4 Levels of Loaded Baked Potato: Amateur to Food Scientist | Epicurious

hi i'm onika and i'm a level one chef i'm gabrielle and i'm a level two chef i'm frank i'm an instructor at the institute of color education and i've been a chef for 24 years so today i'm making a baked potato stuffed with a cheesy queso sauce but i put turkey meat in it it's a whole entree in one baked potato it's a meal it's not a side dish this is the main chick of baked potatoes today i'm actually going to be making a baked sweet potato the toppings i'm preparing for it are israeli inspired today i am making a baked potato with all of the toppings that a croque monsieur usually has a crook monster is a classic french sandwich with ham gruyere cheese and a nice creamy bechamel that you put under the broiler and get everything nice and bubbly and delicious so i figured i'd put that on a really delicious baked potato the first thing that i'm going to do is prep my potato for a baked potato you must have a rustic potato okay traditionally we use idaho or russet potato they're kind of nice and fluffy on the inside they tend to be a little grainy for me so i chose a german butterball they have the best attributes of the russet and kind of a yukon where you have some of that dryness and that fluffiness and a little bit of waxiness and i think that when you combine both of those it makes a really nice baking potato i'm actually going to be making a baked sweet potato i love the flavor of the sweetness because it's going to be paired with some really fun spices sweet potatoes and yams they seem to be pretty synonymous here in the u.s i'm going to wash my potatoes in some water and use a sponge just so i can get in there really good you want to really clean it because we're eating the skin i think that the skin is like a nice little nutritional boost i guess so now our potatoes are clean so we're going to dry these off a little bit what makes a really good baked potato is how you prepare the skin so what i do with my potatoes take the olive oil make sure that you really get in there give it some real good loving hey boo how are you feeling it's about to get hot for you it's about to go down in your dm and i'm going to make a flavored salt it's going to give it a nice kind of salty crust and give us like a slight time flavor i'm using kosher salt it has kind of a flakier grain and i'm going to use fresh thyme don't use dry thyme for this fresh thyme has more floral characteristics it's got a better flavor and it's going to kind of read better once we bake our potatoes we want the salt to just get a little green and we want it to be fragrant it smells amazing a baked potato without salt isn't worth eating it's like french fries with no seasoning come on without salt it's just a bland wet spud i'm just gonna take these potatoes put them in my tray and i'm just gonna rub them lightly with some of that extra virgin olive oil just so that my salt sticks and i'm gonna drop it in look at that it's like snowing on the potato yes it's a lot of salt but first of all we're just putting it on the outside second of all when we cut these open some of the salt is going to fall off and i'm totally comfortable with that this is just to kind of start my flavor so some people poke holes in the potato i'm actually going to stab them with a fork and this will help to basically let out any steam that's building up on the inside of the skin i don't think you need that it makes it look a little ugly and if you're gonna put the potato in the oven dry without anything on it not wrapped in foil you should poke them because what happens is the skin gets really tight and the inside starts to expand and then they explode for this potato i have stuff on the outside i have oil it's gonna get crispy and not get too tight and not explode i'm just gonna go ahead and wrap each one in some foil and i actually like to kind of keep it a little looser at the top so that it's easy access to my sweet potato to kind of go in and see if it's tender now that my potatoes are prepped i'm gonna put them in the oven at 425 for about 50 minutes we're gonna take these and put them in a high oven about 400 degrees and then we're going to lower it down to 350 and the reason i put it in high and then go low is i want to jump start the browning on the outside i want the skin to get a little crispy okay so these are going to go into the oven at 400 degrees for about 40 to 50 minutes i'll be right back while my potatoes are baking it's time to start working on my toppings first i'm going to start with my pickled bread onion don't start chopping remember to put your weight into it gotta show the food who's boss just add this into my bowl sort of spread out some of the little petals if you work quickly your eyes will water which mine are starting to i'll make it through i'll be strong for my baked potato and then we're gonna put some shallots in they're a really nice kind of oniony flavor with just a little hint of garlic and we're going to throw that right into the pan with our butter i'm going to hit this little salt right now just to kind of get the shallots to start cooking a little bit of pepper and now my red bell pepper you don't really need a lot this is all i'm going to use i'm going to go ahead and zest my lemon the zest is where the oil of the lemon is so it's going to be a lot more concentrated flavor of lemon and then squeeze out all this juice now i'm gonna add my lemon juice to my red onion and then this is going to end up being reserved for my yogurt later i'm going to add in my salt and sumac sumac has sort of this really nice floral woody earthy flavor to it so i'm gonna go ahead and let my onions pickle for about the same amount of time that my potatoes in the oven so 40 to 50 minutes and they'll be ready and while that's going i'm going to slice my speck now if you've never had speck it is a ham that is slightly smoky it's absolutely delicious so our shallots are cooking i take the sprig of thyme i'm going to pull the stem out before we actually fill our potatoes i'm going to take our speck and i'm just gonna warm it through i'm not really going to cook the speck i don't want it to be crispy and this is gonna be the base for our filling here's my turkey meat do you hear it go ahead turkey meat next i'm gonna do my chickpeas i do realize that baked potatoes are kind of synonymous with bacon and meat and everything else hey i get it it tastes good but this is gonna make it feel good meat isn't necessary in this baked potato i just think it adds a lot of flavor so in my baked potato meat is necessary i'm going to first mince my garlic just one clove is fine you don't need a lot i love garlic i'm a big garlic person there is no vampire that is going to come near me or any other human i guess for that matter i'm looking for that nice like brown color now my oil is infused with garlic so i like to go ahead and add in my chili flakes to let the chili also impart into the oil so they're gonna be spicy this sauce when you bite it it kind of bites back i'm gonna take a little bit of my red pepper flakes a little bit of the black pepper i am going to add in my chickpeas perfect in goes my smoked paprika my cumin and my tumeric so i'm going to put my onions in here to top it off i'm going to just do a little creole seasoning i think they're about done now because i'm noticing some of the crispiness i'm just going to take my lovely garlic pieces give them a little stir and then these are done yes girl look at that so my meat is ready potatoes out of the oven and now i want to take the insides of these potatoes out so what i want to do is make that slit right down the middle and you can see how nice and yellow they are inside then i'm going to get my spoon and i'm going to scoop out a nice big scoop of the flesh so potatoes are emptied we're going to add our ham mixture and just kind of mash it a little we're going to add some creme fraiche just to bind it together creme fraiche is just cream that is cultured so it's kind of like a mix between cream and yogurt so that's our filling i'm gonna hit with a lot of black pepper so now i'm gonna start on my cheese sauce cheese is great on a baked potato but i can't really eat cheese unfortunately if you don't like dairy you can't have it i understand but you got to put something in there that gives the potato a little bit of moisture so my other topping is going to be my greek yogurt i'm going to go ahead and add in my greek yogurt with my little tiny rubber spatula so tiny and cute some salt my lemon zest just a little bit of lemon juice i would recommend putting this into the fridge for about a half hour just to let that zest kind of bleed out into the rest of the greek yogurt i'm opening just a can of rotel which is diced tomatoes and green chilies so we're just gonna let that simmer and now we're gonna make our topping for this which is a bechamel sauce bechamel usually starts out with butter but you can use pretty much any fat that you want i'm just using some unsalted butter while my butter melts i'm going to take this clove of garlic and i'm not going to chop it up i'm just going to whack it with my hand because i'm going to strain my bechamel i'm going to pop this in i don't want it to brown i just want a nice subtle garlic flavor our butter's melted our garlic's in there i'm just getting a little all-purpose flour once you start to smell like baking bread that's when you know it's ready to put in the milk so my milk is room temperature or cold and i'm just going to whisk it until it starts to thicken i'm going to keep whisking until this comes up to like a very light simmer and then i'm going to lower it down and let it cook for about 10 minutes i almost forgot let's season salt and black pepper season it well the best meal has been cooking for about five to seven minutes you can see that it got nice and thick and now what we're going to do is strain it so when i push this through i'm just trying to get out most of the lumps and that's our bechamel sauce the last of my toppings for my baked sweet potato is toasted sesame seeds so this is the color you're looking for it's a little bit more golden you can't believe the difference in flavor that toasting gives the sesame seed are we ready to stuff okay good so open it up stuff it in there right because this is almost like a little individual meal at this point okay this one's the broken one but we're gonna make it look nice as a chef people think that we never make mistakes and i thank the editors for that but for the most part we make mistakes things fall apart sometimes and you just do the best you can with what you have now i broke this potato but after i serve it you're never going to know before i put everything on top of my potatoes i want to grate my cheese so i'm going to grate the extra sharp cheddar cheese and you gotta get in there but for me i'm using too many muscle groups for this i have to use my shoulder my arm there's a lot of work involved so i like to get myself a tray i lay the grater on its side i get a piece of cheese that fits in my hand and i push i'm basically using my body weight to push the cheese through the grater it's easier it's faster so i expect everyone to grate their cheese like this from now on there will be a quiz okay so we're just gonna take this cheddar cheese and we're just gonna toss it in the rotel i'm gonna put a little bit of this sour cream now velveeta i don't know what velveeta really is elvita is probably my mortal enemy no you would think because i'm a chef i hate velveeta i grew up eating velveeta velveeta american cheese i love them i think they're great but it tastes delicious thank me later you guys are gonna make this and you're gonna like that girl onika boy she was on to something my potatoes are done so now we get to assemble i just kind of do a simple slice open so we're gonna open her up it's pretty right yeah i'll even pinch the edges in a little just to kind of really emphasize that it's a vessel i'm gonna take my bechamel i'm just gonna take a nice spoonful and dollop in a yogurt mixture take some of my cheese sauce and don't be shy with the gruyere i make a nice pile in the center i like my loaded potatoes to be loaded look at that i'm going to take these to the broiler until they're nice and golden brown and then i'm going to go ahead and add my crispy chickpeas with my crispy garlic some of my pickled onions it's gonna just add a nice little brightness i'm going to sprinkle some of my toasted sesame seeds and then last but not least just some nice parsley some green some freshness get all that cheese that went on the bottom i'm just going to make a little bed with that prop our potato up slide that sucker over and what is a baked potato without sour cream and this is my baked potato this is my baked potato and this is my baked potato [Music] so now is the moment of truth let's dive in make sure you get a little bit in every bite wow i was just taking a flavor town with that bite this potato is perfect for any day any occasion kind of the perfect little meal this is like love on a plate you should give it to everyone that you care about maybe not your cardiologist though this is not the potato that you bring home to mama you take this potato to miami for the weekend no social media put your phones away you act like you've never done it but you did and you're happier for it baked potatoes are a favorite they're satisfying and delicious and so versatile you can have them for dinner or as a side dish let's see how each of our three creative chefs made theirs each chef used a different type of potato onika used a russet which is classic as a baked potato for baked potato you must have a rustic potato okay it's a mealy potato which means it has a lot of starch concentrated within the potato cells so it's slightly less dense when they're baked the starchy cells separate and swell and make a fluffy texture that holds up well to onika's toppings gabby baked a sweet potato which is not a potato botanically speaking it's a member of the morning glory family a healthy pigment called beta carotene gives them their orange color and they're sweet mostly because starches are hydrolyzed into maltose which is sugar but less sweet compared to white table sugar called sucrose the sweetening process happens during baking as the starches absorb moisture and expand and finishes when the enzyme is denatured or cooked around 170 degrees fahrenheit sweet potatoes are sometimes yams yams are sometimes sweet potatoes i'm sure rose probably knows a little bit more about that sometimes people interchange the term sweet potatoes with yams it's mostly a labeling problem from the 1930s when marketing campaigns conflated the common orange sweet potato with orange yams true yams are native to africa and are more starchy than sweet potatoes and can get to be very large up to a hundred pounds they're not something that we usually see in the retail market in the united states they're all a sweet potato at the end of the day frank baked german butterball potatoes which are oval shaped with slightly netted skin that's a little thinner than a russet they're buttery and slightly golden from the presence of carotenoid pigments and have a higher moisture content than onika's russet or gabby sweet potato these are heritage potatoes which means they've been grown and harvested for a long time sometimes hundreds of years i'm just going to go ahead and wrap each one in some foil baking potatoes and foil traps moisture and steams the potato instead of dry baking it you end up with a softer skin and a tender interior but it also might seem a little bit soggy i never wrap frank roasted his potatoes in a salt crust and you're gonna say chef frank oh my gosh it's so much salt yes it's a lot of salt not only does this season his potatoes but the salt forms a crust and barrier around the potatoes as it partially melts during baking unlike covering a potato in foil the salt has a protective effect because it's hygroscopic meaning it attracts water so the potato skin stays dry and won't get soggy each chef chose a unique blend of toppings that worked really well with their individualized potatoes onika used velveeta i don't know what velveeta really is it's something velveeta is not a true cheese but more of a relative of cheese the us fda calls it a pasteurized processed cheese food velveeta is made with a combination of older surplus cheese scraps mixed in with fresh ones an emulsifier is added to the ground up cheese mixture to bind the two together which enhances the melting process it melts like a dream it's inexpensive but it's highly processed and not a pure cheese gabby pickles her onions pickling is a process of acidifying a food over time which makes conditions less favorable to spoilage organisms it's an ancient form of non-refrigerated food preservation but in gabby's recipe it's a quick tart crunchy addition to her baked potato she also added sumac sumac is a ground berry that's common in middle eastern and northern african cuisines it's also piney earthy and woody it worked really well in gabby's pickled onions after baking frank scooped out the inside of his potatoes and mashed them with seasonings creme fresh and speck an italian smoked ham that's seasoned and cured it's high in fat and more dense than prosciutto but with comparable flavor impact frank then added a classic bechamel sauce bechamel is one of those sauces we use in classical cooking and it's basically a cream sauce made from butter flour and milk bechamel is seasoned milk or cream thickened with a roux a roux is equal parts fat and flour mixed and added to a hot liquid the starch granules swell when heated in a liquid to many times their original size thickening a sauce bechamel is thick and decadent this was a sumptuous addition to frank's already incredibly rich baked potato next time you're in the mood for a delicious baked potato for a meal or a side dish we hope you'll take some of these tips from our three amazing chefs

Channel: Epicurious

Views: 1,706,542

Keywords: 4 levels, 4 levels baked potato, 4 levels baked potatoes, baked loaded potato, baked potato, baked potato recipe, baked potatoes, epi 4 levels, epicurious, epicurious 4 levels, how to make baked potato, how to make baked potatoes, jacket potato, jacket potato recipe, loaded baked potato, loaded jacket potato, make baked potato, make baked potatoes, perfect baked potato, perfect jacket potato, potato, potato oven recipe, potato recipe, potatoes, potatoes recipe

Id: wz0GkBkyH0Q

Length: 18min 37sec (1117 seconds)

Published: Wed May 26 2021