Twice-Baked Puhdadoes

This is a fantastic Friday-night (or Monday-night) comfort food meal for the middle of winter (sorry in advance for the dark photos), mostly because it’s super-quick, super-good, and full of starchy goodness.  It’s also super easy, though we made ours a team effort.

Cait grated the cheese.

I cut the tomatoes.

Even Ruby helped.  Mostly by sitting in the middle of the floor.

So get yourself some potatoes.  You want these to have a decent skin on them, like jacket potatoes, or russets.  Give them a good scrub.

You can pre-cook them a bit first in the microwave if you wish.  Just make sure to poke some holes in them first.

Pop the in the oven (no pan is necessary) at about 400°F and cook them for a long time, until the skins are slightly wrinkled and crisp, about 45 minutes to an hour.  You can tell if the potatoes are ready by sticking a fork into the potato and waggling it back and forth.  If you don’t encounter much resistance, they’re defeated done.  Take the potatoes out of the oven but leave the oven on.

Slice the potatoes open on one side in a large X pattern.

Use a spoon to scoop the cooked potato into a large bowl.

Grab yourself an electric mixer (because it’s late and you’re lazy).  If you must, climb up on the counter to reach your tallest cabinet.

Start mixing the potatoes with enough milk and butter to satisfy you, then add more grated cheese than you really think is appropriate.  We also chucked in diced tomatoes, for colour and vitamins.

Then of course we added bacon.

Spoon this magic mixture back into your potatoes.  They will be rather overstuffed at this point but that is very much okay.

Place them on a pan and bake them again until the mixture is crusty and golden on top, about 15 minutes.

Garnish with a dollop of sour cream and a sprinkle of chives.  They are good cold and also reheated the next day, so I hear.

We had our potatoes with rectangular chocolate cake and a good evening was had by all.