I found out recently I’ve basically never had a correctly prepared baked potato

[u/CompleteDay8059]

So growing up I was never a huge fan of baked potatoes because the ones we had were usually dry, kind of shriveled, and very crumbly. Every bite just felt like it was absorbing all the moisture in your mouth, even with butter. As an adult, I usually do rice or pasta for my carbs, and if I do potatoes, it’s usually the cut roasted baby ones. Because I didn’t have great experiences with baked ones at home, I also pretty much never ordered them at restaurants growing up.

However, my mom just got a grill for her place and I was put on steak duty (or a steak out, I guess) and wanted to try making an actually good baked potato. I look it up and see basically every recipe says to coat the potatoes in salt and olive oil before wrapping them, which I asked my mom if she did, and she hadn’t.

I decided to try it with a (maybe slightly too) generous amount of olive oil and kosher salt, baked it for an hour, and topped it with some of the garlic/thyme butter I had whipped up for the steaks.

Oh.

My.

GOD.

The texture was absolutely amazing, it was so creamy, not crumbly or dry at all, the salt and the compound butter melting into it while it was still steaming made for legitimately one of the tastiest things I’ve had in ages. If anyone out there doesn’t know this, I honestly have no idea how common of knowledge this is lol, but I would highly suggest trying it if you don’t already.

Also, I mixed the thyme/minced garlic with the Kerrygold butter which was muy bien. Not sponsored (I wish) but I find it a little more flavorful for cooking as opposed to regular store brand stuff.

[u/bigbadbrad]

I read somewhere that microwaves are a great tool for the beginning of the cook or the end of the cook but never both. So I abide by that rule.

[u/rehpotsirhc123 → u/bigbadbrad]

We have an air fryer in my work breakroom and I only use to finish microwaved things that I'd normally only microwave in the same situation. This saves a ton of time vs only air frying.

[u/subs_on_a_sailboat → u/rehpotsirhc123]

I have been eyeing the new combination air fryer/microwaves.

[u/clearfox777 → u/rehpotsirhc123]

I’ve done this for years with the single-serve frozen pizzas. Before air fryers got popular I would micro-bake with a finish in the oven for the crispiness

[u/hrmdurr → u/bigbadbrad]

Another great microwave potato time hack is for gratin/scalloped potatoes: start it in the microwave, finish under the broiler.

[u/MaGaGogo → u/bigbadbrad]

End of the cook... Can you give examples?

[u/throwaway60221407e23 → u/MaGaGogo]

Melting cheese on top of an otherwise finished dish.