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Comfort me with potatoes

Mashing baked potato

Seriously! The renowned American food writer and restaurant critic Ruth Reichl may have preferred apples (she wrote an engaging memoir called Comfort Me with Apples), but for me it’s all about spuds, so yes, comfort me with potatoes, please, anytime.

Jacket baked potatoes with butter
Jacket baked potatoes with butter

I eat potatoes all year round: steamed, mashed, pan-fried, sautéed, roasted … but come winter, all I want is jacket-baked potatoes, but baked just so. Yes, I’m fussy. The potatoes must be a floury type, like agria. I give them a good scrub, prick them all over with a skewer so they don’t explode as they cook (it happens, and it’s nasty), then, while they’re wet, I roll them in flaky sea salt. If the potatoes are dry the salt won’t stick. Put the salt on paper towels because if you try to apply it with your fingers, the salt will stick to your fingers and that defeats the purpose. Then they go into a hot oven, 200°C (400°F), straight onto an oven rack. I put a baking tray on the bottom of the oven because some salt will flake off and make a mess on the oven floor (a tray is easier to wipe). Most people bake their potatoes for 50-60 minutes. That’s a mistake, in my books. Sure, they’ll be tender by then, but it’s not long enough; they need 1¼ to 1½ hours. It’s the extra cooking which turns the skins into crunchy gorgeousness and concentrates the flavour of the potato pulp inside the skin by driving off moisture. There’s one more trick, and this one’s vital: once you remove the potatoes from the oven, transfer them to a wooden board (it will help keep them warm), and cut open immediately with a sharp knife. Don’t dither for even a minute, because it is at this point that it can all go drastically wrong. Once removed from the dry heat of the oven – which keeps the skins crunchy – the potatoes will continue steaming on the inside and the steam will soften the skin. Within minutes! It’s so disappointing if this happens. If you cut a potato as soon as it comes from the oven, the steam escapes and the skin stays crunchy. A joy to behold.

Mashing baked potato
Mashing baked potato

What you do with the potato/es at this point is up to you: Slather with butter; drizzle with golden olive oil; shower with grated cheese; top with an egg, poached or fried, with or without garlic or chilli butter or oil drizzled over; or add a dollop of chilli beans, a spoonful of sour cream and a smattering of chopped coriander. Then there’s bolognese sauce and parmesan. It’s worth making the sauce just for this, to nestle inside steamy, buttery jacket potatoes, instead of dressing pasta. Just about anything that goes with potatoes can be served on top or in a jacket potato. Just give it a go.

Baked potatoes with cheese
Baked potatoes with cheese or chillied egg

One great thing about jacket-baked potatoes is the little time it takes to prepare them (no more than a few minutes). Another great point is that you eat the skin – it’s the best part, and nutritious – and as the potatoes are not cooked in water, all their water-soluble vitamins, such as Vitamin C, are intact. They become a culinary force to be reckoned with: comfort food supreme, fast to prepare, they take care of themselves in the oven, they’re nutritious, tasty, crunchy and tender, filling and satisfying, versatile, too, oh, and they fill the pit of the stomach like nothing else – you know that hunger-hole you have there when you are tired, cold and nearly dropping dead from lack of sustenance – a jacket-baked potato is like swallowing a warm glow of happiness that spreads from the pit of your stomach upwards, leaving nothing but pleasure in its wake.

Jacket potato all eaten
Ooii! Don’t tell me not to eat potatoes after 6.00pm!

Read more about jacket-baked potatoes and the recipe for Baked Potatoes Stuffed with Smoked Fish & Paprika

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5 Comments

  1. Thanks so much Julie for the tip on how to keep the skins crunchy, also the advice 0n the longer cooking time, will try all this next time I have jacket potatoes. Ciao, Joan

  2. Hi Julie, just heard you on RNZ talking about these so thought I’d hunt down the reeipe as I love jacket potatoes but never cook them as they never turn out like my Mum’s did which were always just like yours appear to…. I’ve now realised I’ve not cooked them long enough or on a high enough heat.

    Just one Q – if I’m only doing one or two potatoes do I still need to keep the same cooking time? I’m assuming so but just thought I’d check before trying these.

    1. Hi Mike, yes, regardless of how many potatoes you cook, they need that temperature and that long to turn crunchy. It’s a bit of a waste to only do 2 potatoes (although I always eat at least 2!), so I bake a whole heap and the next day chop up any left over, drizzle with butter and bake on high until crunchy. They make the crunchiest golden potatoes ever!

    2. Hi Mike, I did reply but I think it went awol, so here is my reply in case you didn’t get it. Cheers
      Hi Mike, yes, regardless of how many potatoes you cook, they need that temperature and that long to turn crunchy. It’s a bit of a waste to only do 2 potatoes (although I always eat at least 2!), so I bake a whole heap and the next day chop up any left over, drizzle with butter and bake on high until crunchy. They make the crunchiest golden potatoes ever!

  3. Hi Julie, somehow I received an email from you which I think was supposed to be to Mike!!! Hate to think that Mike did not get it. Cheers Joan

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