cooked potatoes in the microwave until soft. About 10 minutes. Scooped out potato and left about 1/2 inch thick
seasoned potatoes with chili powder, cumin, salt and pepper.
I wanted to line the potatoes with bacon, but I was worried about too much bacon fat pooling in the potatoes so I partially rendered them first. I left a few with raw bacon to see the difference.
Preheated the mini-wsm to about 300 degrees and threw in a chunk of hickory. Loaded the skins in the smoker on 2 racks and smoked them for about 2 hours.
When I pulled the skins off, I was surprised to see that there wasn't much difference between the bacon that was rendered and the raw bacon. You can see the difference in this picture. Raw on top, rendered on bottom. The skins with the raw bacon turned out better.
Added cheddar jack cheese and threw them back on at 350 to melt the cheese. You could do this in the broiler too.
Here are the final skins. Melted the cheese a little bit more in the broiler at my neighbors house prior to serving. Serve with sour cream and scallions. Barbecue sauce on the side for dipping.
Lessons
- Don't render bacon first. The extra fat kept them moist.
- Leave a good amount of potato in the skins, so they don't dry out. The more full the potato, the better it was.
- Rotate the skins halfway through. the ones on the bottom were more crispy than the top.
