I’m very particular about my twice baked potatoes. I guess I’m that way about a lot of things in the kitchen. The other day Gar was grilling steak and I kept hovering and staring until he said, “What?” and I said (mildly accusingly), “How many times have you flipped that?” he said “once” and I said “good.” Back to the potatoes, once they are baked I like to make a couple slits, open them, and let them cool slightly before scooping out as much of the potato as possible. A handful of pulses in a food processor works great to mix all of your ingredients. The potato you see in the picture was 369 calories (including the prosciutto) and very filling. I combined my potato with 2 tbsp. of fat free half and half, 1/8 cup of 2% shredded sharp cheddar cheese, 3/4 of a cup of broccoli, a few mushrooms that I sautéed with a little margarine (I had some mushrooms I needed to use), salt, and freshly cracked black pepper. Once everything was combined I stuffed the mixture back into the potato, topped it with just under 1/4 cup of the cheddar, and baked it in a 425 degree oven for another 10-15 minutes. In the meantime, I put some left over prosciutto in the toaster oven at 400 degrees and cooked it for about 10 minutes on each side until it was dried out and crumbly and used it as the final topping on my potato.
Now, let’s talk about crispy prosciutto for a moment. I bought some prosciutto for a chicken saltimboca recipe I wanted to try out from my new Batali cookbook. I wasn’t too impressed with the recipe (I’ll post about it next week) but I had a decent amount of prosciutto left over that I needed to use. Topping things with dried, crispy prosciutto is a great way to use leftovers. It is so easy to make and it provides the great smoky pork flavor without bringing along the grease that bacon usually does. Finally, it is so incredibly crispy without tasting burnt or being difficult to chew. I highly recommend using prosciutto in this way. On this potato, small paper thin crispy pieces of yummy flavorful pork permeated every bite, I was loving it.