the skewer with a sharp knife, turning the potato and making a spiral. Then it's simply a case of being seasoned and fried, with popular flavor choices like salt or cheese.