Twice Baked Potatoes Recipe
This twice baked potatoes recipe is a real weekend treat and well worth your time. Crisp, crunchy potato skins are stuffed with cooked potato, cheese, onion and red pepper before being baked for a second time. Perfect food to share with friends and, in the UK, a perfect Bonfire Night treat.Serve twice bake potatoes as a side dish, as finger food or as a main meal, depending on the size of your potatoes.Don't forget to experiment with different fillings, too.
Servings 4
Calories 450kcal
Equipment
- Mixing bowl
- Cheese grater
- Sharp knife
Ingredients
- 4 medium potatoes scrubbed, skin on
- 200 grams Izmir tulum or kaşar cheese grated
- 1 large onion peeled & finely chopped
- 1 large red bell pepper deseeded & finely chopped
- 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard optional
- 1 teaspoon chilli flakes optional
- salt & pepper to season
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 220 degrees Celsius.
- Meanwhile, scrub your potatoes and prick each one a few times all over with a sharp knife.
- Place your potatoes directly onto an oven rack and add to the centre of the oven.
- After 45 minutes, turn your potatoes over.
- Meanwhile, you can add the rest of your ingredients to a large mixing bowl.
- After around 90 minutes, check your potatoes. It's important that the skin is crisp so that it is sturdy enough to carry your filling.
- If the skin isn't so crisp, place them back in the oven on the top shelf and increase the temperature.
- When you are happy with your potatoes, remove them from the oven but leave the oven on.
- Take a sharp knife and cut each potato in half, lengthways. Obviously, they will be very hot so use a cloth or oven glove to cover your hand.
- Now take each half in your covered hand and use a fork to scrape all the fluffy potato into your cheese mixture.
- Once you've emptied all the potato skins, give the cheese and potato a good mix.
- Now you can refill the potato skins with your cheesy mixture.
- Rough up the top of your potato mixture with a fork and place the potatoes back onto your oven rack.
- Turn your oven to the highest setting and place the rack on the top shelf of your oven.
- Bake for around 10 minutes until the filling is hot and the top is crisp and golden.
- Serve immediately as buffet food, a side dish or as a main meal.
Notes
- Twice baked potatoes are really versatile and you can play around with different fillings. Cheese is the staple ingredient, however.
- In our twice baked potatoes recipe, we use kaşar cheese or Izmir tulum. These are hard, full fat cheeses which melt easily. If you're not in Turkey, any tasty hard cheese which melts easily will be perfect.
- If you want extra oozy potato toppings, feel free to add some butter or more cheese to your mixture. You might need to add an oven tray under your rack if you do this so you can avoid dripping cheese landing on the bottom of your oven.
- We add a bit of Turkish mustard (a mild mustard like Dijon) to our mixture but you can leave it out if you like.
- Cooking time for your potatoes will depend on the size and type of your oven and, obviously, the size of your potatoes. We have suggested medium potatoes - about 350 grams per potato - but it is up to you.
- Buy potatoes that are not waxy and have a good skin on them. In Turkey, sarı patates (yellow potatoes) make perfect twice baked potatoes.