Oven Baked Potatoes - Secret Cooking Tips
|
|
|
|
|
Although any potato can be baked, the best oven baked potatoes are made using mature baking potatoes like the Russet potatoes. These potatoes, when baked properly, have a delicious flaky texture. The potatoes you pick should have a brown skin without greenish casts. Also, the potatoes shouldn’t have many bruises, sprouts or discolored spots on their outer surfaces. If you are going to bake a large number of potatoes in the same setting, try to pick up ones that have similar sizes and shapes as this will help them to cook evenly and get done simultaneously. Always remember that you are going to eat the skins of oven baked potatoes, so each potato should be thoroughly rinsed and scrubbed under running cold water using a bristled brush.
After drying each potato well, inspect them again and cut any bruised areas or sprouts using the tip of a knife. Thereafter, you should pierce each potato deeply with a knife on each side at about one inch intervals. This ensures that the steam would escape during baking; otherwise the potatoes might explode in your oven creating a terrible mess. Then, start brushing the skins of your potatoes with vegetable oil, olive oil or butter whatever is convenient for you. To get yummy oven baked potatoes, you can roll your potatoes in some coarse salt after brushing them with oil and before placing them in the oven. Some prefer to wrap the potatoes in aluminum foil, before placing them in the oven. Aluminum foil wrapped oven baked potatoes usually have thin non-crispy skins and lack the unique flaky texture. Actually, if you wrap the potatoes in aluminum foil, you are steaming not baking your potatoes and the moisture of the potatoes will remain trapped in their cores.
Preheat the oven to a temperature between 300 and 400 ?F. Usually oven baked potatoes get done within a period that ranges from 45 to 90 minutes. The higher the temperature of the oven, the sooner oven baked potatoes will get done. Potatoes should be placed on the racks of a preheated oven, until they become tender. The potatoes should be turned over at the middle of the baking time to prevent browning of the surfaces of the potatoes touching the rack of the oven.
To make sure that your potatoes are well done, test it with a thermometer and make sure its temperature is about 210?F. Moreover, the potatoes should feel tender when pierced with a fork. If you don’t have a meat thermometer, you can test the doneness of oven baked potatoes by squeezing the centre of the potato using a pot holder. If the potato easily gives in to your touch that means that it is done.
After oven baked potatoes are perfectly done, their top should be slit open using a sharp knife and both ends should be squeezed towards their centre. This will help to loosen the white flaky interior of the potato from its skin. Add to the potatoes your favorite topping and you are ready to enjoy the best oven baked potatoes.
This were the best cooking tips for oven baked potatoes, try them and enjoy.
|
