Baked Sweet Potatoes

 

1. Make sure it’s a long sweet potato

Sweet potatoes come in many shapes and sizes.  There are long ones, small ones, fat ones, skinny ones and thick ones.  It’s hard to decide which one to choose.

2. WASH, WASH, WASH! Then wash some more

Once it is clean, I dry it using a paper napkin and let it sit for about 10 minutes. I want to make sure that there is no water left on the skin

3. Poke Holes Into The Potato

Poking holes works! The end. The holes are not deep, just superficial enough to allow an escape route for the steam

4. Lightly Oil The Outside Of The Sweet Potato

I cannot stress the importance of this tip. When I oil the outside of the potato, the skin doesn’t become a dry and crinkled mess. The skin remains smooth and easy to peel once the sweet potato is baked.

5. Cover Up With Sweet Potato’s Best Friend

When I wrap my sweet potato in foil, I wrap it loosely. So, some of the steam still escapes out of the ends of the foil. Most of the heat is contained within the sweet potato and it also cooks the outsides of the potato.

This bakes the potato from the inside and the outside. Therefore, you will notice that sweet potato is baked evenly.

6. Leave It In The Oven

Bake the potato in the oven at 400 degrees for 65 minutes.

Depending on your oven, the bake temperature and time may vary. At about the 45-minute mark, I take a knife to it and see if it is easy to pierce the skin of the potato. If the knife goes through easily, then I turn off the oven and let the sweet potato sit in the rack.

I leave it in the oven for about 10 to 15 minutes and then remove it from the oven. 

For loaded potatoes, I open them up, squish them around a little, add some butter, brown sugar, and cinnamon, then top with mini marshmallows.  Put under the broiler until the marshmallows get toasty.