Subject: Jacket potatoes in aluminium foil
Newsgroups: rec.food.cooking

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From: Stef Glassée (jessyej at pc.jaring.my)
Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 09:53:02 +0200
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Potato / European (Belgium) / Side Dish / Dinner / Oven/ No marination

Jacket potatoes in aluminium foil (2001-10-10)

Source: http://www.javabit.com [link dead. later redirect blocks in archive.org], Recipe 114
Author: Stef Glassée
Authors email: stef at javabit.com
Contains no meat.
Contains no alcohol.
Contains no sugar.
Preparation Time: 1 hour

DESCRIPTION:

The authentic ancestor of this recipe dates way back in my childhood days...

At the beginning of summer, we used to harvest peas. My father didn't grow the small bushes, no, he grew them 2 m high... The higher they grow, the more peas they carry...Yes he had 5 demanding mouths to feed.

After the harvest, we were left with a lot of dry pea-plants. Around the same time we would trim our much to high hedge and collect all the dead branches from the trees around our garden.

Ecology was not a big issue during those days, so the best disposal was putting a fire on all that organic dry material. Boy, did that make a hell of a big fire. Making use out of everything, father told us to take potatoes and apples, put each separate in aluminium foil and throw it in the fire... Hours later in the black ashes : it was a bit digging around for our food-treasures : the most delicious charcoal tasting dinner was ready! And on top of that : we even 'cooked it ourselves'.... Time to be double proud :-)

These days no fires allowed anymore, so the next best thing is putting the potatoes in the oven. It lacks the charcoal taste, but served with some butter and meat gravy on top, it is also delicious.

PREPARATION

1. Wash the potatoes. Dry them and prick them a few times with a fork.

2. Preheat the oven at 175°C.

3. Put each potato in aluminium foil and heat them in the oven for 1 hour (our oven is the air-circulating-type)

4. Serve in the foil with fresh butter on top.

INGREDIENTS:

3 fresh big potatoes of equal size.

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From: penmart01 at aol.como (Sheldon)
Date: 10 Oct 2001 11:37:44 GMT
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Stef *Imbecile* Glassée writes:

>Jacket potatoes in aluminium foil (2001-10-10)
>Contains no alcohol.
>Contains no sugar.

Potatoes do in fact contain sugar... may even contain alcohol.

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From: stan at temple.edu
Date: 10 Oct 2001 15:36:30 GMT
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Stef, try cooking the potatoes without the foil sometime. The result will be a potato with a crispy skin and a tender inside. The foil simply traps the moisture in the potato and causes the potato to be steamed rather than baked.

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From: Decobabe (decobabe at libero.it)
Date: Thu, 11 Oct 2001 07:47:46 GMT
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stan at temple wrote:
> Stef, try cooking the potatoes without the foil sometime. The result
> will be a potato with a crispy skin and a tender inside. The foil
> simply traps the moisture in the potato and causes the potato to be
> steamed rather than baked.

Except if you are roasting them in the coals of the fireplace. You need the foil then, and you still get a thick, crisp skin.

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From: stan at temple.edu
Date: 11 Oct 2001 13:03:38 GMT
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Decobabe wrote:
> Except if you are roasting them in the coals of the fireplace. You need the
> foil then, and you still get a thick, crisp skin.

Agreed.