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Potatoes on the Half-Shell
Select medium-sized potatoes and bake. Remove the top of each potato so as to make it boat shape. Scoop out the inside, being careful not to break the shell. Mash very thoroughlyit is well to put them through a ricer-add butter, salt and hot milk and beat well. Pile the mixture lightly into the shells, do not smooth down the top, stand each in a shallow pan, return to the oven and brown lightly on top. A quick oven is required to brown the potatoes.
If the potatoes are too large for a single serving, they may be cut in two lengthwise, and each half may be stuffed.
A twice-baked potato in all but name, and the method still holds. The only vague parts are the oven and the quantities, both easily pinned down.
- Oven for the first bakeBake the whole potatoes at 400F for 50-60 minutes, until a skewer slides through with no resistance. Prick the skins first and set them directly on the rack so the shells dry out rather than steam.
- "A quick oven" for browningThat means 425-450F. Ten to fifteen minutes near the top of the oven is enough to colour the ridges; a couple of minutes under the broiler does the same faster if you watch it.
- Butter, salt and hot milkNo amounts are given. For four medium potatoes, work in about 3 tablespoons butter, 1/3 to 1/2 cup hot milk, and 3/4 teaspoon salt, adding the milk in stages until the mash just holds a peak.
- Why the milk must be hotCold milk chills the mash and makes it stiff and heavy, and it is absorbed less readily. Hot milk keeps the mixture warm and light and lets it take more liquid before it slumps.
- The ricer is not optionalThe ricer -- The recipe recommends it rather than requiring it, but it is the sensible choice: a ricer or food mill breaks the potato without working the starch, whereas a food processor or vigorous blender turns it to paste in seconds.
- Work them hotScoop and mash while the potatoes are still too hot to hold comfortably, using a towel. Cooled potato mashes badly and the shells go leathery.
- Ragged tops on purpose"Do not smooth down the top" is about surface area -- the peaks and rough edges catch the heat and brown. Piping the filling through a star tube achieves the same thing.
- YieldOne medium potato per person as a side dish, or half a large one. The stuffed shells can be filled ahead, refrigerated, and browned from cold with about 10 minutes added.
Baked potatoes served back in their own skins were a familiar feature of late-Victorian and Edwardian dining, where the shell did the work of a serving dish and cost nothing; the name echoes the older use of 'on the half-shell' for oysters and scallops. The insistence on a ricer reflects a period preoccupation with lightness in mashed potato. What Americans now call the twice-baked potato is a close relation, and the method has changed little, apart from the cheese and bacon that came later.