Stuffed and Loaded Baked Potatoes

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Potato, meat, and cheese altogether in one easy, throw together dinner.
These stuffed and loaded baked potatoes are a simple and easy mealtime idea that can be enjoyed as a side or a full on meal.

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Here’s why you’ll love this recipe:

• It is clean-eating and gluten-free.
• It can be made in as little as 25 minutes (depending on the method of cooking the potatoes)
• It makes a great vessel for hidden veggies which is great if you’re dealing with picky eaters!
• It can be served as a side or as the main dish.
• It pairs well with a side of steamed veggies such as broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, etc.
• You can adjust and customize the herbs and spices to suit your personal taste.

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To make these potatoes you’ll need the following ingredients:

• Potatoes: Opt to use a starchy baking potato such as Russets. Starchy potatoes will give you a fluffy, tender interior, and since the skin doesn’t retain moisture as much as waxy varieties it will be able to crisp up easier.
• Ground beef: You can use an 80/20 or even 90/10 blend. However you’re not limited to just ground beef, you can use ground turkey or ground chicken if you prefer.
• Garlic: Whole cloves, finely minced works best. If preferred you can use the powder or dehydrated variety.
• Onion: Yellow, white, or even red, the variety is up to you. You can also use dehydrated onions if you prefer.
• Salt: I’m using a pink Himalayan salt but you can also use a sea salt if you like.
• Ground black pepper: Fresh cracked or preground, the choice is yours.
• Smoked paprika: I love the smoky, earthy flavor it adds to our meat.
• Dried oregano: You can also use fresh oregano in equal amounts if you prefer.
• Dried rosemary: Similar to the above, you can opt to use fresh rosemary leaves if you like.
• Tomato sauce: Opt to use a plain, unflavored, unseasoned variety. You can also use tomato paste if you prefer, just use 1/4 of the amount.
• Worcestershire sauce: This sauce adds great flavor to our dish.
• Butter: In a way this ingredient is optional which is why I initially forgot to include it in the above image. You can use a salted or unsalted butter.
• Cheese: Freshly shredded off the block, you can use any semi-hard cheese that has a good melting quality to it. I’m using a Colby today but you can also use any kind of cheddar, provolone, Gouda etc. Smoked varieties are also phenomenal.
• Chives: This is to top and garnish our final dish. You can skip this or substitute it with any fresh herb of your choosing such as parsley.

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Hidden Veggies?🥕🥒🍅

This is the perfect dish to sneak in some hidden veggies. Finely mince a medium carrot along with a handful or two of finely chopped spinach and add it to your meat mixture and allow it to cook down and soften and blend into the meat. This is a great way to get your picky eaters to (unknowingly) eat their veggies!

Dairy-Free?🚫🥛

To make a dairy-free version omit the butter and cheese or use a suitable clean-eating substitute.

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Here’s how easy it is to make this dish:

Wash and scrub your potatoes clean and prick them with a fork several times on all sides (don’t forget this step!). Now, to cook your potatoes you can use whatever method you prefer.

To Bake Your Potatoes: Preheat your oven to 300F. Pat your washed potatoes dry and rub them with a light coating of olive oil. Wrap each potato and place them onto a baking tray and bake for 60-90 minutes until a knife slides through it without resistance.

To Boil Your Potatoes: Fill a pot with cold water and submerge your potatoes. Set them on high heat to boil until fork tender all the way through.

To Microwave Your Potatoes: Pat your washed potatoes dry and rub them with a bit of olive oil. Place them onto a large plate, ensure they’re not touching each other and microwave for 4-5 minutes before flipping and microwaving an additional 4-5 minutes until they are fork tender. (Note that the time you need to microwave them will depend on the size of the potato and it may require more or less time.)

While your potatoes are cooking, we’ll cook our meat. To a large saucepan add the meat along with the onions and garlic (and hidden veggies if using!) and cook until your no longer pink. Be sure to keep turning and breaking the meat up as it cooks.

Finally, add in your herbs and spices along with the tomato sauce and Worcestershire sauce and mix everything together and allow it to cook for a couple minutes before turning off the heat.

Once cooked through and everything is well combined, remove the saucepan from the heat and allow it to sit (covered or uncovered the choice is yours) so that the flavors can meld.

Once your potatoes are fully cooked, drain them, or remove them from the foil wrapper and allow them to cool for 5 minutes. Once cooled slice them in half lengthwise and place each half onto a lightly oiled baking tray.

As and optional step, score the flesh of each cut potato several times in either parallel lines or cross-hatched, and place a small pat of butter onto each half and allow the butter to melt and soak into the potato.

With all elements done we’ll bring the dish together by piling equal portions of the meat mixture onto each of the 6 potato halves and topping each with shredded cheese.

Finally, set the tray with your potatoes under the broiler for a few minutes to melt the cheese. The length of time will depend on how “well-done” you like your cheese melted. Just melted, bubbling or with a browned almost toasty-caramelized top. However you like it, don’t walk away from your oven at this point since broiling only takes a couple of minutes and can go from perfect to burned quickly.

Remove your potatoes from under the broiler and top with any garnish you like. I’m keeping things simple by using some snipped chives but you can also top with anything from:

• a dollop of sour cream or Greek yogurt,
• fresh parsley,
• cooked bacon crumbles,
• cracked pepper,
• smoked paprika,
• finely diced tomatoes,
• finely diced bell peppers.

I like to serve my stuffed potatoes with a side of veggies such as steamed broccoli or skillet charred green beans.

What do you like to top and serve your loaded stuffed potatoes with? Let us know in the comments below! You can also connect with us (@kitrusycleaneat and #kitrusy) to show off pics of your delectable creations! 🥳