*UPDATED*
We’ve been eating more meatless dishes lately. It’s been good, and I’m surprised at how full I feel after eating a plate of veggies and quinoa or a bowl of mellon! 🙂 I don’t see a strictly vegitarian lifestyle in my future by any means, BUT it’s nice to “lighten up” a little bit.
Anyway, the other day Stuart had mentioned having baked potatoes for dinner, and I didn’t have any ‘taters worth baking. Just a couple small stubby ones in the pantry. So when I went shopping on Sunday I snagged a few of those large baking potatoes. Ya know, the ones that aren’t in a bag and are about 3x’s the size of a “regular” potato.
Anyway, after I got home I scoured the web for some “perfect” baked potato recipes because, quite honestly, I don’t really like the ones that I had been making in the microwave (which I like to use as little as possible) or even baked in foil in the oven. They just weren’t so yummy.
BUT…
I found THIS post about it, and took the advice from this blogger on how to make the PERFECT baked potato and let me tell you, my life will never be the same!
These were A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!!! I ate every bit, skin and all and it was SO good! Stuart even commented on how good the skin was! And I used to just throw the skin away before!! Go figure! The kids all ate theirs as well though they were skeptical at first. 😉
The key is the olive oil and salt! You can click the link to the post I read if you want to see photos, but here’s what you do.
WASH your taters really well, because you will want to eat the skin!
Pierce skin several times with a fork on both sides.
Drizzle olive oil on taters. I rubbed it all over them with my hands.
Sprinkle coarse salt on top. I used my sea salt grinder, but kosher salt will work too!
Set taters directly on oven rack UNWRAPPED (don’t use foil!!) but do use a pan under them to catch drips. 🙂
Bake in 400* oven for an hour. I baked ours for slightly longer because we were waiting for Stu to come home. Didn’t hurt them.
The skin will be crispy and yummy and the insides will be fluffy and deliciously light! You’ve got to try this!
I topped mine with butter, salt and pepper. The kids got cheese, and Stu added cheese and sour cream, oh and ham. 😉 I guess I should get some bacon bits before next time!
The biggest drawback to these taters was having the oven so hot for so long. It’s not so nice in the summer time. But I will be baking these things again, you can count on that! So long microwaved and foil wrapped lesser spuds!
*UPDATE NOTE* Don’t forget to poke your taters with a fork a few times on each side before baking. That is, of course, unless you want the inside of your oven covered with exploded potato. 😉