Tag Archives: Potato

Baked Sweet Potato Fries

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Sometimes I have those days where I just want to bury myself in a bag of popcorn.

Baked Sweet Potato Fries | Beautiful Disasters

Or chips.

Baked Sweet Potato Fries | Beautiful Disasters

Or Girl Scout Cookies. (curse you girl scouts!!!)

Baked Sweet Potato Fries | Beautiful Disasters

These are the days that I hope to the good Lord that I remember that gross feeling in my stomach after I bury my head in chips, and then I make an equally delicious snack that is a bajillion (<– exact measurement) times better for you.

 

Baked Sweet Potato Fries | Beautiful Disasters

Sweet potato fries happen to be a sweet love of mine and I finally got around to making them at home. This recipe is the perfect yield for one person for one nice snack (a little bit over 100 calories!). You only have to wait about 25 precious minutes for that them to be done.

Baked Sweet Potato Fries | Beautiful Disasters

Twenty-five minutes may seem long, but in that time you could do so many things! Fold laundry, watch Modern Family, dance like a maniac, watch youtube hair tutorials, pin workouts to look like a Victoria’s Secret model on pinterest, you name it..

Baked Sweet Potato Fries | Beautiful Disasters

Next time instead of grabbing that deadly box of Girl Scout Tagalong cookies, grab a sweet potato and bake it turn into this delicious recipe! Happy Friday :)

Baked Sweet Potato Fries

(serves 1)

1 medium sweet potato

1 Tablespoon brown sugar

1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

1/4 teaspoon chili powder

1/4 teaspoon paprika

pinch of salt and pepper

cooking spray

  1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Either spray lined baking sheet with cooking spray, or line with silpat.
  2. Wash sweet potato, cut sweet potato into thin strips for fries. Place strips in bowl and either coat with cooking spray (or about 1 Tablespoon oil).
  3. In a small bowl, mix together brown sugar, garlic powder, chili powder, paprika, salt, and pepper. Once combined, coat the sweet potato slices with this mixture until every piece is coated.
  4. Place sweet potato fries on prepared baking sheet and bake in preheated oven for 15-20 minutes or until turning crisp. Enjoy!

Baked Sweet Potato Fries | Beautiful Disasters

Random Fact of the Day: Club Direct, a travel insurance company in Britain, provides insurance plans for protection from falling coconuts.

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Potato Skins

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Even if you have never been to T.G.I.Friday’s, I’m sure there is a good chance that you have heard of potato skins

Growing up I remember having these A LOT with our dinners. You can buy them in the freezer section and just pop them in the oven to go with dinner.

Little did I realize how incredibly simple and easy they are to make. Plus, since YOU are making them you can make them just the way YOU like! Let’s say YOU a little more. YOU. YOU. YOU.

So have fun with these. There are endless possibilities of variations you can make with potato skins! Mexican with black beans and salsa, italian with tomato sauce and sausage, greek with spinach and feta…. My mouth is watering thinking of all these different kinds. This go around I decided to just make the traditional bacon and cheese kind, but next time I know I for sure will try one of those (or all of those!) combinations I said before.

The instructions for these are super duper simple, so just look below for the recipe and get cooking!

Potato Skins

4 Baking Potatoes

about 3/4 cup shredded cheese

about 1/2 cup bacon bits

about 1/2 Tablespoon butter, melted

  1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
  2. Bake potatoes in preheated oven for 1 hour. When done baking, let potatoes sit until cool enough to handle.
  3. Cut potatoes in half lengthwise and scoop out potato, using a spoon or scoop. Be sure to leave about 1/4 inch of potato lining the skin!! (I placed the potato that I scooped into a tupperware container for later eating!) Brush the entire surface of the hollowed-out potato halves with melted butter, be sure to get the inside AND outside. Place hollowed-out halves on baking sheet.
  4. Broil the potatoes on baking sheet on HI, cut side up, for about 6 minutes or until edges start to turn dark brown.
  5. Sprinkle 2-3 Tablespoons of shredded cheese on top of each skin and sprinkle about 2 teaspoons of bacon on each skin. Broil the skins for 2 more minutes or until cheese is completely melted. Take skins out of oven and let sit for about 5 minutes, then enjoy!

Random Fact of the Day: King George I could not speak english

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Grilled Potato Wedges

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So I’ve made oven-baked fries for you before, which I make all the time and love, but sometimes those can be slightly time consuming and in the summer, turning on the oven can really  heat up the house. These are little potato wedge/fry things that are perfect for hot weather because you can just pop these guys on the grill while your cooking up some burgers, chicken, hot dogs, whatever!

The only prep work you really need for these is to boil them just to get them cooked through a bit. Seasoning is a must, too! I like my wedges packed with flavors so I really load on the spices and seasonings. You can, of course, season to your own taste, but the recipe below shows my suggestions on what I used to make mine.

These are super easy and a perfect side for any dish. A nice thing about these wedges are that you don’t have to do everything altogether at the same time. I boiled the potatoes and rinsed them ahead of time and right before I put them on the grill, I cut them into wedges and seasoned them.

Making these made me feel like I was in the middle of summer. This 80 degree weather in Chicago is totally throwing me off on times and dates!

Grilled Potato Wedges

(Serves 4)

4 red potatoes

1/2 Tablespoon onion powder

1/2 Tablespoon garlic powder

1 1/2 Tablespoons spice mix

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/4 teaspoon chili powder

1 teaspoon paprika

1/4 teaspoon cayenne red pepper

1 teaspoon parsley flakes

2 Tablespoons olive oil (or any other type of oil)

  1. Wash potatoes and place in pot. Fill pot with just enough water to cover potatoes, salt the water, and boil on medium-high heat with lid on. Once water is at a high boil (or when you see water coming out the top-you really don’t want to get to this point, though), tilt the lid on pot so it’s a little open and continue cooking for 15 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water.
  2. Cut potatoes into wedges and place in a large bowl. Place one Tablespoon olive oil and coat wedges. Season with desired spices and seasonings. Place wedges in a foil pan that has been greased with remaining oil and place on grill on medium-high heat. Check and flip every 5 minutes or so. Keep cooking for about minutes or until desired doneness.
Random Fact of the Day: A person will burn 7 percent more calories if they walk on hard dirt compared to pavement.
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Spiced Up Cheesy Potato Soup

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After I made that Cheddar Broccoli soup I felt on top of the world.

And then I found another soup recipe. Something many of you may not know about me is that I happen to love soup. Even though I’m always talking about cupcakes and cookies on here, I actually do like to eat normal food every so often ;)

Soup gives me this warm cozy feeling. It’s almost like a liquid hug. Everything just feels right and dandy when I’ve got a nice hot bowl of soup on my lap and a spoon in my hand.

I have never actually tried potato soup from a restaurant before, so I did not really know what I was looking for here in terms of texture. Halfway through the recipe, I started to realize that the soup was going to turn out with just chunks of potato in it and I just did not like the sound of that. I then decided to stick a potato masher in the pot and mash around a little bit. I mashed until the soups became almost like very thin mashed potatoes.

I, personally, loved it. I added quite a few spices in mine. Next time, I think I’ll use less spicy spices (that makes sense, right?) because I am a total wimp when it comes to foods with a little heat.

This soup is a thick soup that really hits the spot. We served ours with ham paninis and they were a perfect combination. Two thumbs up to this meal! :)

Thick Cheesy Spiced Up Potato Soup

1 cup chopped onions

1 Tablespoon butter or margarine

2 1/2 Tablespoons flour

1 lb. (about 6 small) red potatoes, cleaned and cubed (I didn’t peel them)

3/4 cup chicken broth

1 cup water

1 1/4 cup milk (I used skim)

1/2 cup shredded sharp cheese

1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper flakes

a couple teaspoons of spice mix, or a mix of spices that fit your taste (I recommend garlic powder, maybe some onion powder, paprika, chili powder, and some other spices to flavor it up nicely)

  1. Heat butter or margarine in pan and saute onions until tender. Sprinkle flour and cook an additional minute, stirring constantly. Add in potatoes, milk, broth, and water to pan and bring to a boil.
  2. Once mixture is boiling, cover, reduce heat, and simmer for 10 minutes. Add cheese and seasoning; cook for 2 minutes or until cheese melts, stirring frequently. Enjoy!!

Random Fact of the Day: A hurricane releases more energy in 10 minutes, than all the world’s nuclear weapons combined.

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Make this oven baked fry, it’s worth a try!!

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Ahh sorry about the weird title. I feel like I need to be making creative titles and “Oven Baked Fries” was just not gonna cut it.

The other night my family was having pub burgers. (YUM!) And of course since we are Midwestern we have to have some type of potato-y thing with it. So I decided to make some good ‘ol oven baked fries because I was not about to put a bag of chips on the dinner table.

They really are super super simple. You don’t even have to peel any potatoes!! Here’s how you do it…

First you have to make sure all your potatoes are cleaned off

Then you start cutting them into fries. You can use a french fry cutter or if you have a setting on your mandolin for fries that’ll work fine too. I cut them by hand and it took maybe 5 minutes, really easy. I cut mine in half length-wise and then into about 1/4 inch strips.After you finish cutting them up, you need to soak them in hot water in a large bowl. And while their soaking in the bowl, you should coat an 18 by 12-inch heavy-duty rimmed baking sheet with about 4 tablespoons oil and sprinkle evenly with 3/4 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. By now, you potatoes should be just about done soaking, so it’s time to drain them. Dry them by setting them onto paper towel, then kind of just dabbing them dry. Now you need to rinse and wipe out that bowl you just used and put the dried potatoes back into the bowl. Toss the potatoes with your spices and one tablespoon of oil. You really can jazz this up any way you like, I actually even used a little bit off BBQ seasoning that I got when I was in Memphis. Once your potatoes are seasoned to your taste, arrange in a single layer on the prepared baking sheet. Cover tightly with foil and bake for 5 minutes in your 475 degree oven.When they are done with their first 5 minutes, take off the foil and keep on baking until the bottoms of the potatoes start to brown. 15-20 minutes. You should try to keep rotating the pan every 10 minutes for even browning. When they are brown on the bottoms, scrape the pan with a spatula to loosen the potatoes and flip them over, continue baking until the fries are golden and crispy. About 5-15 minutes more-keep rotating the pan as needed. Transfer the fries to another baking sheet, lined with paper towels, to drain. Toss with parsley, pepper, salt or any other desired seasonings. Enjoy!!

Oven Baked Fries

(base from The Pixelated Crumb )

3 potatoes

5 T. vegetable oil

3/4 t. salt

1/4 t. pepper

1/2 t. oregano

1 t. paprika

1 1/2 t. BBQ seasoning

1/4 t. chili powder

  1. Lower the oven rack to the lowest possible position and preheat the oven to 475 degrees F.
  2. Wash you potatoes and cut them into fries. Cut them in half length-wise first, then into 1/4 inch fries. In a large bowl, cover the potato slices with hot water and soak for 10 minutes.
  3. Coat an 18 by 12-inch rimmed baking sheet with 4 tablespoon oil and sprinkle evenly with 3/4 teaspoon salt and 1/4 t. pepper and set aside.
  4. Drain the potatoes and then dry them by spreading them out on a few layers of paper towels. Use more towels to pat them dry. Rinse and wipe out the bowl and return the potatoes to the bowl to toss with the seasonings and 1 tablespoon oil. Arrange the fries in a single layer on the prepared baking sheet and cover tightly with foil. Bake for 5 minutes. Remove the foil and continue baking until the bottoms of the potatoes start to brown. Rotating the pan every 10 minutes will help even baking.
  5. Scrape the pan with a spatula and tongs to loosen potatoes from the pan, then turn the fries over, keeping them in a single layer. Keep baking until the fries are golden brown and slightly crisp. Transfer the fries to a second baking sheet lined with paper towel to drain. Toss with any additional desired seasonings.

Have an awesome day!! :)

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