Twice Baked Potatoes

For Christmas dinner Bryan made a special request. He wanted twice baked potatoes.

For those looking for the milk-free version of this recipe, scroll down to the bottom.
The potato in the photo above is milk free.

Now, me being allergic to milk, this is nothing that I have ever made. He offered to have his mom make them... but I wasn't having it. If he wanted twice baked potatoes, his lovely wife (that's me) was going to be making them. No offense to my wonderful mom-in-law, Leslie, but I like to cook for my man!

I did call Leslie for the recipe, though. I love Leslie's "recipes." She knows how to make these things by heart and never has amounts or times. :) Here is what she told me:

Bake potatoes and let them cool. Apparently if you don't let them cool you ruin the skins. Slice lengthwise and scoop potato into bowl.

Got it. Easy stuff.

Add cubed up Velveeta, a small amount of milk, butter, and a little salt. Mash it up.

At this stage, Bryan came into the kitchen and looked at my hand-held potato masher with some confusion. He informed me that his mom always used a mixer to "mash" her potatoes, and that the Velveeta should be more combined. Fair enough.

After a few moments of discussion over the meaning of the verbs mash and mix I realized this was his special order, and if the man wanted it mixed, so be it. Incidentally, it did seem to incorporate the Velveeta better with the mixer.

Now all that remained was to scoop it back into the shells and return them to the oven to warm them back up.

But those looked horribly bland, so I decided to spruce them up with some bacon. I later learned his mom used to sprinkle paprika -- but she didn't mention that during our brief phone conversation, so I went with bacon. And who doesn't love bacon?

I cooked up several slices of bacon

And used my kitchen shears to make my own bacon bits.

Yum!

Now don't these potatoes look nicer?

Meanwhile, I was determined to try these wonderful creations for myself, after a fashion. I had purchased some faux milky products and looked up a version of this recipe that called for sour cream too.

I started with Vegan Gormet Cheddar which I shredded into a mixing bowl.

Next I added some Tofutti Sour Supreme, Earth Balance vegan butter and some salt, and mashed it up:

I stuffed them back into the skins (which I had cut the opposite way so I didn't accidentally eat the wrong ones!) and topped them with bacon. They went into the oven at 375* for about 20 minutes to warm them all back up.

They were really good. And delightfully different than my everyday fare. In fact, I may have had a few too many of them. Just sayin'.

Measurements of ingredients. If you were making 6 large baking potatoes non-dairy you would use about:

8 ounces Tofutti Sour Supreme
1/3 cup shredded Vegan Gormet Cheddar
3/4 cup Earth Balance vegan buttery sticks
salt & pepper to taste

Enjoy!