Double Your Pleasure - Twice Baked Potatoes, that is!

Ah, the glorious spud. Did you hear the one about the girl potato and boy potato? It goes like this.

There once was a girl potato and a boy potato
who only had eyes for each other;
they married
and had a little sweet potato,
named Yam.

Okay, don’t judge me. Joke telling is not my forte. I do try; but mostly I’m just a “laugher” not a “teller”. My funny bone, uh, did find this a tad humorous. Hey! Remember ... no judging! :-)

What is your most favorite potato dish ever, ever, ever? Today’s recipe is so good, it’ll bump aside some of your old favorites, and take up residence, at the very least, on your favorite top five potato dish list. Two out of three of my picky eaters club members loved this. I mean LUVVVVVD this. Like the song says, two outta three ain’t bad!

These little beauties do take a bit of planning, due to the baking and all, but are easy, easy, easy to do. I’m all about the easy these days. Let’s start:

You will need:

4 large russet baking potatoes
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese, divided (If you have kids like mine, shred an extra cup beyond this because the little potato eaters will swipe finger loads of the yummy goodness while I’m cooking.)
5 strips of bacon, cooked and crumbled
2 green onions slice thin (optional – I left it out of my kids’ servings)
½ cup sour cream
4 tablespoons butter, sliced into pats
Freshly ground pepper
Lawreys Seasoned Salt

Heat your oven to 400 degrees.Hello my beauties! Place your potatoes on a foil lined baking sheet.Stab said potatoes a couple times with a knife or fork; nothing personal mind you, it’s to keep the spuds from exploding in the oven as they bake. Bake potatoes for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until soft.

When potatoes are thoroughly baked, slice in half. Scoop the flesh out of each potato half leaving a canoe like shell.Place flesh in a mixing bowl and combine with butter and sour cream. Mash as you would for mashed potatoes, but leave them a little stiffer than traditional potatoes.Fold in 1 cup of cheddar cheese, bacon, seasoned salt, and ground pepper. If desired, stir in green onions.Refill the shells with the mashed mixture. Really mound it high. Sprinkle remaining cheese evenly over potatoes. Place back on baking sheet, and bake for 10 minutes. Crank up the broiler and broil until cheese is nicely browned, about 5 minutes. Serve. Make yummy noises.Just look at this! I served ours with thin grilled rib eye steaks that I cut into strips, and broccoli. My girls devoured them, and were quite disappointed that I didn’t have “extras” to give them. My son, the carnivore, ate his, but, well, the food groups in the potato were touching and you all know how picky eaters club members feel about food groups that touch. Still, he ate it without complaint. He’s getting better about stuff like that. My youngest asked me why I don’t always make “stuff” like this, and both girls chorused that I absolutely HAD to make this again, soon. Alrighty then.

Couple things, I think next time I’ll use chives instead of green onions for a more mellow flavor. I see no reason why you can’t microwave the potatoes for the baking portion, and finish them off in the oven. These are really filling, and could stand on their own as a main dish next to a leafy, green salad.You could also leave off the final cheese topping ... but why would you want to??? It’s CHEESE. Yum!

One more thing, these are gluten free, all the way, baby!Now, who wants to double their pleasure and have a twice baked potato?