# Dressing up a baked potato



## larry_stewart (Oct 22, 2011)

Whats everyones favorite way to dress up a boring baked potato ?

butter
sour cream and chives
Broccoli and cheddar cheese
chili 

...


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## Aunt Bea (Oct 22, 2011)

I use butter, salt, pepper and Marie's Blue Cheese dressing.


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## Caslon (Oct 22, 2011)

My bro made a big baker last night with the fixins you mentioned, but he was pissed at himself because he forgot to buy some bacon bits at the store.


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## bakechef (Oct 22, 2011)

Bacon, cheese, sour cream and butter!

My best friend likes chili.  She worked in a food court restaurant called "One Potato Two" when she was in high school and that's how she came to like chili on her potato.


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## 4meandthem (Oct 23, 2011)

I like them well fluffed and well done with butter and salt. a little more when they are empty to polish off the skins.


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## Timothy (Oct 23, 2011)

Aunt Bea said:


> I use butter, salt, pepper and Marie's Blue Cheese dressing.


 
Aunt Bea, you always have such neat ideas. In all my life, I've never tried Blue Cheese on a spud. I love spuds, I love Blue Cheese...just never thought to combine them.

I'm trying it!


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## jabbur (Oct 23, 2011)

Is there a bad way to have a potato?  Some days I'm in the mood for simple butter and seasoned salt.  Sometimes add pepper.  Sour cream, cheddar cheese, chili, bacon, broccoli, chives, garlic salt, ranch dressing all have found their way onto a spud in my house.


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## purple.alien.giraffe (Oct 23, 2011)

Timothy said:
			
		

> Aunt Bea, you always have such neat ideas. In all my life, I've never tried Blue Cheese on a spud. I love spuds, I love Blue Cheese...just never thought to combine them.
> 
> I'm trying it!



Blue cheese on a baked potato is fantastic. You can mash it into a little sour cream or just mash it right into the potato.

I love to drizzle a baked spud with browned garlic butter and sprinkle on some chives. A drizzle of bacon grease mixed into cream cheese and some fresh crumbled bacon is good. Shredded cheddar is pretty tastey on spuds, especially with a little sauteed celery and onion. Crumbled italian sausage, fresh basil and a little parmesian are good mashed into the potato too. I'm also a fan of just a little butter and salt with maybe either some chives or parsley.


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## babetoo (Oct 24, 2011)

i like a couple of big spoonfuls of chili and then cheese on baked potato. makes a meal. nothing else is necessary, well maybe a green salad


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## Bolas De Fraile (Oct 24, 2011)

I grew a type of spud just for baking this year. I subbed it for the biscuits in biscuits and gravy.


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## CWS4322 (Oct 24, 2011)

A friend of mine does this: she scoops out the potato, mashes the filling with cheese and cooked, crumbled sausage, and then puts it back in the skin OR makes mounds of the potato filling on a greased baking sheet and bakes the "mounds" for about 10 minutes, I don't know at what temp--probably 350. When she does that, she adds the chopped up skin to the mashed up filling. I love these. I don't remember what she calls them, but they are very good, almost like a biscuit.


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## pacanis (Oct 24, 2011)

That sounds very similar to a twice baked potato, CW. You take the potato meat out, mash it up with other ingredients, put it back in and bake a while longer. The crumbled sausage sounds great for this.

My baked potatoes have butter, sour cream and S&P on them 99% of the time. And are cooked on the grill. I've eaten loaded baked potatoes and liked them, but I prefer my spuds pretty basic.


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## CWS4322 (Oct 24, 2011)

Yes--it is a variation of a 2x baked potato--except when she makes "mounds" of them on the cookie sheet. Those are almost like a biscuit.


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## pacanis (Oct 24, 2011)

I've got some rope sausage to cut and freeze in portions. I'm going to cut some apart and make a sausage stuffed twiced baked tater. As soon as I get some big taters worthy enough.


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## Aunt Bea (Oct 24, 2011)

Twice baked potatoes are fantastic.

 I like them with pizza ingredients, pimento cheese or leftover dips. 

They are a great musgo concoction!


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## betterthanabox (Oct 24, 2011)

I really like to bake them until the skins are nice and crispy, and the insides are nice and fluffy. Then I place some butter on them, and top with some shredded cheddar. I also sometimes like butter and sour cream or blue cheese. Bacon is always a nice addition as well.


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## CWS4322 (Oct 24, 2011)

pac--sometimes she adds roasted garlic when she mashes up the insides or makes "the mounds." I usually do cheese, butter, a bit of milk, and roasted garlic when I make 2x baked potatoes because I do them on impulse, and don't usually have the sausage on hand.


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## pacanis (Oct 24, 2011)

mmmm roasted garlic...


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## no mayonnaise (Oct 24, 2011)

Chopped BBQ tossed with lotsa sauce!


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## Fabiabi (Oct 24, 2011)

I had a potato this evening, it's the first one i've had in ages. I had mine with camembert cheese. So good when it melts over the potato


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## MountainMath (Oct 24, 2011)

Fat free sour cream


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## vitauta (Oct 24, 2011)

a baked potato is like a blank slate.  you can go from minimalist (salt & pepper), to hog wild elaborate, building an entire meal atop your spud.  my last baked potato was heaped with garlicky, buttery bella mushrooms. (that was yesterday)  i also like them with hummus and scallions.  but the possibilities are endless, really....


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## quelle4 (Dec 15, 2011)

My favorite thing to serve in a bake potato is a cold shrimp salad (skagen salad) http://www.christonium.com/culinaryreview/seafood-salad-shrimp-smoked-salmon-crab-skagen
This might seem a bit weird for those who usually think of broccoli and cheese, but is very common to do in Sweden and it's delicious! Another nice option is cold chicken curry salad in baked potato.


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## Addie (Dec 15, 2011)

At one of our tourist traps, Fanuiel Hall, there is a seller there that sells only baked potatoes with trimmings of your choice. I always stop there when I am in town. And I hate baked potatoes that have been wrapped in foil. That makes the potato steamed, not baked. This guy knows that and bakes sans foil. Nice crispy skin that has been oiled and pierced with a fork. He uses a Granny fork that has three times. I have two of those forks and love them.


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## Barbara L (Dec 15, 2011)

I sometimes enjoy more toppings on my baked potato (like the Loaded Baked Potato at O'Charley's), but my favorite baked potato is a Russet--scrubbed, pierced, and baked (not wrapped in foil) until the skin is slightly tough and the inside is buttery smooth, and topped with a generous amount of sour cream, chives (or the green part of a green onion), a dash of salt, and some freshly ground black pepper.


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## babetoo (Dec 16, 2011)

since it would take me forever to eat a bag of potatoes, i buy the single ones wrapped in heavy plastic. microwave them in wrapping. real butter, sour cream, chives and bacon bits. once in a while sprinkled with cheddar. a meal in it's self.


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## Timothy (Dec 16, 2011)

Barbara L said:


> I sometimes enjoy more toppings on my baked potato (like the Loaded Baked Potato at O'Charley's), but my favorite baked potato is a Russet--scrubbed, pierced, and baked (not wrapped in foil) until the skin is slightly tough and the inside is buttery smooth, and topped with a generous amount of sour cream, chives (or the green part of a green onion), a dash of salt, and some freshly ground black pepper.


 
I love the taste of baked potato, butter and sour cream so much that I'm almost up to equal parts of sour cream to potato.


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## Barbara L (Dec 16, 2011)

Timothy said:


> I love the taste of baked potato, butter and sour cream so much that I'm almost up to equal parts of sour cream to potato.


Me too! I have joked on here that unlike the Daisy Sour Cream commercial, where they say, "Do a dollop of Daisy," I do a wallop!


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## Timothy (Dec 16, 2011)

Barbara L said:


> Me too! I have joked on here that unlike the Daisy Sour Cream commercial, where they say, "Do a dollop of Daisy," I do a wallop!


Potato, butter, sour cream and pepper make a fantastic flavor combination. I can make a meal of that alone. I also love to mix in some hot sausage crumbles. Maybe even add some broccoli and cheddar to it and make a meal of it all.


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## buckytom (Dec 16, 2011)

my wife introduced me to the technique of baking potatoes on the bottom of the oven. actually on the floor of the oven, just opposite the broiler burners. i think her mom used to do that many years ago when they had a wood stove.

this makes a nice crispy skin, even a bit of a charred spot or two.

my first choice would be to split open and add sour cream mixed with fresh garlic chives.

another fave is to simply slice into chunks so each piece has a bit of skin, and then sprinkle with seasoned salt.

finally, i like what i call a "french dipped" baked spud. that is to split open and smear with butter, sprinkle with a lot of black pepper, then drizzle in some hot beef stock and drippings, or au jus, mashing it into the flesh.


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## Bolas De Fraile (Dec 16, 2011)

Bake a large spud, split in half, scoop out and quickly fork mash with dill, pickled herring chunks, put back in the skin and blob with sour cream and chives


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## Greg Who Cooks (Dec 20, 2011)

Rather than posting my own recipes I'd rather refer everybody to the website that I got my original inspiration from:

Twice Cooked Potatoes on Simply Recipes

Also see Emeril Lagasse's recipe as presented on ABC's Good Morning America, recipe for:

Twice Baked Potato Casserole

And finally, get _Joy of Cooking_ (cookbook) by Rombauer and Becker, and look up their Cheddar Stuffed Potatoes. (no link, it's a cookbook)

Anybody who doesn't own _Joy of Cooking_ should buy themselves a copy for Christmas.  It's a classic, a reference people like us used before there was any Internet.


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## lifesaver (Dec 20, 2011)

I don't care for twice baked potatoes. I prefer my potato freshly wrapped in foil and baked in the oven until fork tender. A couple dabs of butter with sea salt and pepper. Yum!!!


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## Caslon (Dec 21, 2011)

I know a nail in a potato makes it cook faster. I shove in one or two long meat skewers and then set it on a square brownie pan .  I put a bit of foil down on it for any moisture drippings , easy cleanup. The meat skewers aren't thick enough tho.

I like how the skewers have a round end handle to yank them outta the potato afterwards.

I'd like to insert something  thicker, something like knitting needle or big nail sized (with a yank out handle) to conduct the heat to the potato. Knitting needles are coated in plastic I believe.  Something that size and length I would gladly order on the net, if I could find it.

I might have to shop stainless steel construction items.


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## Addie (Dec 21, 2011)

Caslon said:


> I know a nail in a potato makes it cook faster. I shove in one or two long meat skewers and then set it on a square brownie pan . I put a bit of foil down on it for any moisture drippings , easy cleanup. The meat skewers aren't thick enough tho.
> 
> I like how the skewers have a round end handle to yank them outta the potato afterwards.
> 
> ...


 
Try starting your potatoes in the micro and finish it in the oven to crisp up the skin. Works for me.


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## taxlady (Dec 21, 2011)

Caslon said:


> I know a nail in a potato makes it cook faster. I shove in one or two long meat skewers and then set it on a square brownie pan .  I put a bit of foil down on it for any moisture drippings , easy cleanup. The meat skewers aren't thick enough tho.
> 
> I like how the skewers have a round end handle to yank them outta the potato afterwards.
> 
> ...



KitchenCraft Baking Rack Oven potato baking spike bake spuds evenly and efficiently 4 folds flat storage Kitchen







I found it by googling "potato baking rack".


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## Greg Who Cooks (Dec 21, 2011)

Addie said:


> Try starting your potatoes in the micro and finish it in the oven to crisp up the skin. Works for me.



I do the same thing. I poke the potato with a fork several times so that the steam generated by the microwave heating has a way to escape.

Microwave pre-heating avoids the initial stage where the oven is warm but the potato is cold, by bringing the potato up to nearer the oven temperature. I try to do most of the cooking after it's in the oven.


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## Dawgluver (Dec 21, 2011)

We had a potato bar lunch at work.  The colleague in charge of baking the spuds smeared the skins with butter before baking, and the jackets came out nice and crispy.


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## Aunt Bea (Dec 21, 2011)

Dawgluver said:


> We had a potato bar lunch at work. The colleague in charge of baking the spuds smeared the skins with butter before baking, and the jackets came out nice and crispy.


 

I do that sometines and then sprinkle the skins heavily with salt before I put them in the oven.  The salt sticks to the skin and it becomes the best part of the potato.


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## Timothy (Dec 21, 2011)

I love cooked potato skins. Having a bit of skin with each bite is a must for me.


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## Dawgluver (Dec 21, 2011)

Aunt Bea said:
			
		

> I do that sometines and then sprinkle the skins heavily with salt before I put them in the oven.  The salt sticks to the skin and it becomes the best part of the potato.



Yes!  She salted them too.


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## Addie (Dec 21, 2011)

Dawgluver said:


> Yes! She salted them too.


 
With sea salt of course.


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## joesfolk (Dec 21, 2011)

I'm not sure if this qualifies but my favorite way to dress up a baked potatoe is to bake it till the outside is crunchy then scoop out the innards and give them to DH.  Then I slather the skins with butter, salt and pepper and gorge.  They are one of my very favorite comfort foods.  Unfortuately I only get them once or twice a year...not sure why.


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## Sir_Loin_of_Beef (Dec 21, 2011)

I can think of several different ways to dress up a baked potato:


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## Aunt Bea (Dec 21, 2011)

That reminds me of the Mr. Potato Head I got for Christmas one year.

Kids sure used to be stupid!

Now it is all expensive electronics.


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## Sir_Loin_of_Beef (Dec 22, 2011)

*Spud, I am your father!*


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## Timothy (Dec 22, 2011)

Sir_Loin_of_Beef said:


> *Spud, I am your father!*


 
Now THAT'S funny!


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