We love the classic Cheese and Bacon Crispy Potato Skins, but anything pizza flavoured is always a winner!
I love pizza and I love potato (oh – and cheese), so it was inevitable that I would do a mash up of the two. I’ve made pizza potato skins in the past using full size potatoes, but I found that there was too much pizza sauce and cheese required to fill the potato skin (because the scooped out potato bowl is quite deep). So I like making them using baby potatoes because you get a good potato / pizza sauce / cheese / topping ratio. In Australia, we call baby potatoes Chat Potatoes. They are about the size of a golf ball and are great for roasting and using in salads. I am reliably informed by my friend Meggan from Culinary Hill that baby potatoes are called New or Salad potatoes in America. Basically, any small potato will work for this recipe. Or large. You choose. 🙂
These are quite fast to make if you do it “my way” and cook the potatoes in the microwave first, then bake them briefly in a cranked up oven to get the skin crispy. Scooping out the potato is a breeze because one scoop of a teaspoon is all it takes. Then fill them with pizza sauce, top with cheese and whatever other toppings take your fancy. I just kept it simple and popped on a few mini pepperoni slices. “Each time I scooped potato out of the skin, I kept accidentally eating it. I really need to get to a Potato-holics Anonymous meeting.” One of the (many) reasons I love making these when entertaining is because you can assemble it ahead then just pop it into the oven when you’re ready to serve. They take just over 5 minutes to heat through and for the cheese to melt. I do find that the skin isn’t quite as crispy as when you make them fresh, but that’s a small sacrifice to make for the convenience of being able to have these ready to go. For those in the US, you have the benefit of being able to buy pre sliced mini pepperoni. For us poor sods in Australia, we have to slice it up ourselves. You can buy mini pepperoni sticks at the deli counter in Coles and Woolworths. Or just buy normal pepperoni and dice it up. I actually prefer to do this most of the time because the large pepperoni has a stronger flavour. I haven’t been able to stop popping these in my mouth as I write up this post. I better sign off so I can pack them away before I demolish the whole plate! – Nagi Everything Pizza!
Homemade Frozen Pizzas Garlic Bread Mini Pizzas Pull Apart Pizza Bread Hot Mushroom Pepperoni Pizza Dip
