skinned alive

At least I think I'm still alive.

I've never had a semester with such a brutal exam schedule. But, it's over. And I think my GPA made it out relatively unscathed.

I on the other hand am exhausted, brain dead, and ready to sleep for a week. But first, dinner:

I'm very much a fan of finger foods. No cutlery to wash. And since it's the time of year for entertaining (apparently in December, most people get to go to parties, and don't have to do metric shittonnes of calculus) I made an appetizer for dinner.

Fast enough that you can make them long after the guests arrive, easy enough that you can make them long after the first bottle of wine is empty, and tasty enough that you won't have to figure out what to do with the leftovers.

Potato Skins

What you need:

• 4 small baker potatoes
• 1 c grated cheddar
• 3 strips very crispy bacon
• 2 green onions
• 1/2 jalapeno (or a few rings of the pickled ones)

What you gotta do:

We at authorskitchen do not typically advocate cooking anything in the microwave, but there have been times when we've had to. And times when we totally regretted it. But when you're whipping up an appetizer for hungry guests, or brain dead engineering students, baking a potato in the microwave just really doesn't seem that bad.

Just make sure you poke holes in them first.

Mine took about 12 minutes, but I did them in 4 minute increments. 4 minutes seems a reasonable increment.

They will be making steamy noises and will give under pressure if you squeeze them.

Set these aside and let them cool while you chop the onions, crumble the bacon, grate the cheese, and preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

Once the potatoes are cool enough that you can hold them in your hand without wanting to toss them across the room at someone, roll them around on the counter or baking sheet first though to see which are their flat sides. Cut them in half so that the halves rest on the flat sides.

Remove the potato innards with a small spoon. Leave a bit of an edge and enough on the bottom so that the filling will have something to sit on.

Toss the cheese, bacon, etc. together and then divide it up between the skins. They will seem full, but trust me, they're not. I think about 1.5 times the amount of stuff I put in these, would be ideal.

They only need about 7 minutes to bake.

Bacon, melted cheese, eat with your hands. Perfect.

I imagine most Americans will want to dip these in ranch dressing (srsly guys, what's with the fucking ranch on everything?) but I like a bit of sour cream spiked with some hot sauce.

And there you go, less than 30 minutes and you've got tasty cups filled with bacon and cheese.

What more could anyone want?

Comments

[Taneasha]

"srsly guys, what's with the fucking ranch on everything?"

I'm pretty sure the answer is in the name. I mean, aren't Americans sort of known for cowboys and ranches?