Baked: Baked Potato. (what's the secret) (WENDY'S has the best ones, I want the same at home)
Subject: Baked Potato. (what's the secret) (WENDY'S has the best ones, I want the same at home)
Newsgroups: rec.food.cooking
From: JP (jpimages at hotmail.com)
Date: Tue, 11 Jan 2000 14:50:50 GMT
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I love baked potato's that I have gotten from Wendy's and yet for some reason I can't seem to get it quite like them.
The skins come out so damn tough & hard. At time impossible to cut, a crunchy texture. Some may like that I hate it.
Now Wendy's has got it right. Anyone know what they do??? Or how I can do the same.
Thanks
From: sue at flesch.org (Sue Flesch)
Date: Tue, 11 Jan 2000 19:24:07 GMT
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Some people bake them wrapped in tinfoil for most of the cooking time so they steam, just removing the foil for the final ten minutes to dry the outside skin a little.
From: Alan Boles (hahabogus at hotmail.com)
Date: Tue, 11 Jan 2000 21:06:50 GMT
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Wash your tator. Rub it with a little cooking oil (olive, peanut or canola).
Chuck it in an oven at 375F to 400F for 45 minutes.
Test the potato, lightly squeeze it if it feels soft and crispy it is done.
If not test again in 15 minutes. Oh dry the tator before rubbing in oil.
Baked potatoes make the best potato salad. IMHO.
The crispy tator skins (by themselves) are nice sprinkled with a little salt and some grated cheese melted on them.
From: Steve Boyer (thedogman at ibm.net)
Date: Tue, 11 Jan 2000 15:42:04 -0800
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Speaking of potato salad, Alan, or anyone else... do you have a "close to exact" cooking time for perfect texture taters for the salad? I am tired of constantly looking, testing, looking, testing,looking, testing... leaving them to cool on their own or dousing(sp) in ice water.
I'm guessing this might be a long thread.
From: Alan Boles (hahabogus at hotmail.com)
Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2000 01:24:58 GMT
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I usually bake a mess of tatters at about 400F for an hour or so. Check how they feel. If they feel softish and I hear a crunching sound like sound made by balling up a sheet of paper <kinda a rustling noise> they are done.
Oh I wash and oil the tatters first as well as sticking a few holes in them with a fork <stops them blowing up> messy and hard to clean-up
I then while they're hot ; aided with a tea towel, knife and teaspoon; cut them in half <lengthways> and scoop out balls of cooked tatter with the spoon.
These misshapen balls I put in a bowl and allow to cool.
I save the skins for Tatter skin snack. slice skins up to bite size
sprinkle spices of choice and some grated cheese heat in oven to melt cheese. <kinda like nachos>.
I then make tatter salad out of them.
If a ball seems to large I cut it up.
You can make it as chunky as you like.
I add chopped hard boiled eggs green pepper celery white onions and Mayo <Hellmann's>.
And sometimes thinly sliced radish as well as a very thinly chopped Jalapeno or two.
If using the hot peppers I like the salad to sit a longish time <like overnight> to marry the flavours. Adds a nice zing.
Usually I keep out some of the cooked egg yolks as too many turns the salad yellow.
Those I use in making devilled eggs for same meal or next day.
I have always used day old boiled potatoes for my salad until recently reading a thread at this NG about this.
Seems to taste better. I guess the tatter flesh is slightly dried and flakier by baking which makes IMHO a better salad.
From: Alan Boles (hahabogus at hotmail.com)
Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2000 01:24:57 GMT
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If you want a soft skin wrap in foil. But this is like a steamed tatter not baked. Also using a microwave would do the same. To me a baked tatter must have a crisp skin.
From: jp (koooba) (spammers at get-A-REAL-job.com)
Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2000 00:25:23 GMT
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Steve Boyer wrote:
> Speaking of potato salad, Alan, or anyone else... do you have a
> "close to exact" cooking time for perfect texture taters for the salad?
yeah your going to kill my thread, how about a new post ;-)
i'm still looking for more opinions about getting Baked Potato's like Wendy's
soft skin, not hard.
From: Karen Anderson O'Mara (karen at randomgraphics.com)
Date: Tue, 11 Jan 2000 16:39:04 -0800
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jp (koooba) wrote:
> soft skin, not hard.
Wrap in foil and bake in oven, or microwave it [without foil.]
From: head.trollop at bigfoot.com (Damsel in dis Dress)
Date: Tue, 11 Jan 2000 18:51:10 -0600
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jp (koooba) spake unto us, saying:
>i'm still looking for more opinions about getting Baked Potato's like Wendy's
>soft skin, not hard.
Wendy's cooks their potatoes in foil. The foil will keep the moisture from inside the potato from escaping, and will keep the skin softer than if it were exposed directly to the heat from the oven.
Do you use russet potatoes? They're a little fluffier than some of the other varieties. A nice, all-purpose potato.
Carol
From: Jim K (jkajpust at concentric.net)
Date: 11 Jan 2000 23:09:19 EST
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You also might want to try rubbing a bit of butter on the skin before
wrapping them. But then again, does anything really taste bad with
butter added.... :-)
From: Cindy (jpucci at spampitton.com)
Date: Fri, 14 Jan 2000 02:20:50 GMT
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I like the potatoes at Red Lobster too. They have butter and coarse salt on the outside, and I know they use foil because the tater comes wrapped in it.
From: Roby Daniels (roby_44039 at yahoo.mail)
Date: Fri, 14 Jan 2000 01:28:06 -0500
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Butter and coarse salt yes, but they don't use foil at the Red Lobster where we go.
From: p1x1edust at aol.com (Erica)
Date: 14 Jan 2000 13:29:01 GMT
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They have some at Hard Rock Cafe that are out of this world, with the coarse salt stuck on the the outside of the skin like previously mentioned. Does anyone have any idea how to do that? I was simply in HEAVEN I tell ya ;) =)
From: Cindy (jpucci at spampitton.com)
Date: Fri, 14 Jan 2000 15:46:53 GMT
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Roby Daniels wrote:
> Butter and coarse salt yes, but they don't use foil at the
> Red Lobster where we go.
They might not serve them with the foil, but surely they had to be cooked in foil so that the butter and salt didn't disappear from the outside?
From: Cindy (jpucci at spampitton.com)
Date: Sat, 15 Jan 2000 05:55:22 GMT
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Barry Grau wrote:
> What if they rolled them in it after they finished cooking them?
Aha! I hadn't thought of that!
cindy
From: kris at vilnya.demon.co.uk (Kris Dow)
Date: 15 Jan 2000 17:36:38 GMT
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Cindy wrote:
>They might not serve them with the foil, but surely they had to be cooked
>in foil so that the butter and salt didn't disappear from the outside?
Not really. The Delia Smith potato method is to wash the potato, poke some holes, dry it completely (I normally pop them in the hot oven for ~5 min, because I'm too lazy to be bothered drying them, and it gets the skin a bit drier than just using a towel, ime) and then rub with oil, then roll in salt. I would imagine it would work fairly well with melted butter (or possibly clarified butter) and salt. You get a nice fluffy inside, and nice crispy skin. Really nice. (You can mix stuff in with the salt if you want- I've been known to put in some freshly ground pepper and powdered garlic, sometimes a little bit of a herb that'll go with whatever i'm serving it with.) Some of the salt comes off, but not too much. (I normally end up having to brusht hem off before serving if I've used normal table salt, because it sticks like nobody's business.)
From: Cindy (jpucci at spampitton.com)
Date: Sun, 16 Jan 2000 16:12:36 GMT
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Kris Dow wrote:
> Not really. The Delia Smith potato method is to wash the potato,
> poke some holes, dry it completely (I normally pop them in the hot oven
> for ~5 min, because I'm too lazy to be bothered drying them, and it gets
> the skin a bit drier than just using a towel, ime) and then rub with oil,
> then roll in salt.
Thank you Kris, you explained that little mystery for me. Now if somebody could just explain where Wendys and Red Lobster get those huge honkin potatoes...
From: C.L. Gifford (saiga at concentric.net)
Date: 12 Jan 2000 06:29:40 EST
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jp (koooba) wrote:
> i'm still looking for more opinions about getting Baked Potato's like Wendy's
> soft skin, not hard.
I too like a soft skin. I use russets. Poke several holes in them with a fork, put on a paper towel and microwave for 8 to 13 minutes depending on the size of the potatoes. Turn them over 1/2 way through. I eat them a lot so I purchased for about US$3 a micro baked potato holder. It holds four large potatoes standing on end and no turning the potato is necessary. Perfect, for me, baked potatoes.
Charlie
From: head.trollop at bigfoot.com (Damsel in dis Dress)
Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2000 10:41:25 -0600
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I know that this is culinary blasphemy, but sometimes I prefer a microwaved potato over baked. The texture of a microwaved potato is so smooth and creamy - sometimes, it's a very nice comfort food. Most of the time I bake 'em. We scrub the heck out of the skins so we can eat the whole darned tater, too.
From: Cindy (jpucci at spampitton.com)
Date: Sat, 15 Jan 2000 05:58:19 GMT
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I like em in the microwave if I'm going to put lots of butter and broccoli and cheese on them.
From: ref at sullivan.realtime.net (ref)
Date: 12 Jan 2000 13:24:06 -0600
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>way through. I eat them a lot so I purchased for about US$3 a
>micro baked potato holder.
I just stick it in a coffee mug.
From: Alan Boles (hahabogus at hotmail.com)
Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2000 04:07:17 GMT
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> We scrub the heck out of the skins so we can eat the whole darned
> tater, too.
I don't care for the pesticides or fertilizers or for that matter any of the dirt left on the spuds. So I wash them and use a vegie brush/scrubpad. The brush can be used to make the smaller blemishes disappear.
From: Stan Horwitz (stan at typhoon.ocis.temple.edu)
Date: 12 Jan 2000 19:33:27 GMT
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If you want your baked potatoes to have a soft skin, just wrap them tightly in aluminum foil then prick a hole or two in the foil to let the steam escape. Bake as usual.
From: maryf(aka pud) (maryf at earthlink.net)
Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2000 04:17:01 GMT
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Oh I guess I'm evil then. LOL. I like a baked potato with a really crunchy skin (yes like a potato skin). soft and steamy in the middle, but the skin on the outside. But I understand those that like it soft on the outside :-). I like to take a russet, rub it with crisco and bake it at 500 or 550 degrees for 1 hour, then rip it open and slather it with sour cream, butter, salt and pepper, that is very sensous to me (and shaddup sheldon LOL :-) )). heaven on earth is a well baked potato!
From: fish4 (chriswidgery at yahoo.co.uk)
Date: Mon, 17 Jan 2000 05:48:31 -0800
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First off, I have to admit that I've never had a Wendy's baked potato (there only seem to be about three branches in London, one of which has just closed). But if you want them with a crispy skin (but not hard) and fluffy on the inside then this might work...
Put some olive oil on your hands and rub the potato to cover it all. Then put a little bit of salt on it (the oil'll make it stick) and then bake it for 2 hours at 190C (not sure what that is in F, I'm afraid). Don't punch holes in it, and after two hours it'll be lovely. And before eating it (and this applies to pretty much all oven (as opposed to microwave) then gently punch it - not hard enough to break the skin, but it'll just fluff up the insides.
It takes time, but it's worth it.
From: John L Williams (jlw at sprintmail.com)
Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2000 03:04:50 GMT
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And after you've baked the little sucker at 350/400 for 45/60 min whats left that isn't sterile that would require scrubbing the *** out of ?????
From: penmart10 at aol.com (Sheldon)
Date: 13 Jan 2000 16:06:00 GMT
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John L Williams writes:
>And after you've baked the little sucker at 350/400 for 45/60 min whats left
>that isn't sterile that would require scrubbing the *** out of ?????
Teeth don't like sand, and living bodies don't like pesticides, whether sterile or not.
From: head.trollop at bigfoot.com (Damsel in dis Dress)
Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2000 21:11:32 -0600
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John L Williams spake unto us, saying:
>And after you've baked the little sucker at 350/400 for 45/60 min whats left
>that isn't sterile that would require scrubbing the *** out of ?????
The advantage of scrubbing potatoes is that you don't get fine dirt particles in your teeth. It isn't a sterility issue. It's a debris issue. I don't want to eat fine particles of debris, no matter how sterile they are.