Courtesy of Tom Gates, Mack Daddy’s Blackener
I f you like baked potatoes then you are going to ABSOLUTLEY love them prepared on our Mack Daddy’s Blackener. I like to shop for baked potatoes at grocery stores that have the potatoes in bins that allow you to select which potatoes you want to buy. I try to pick the largest ones that I can that are similar in size (so they cook the same rate) and that don’t have any cuts or bad spots on them. Wash them thoroughly using a scrub brush or rough cloth and dry them completely. Pierce them with a fork several times all over and then coat the whole potato with a good coating of olive oil. Then sprinkle salt (the oil helps the salt stick) heavily all over the whole potato and put it on the Mack Daddy’s Blackener. The skillet will hold six fairly large potatoes. Four facing one way parallel to each other and the other two placed at the top of the skillet facing the opposite direction end to end. Put the skillet with potatoes into a pre-heated 400 degree oven and cook for about an hour and thirty minutes to an hour and forty minutes.
After 45minutes in the oven, or about the half way mark, turn the potatoes over on the skillet and return them to the oven. Be careful because they are hot. You may want to use a dish towel or oven mitt to do this. I know most people say cook baked potatoes for an hour but they are wrong. They just don’t get properly done that quickly. Especially the big ones! I promise you that if you follow my directions these will be the best baked potatoes you have ever tasted. I think what happens is the salt on the outside of the potato helps draw the moisture out of the potato through the pierced holes you make with the fork and concentrate the flavors. The oil helps produce a crispy skins which I personally love to eat. Serve them with your choice of butter, chives, sour cream, chopped scallions, bacon bits, salsa, or cheese. Baked potato bars are a big hit at parties. I honestly don’t know why the Mack Daddy’s Blackener helps them turn out the way they do. It just does and they are delicious!
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