eli5: why is potato chips so high in calories but potatoes are relatively low?

Question

eli5: why is potato chips so high in calories but potatoes are relatively low?

In: Other

Answer 1

Most raw ingredients are mostly water. In a hundred grams of potatoes there are about 78 grams of water and about 20 grams of carbs. Because frying takes almost all the water out of the original potato and adds some fat so what’s left is basically pure carbs, fat, and salt.

So 100 grams of chips is 250 g of potato then frying out almost 200 g of water and replacing it with 40 g of oil.