To watch every episode of America’s Test Kitchen commercial free, join our All Access membership program:
The perfect baked potato has a uniformly fluffy interior encased in thin, crisp skin. We baked nearly 200 pounds of potatoes to get it just right.
Best Baked Potatoes recipe:
Smoked Trout Topping recipe:
Herbed Goat Cheese Topping recipe:
Buy our winning chefs knife:
Buy our winning baking sheet:
Buy our winning wire rack:
Buy our winning instant-read thermometer:
Buy the Thermapen One:
Browse all WED content:
Follow Dan on Instagram:
Follow Dan on Twitter:
ABOUT US: The mission of America’s Test Kitchen (ATK) is to empower and inspire confidence, community, and creativity in the kitchen. Founded in 1992, the company is the leading multimedia cooking resource serving millions of fans with TV shows (America’s Test Kitchen, Cook’s Country, and America’s Test Kitchen: The Next Generation), magazines (Cook’s Illustrated and Cook’s Country), cookbooks, a podcast (Proof), FAST channels, short-form video series, and the ATK All-Access subscription for digital content. Based in a state-of-the-art 15,000-square-foot test kitchen in Boston’s Seaport District, ATK has earned the trust of home cooks and culinary experts alike thanks to its one-of-a-kind processes and best-in-class techniques. Fifty full-time (admittedly very meticulous) test cooks, editors, and product testers spend their days tweaking every variable to find the very best recipes, equipment, ingredients, and techniques. Learn more at
If you like us, follow us:
29 Comments
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Thanks for watching everyone! It's a pleasure to make this show and an even greater pleasure to read your commentary.
I blew up a couple potatoes in the oven about ten years ago. I was cooking at least a dozen relatively small russet potatoes and had forgot to poke them. If I had to guess, it was probably around 400 – 450 degrees, and was cooking for somewhere between 30 -45 minutes directly on the oven rack. About three or four potatoes all exploded within a few seconds of each other, making a popping noise, one after another.
I'm sorry I doubted you.
LoLz
I had 15 baked potatoes going at 450° and at about 45 minutes they exploded all at once blowing the oven door off , it flew right across the kitchen through the back window and into the yard. I’m just thankful I wasn’t in the kitchen at the time.
why deident you reference the woman who first did theist ATK, Elle on Feb 25, 201. YOURE BUSTED
I do them at 425'c in an oven for 1 hour having given them the slightest rub in olive oil and sprinkle of salt on all sides (and fork pricking). Straight onto the rack. Never fails.
It's not a dish i don't plan to have that 1 hour to make.
Like many I take the quick route by part cooking in the microwave first. My secret sauce though, is to finish in a toaster oven style air fryer which gives a beautifully crispy skin in only a few minutes.
I had a few potatos blow up, they were ones fresh out of the garden. Think since they had not sit on the shelf to dry out some maybe to water content may have been higher?
I have only had potatoes explode in the microwave.
Who needs a recipe for a baked potato?
The only time I've ever had a potato explosion happened jist as I was reaching in to grab the potato from the oven. (Was just grabbing it with an oven mitt) and it exploded away from my mitt. I don't recall temp or time as it was like 20 years ago.
I definitely needed a recipe for a baked potato since I’ve never had one this good!
Dan, you're the best part of ATK. I've been watching for more than a decade, and you so remind me of how I used to be in the kitchen. My friends used to call me a "cooking nerd", but they always wanted to know if they could come over for dinner!
I'm a chef and I went to school and all that, but sometimes you wanna see how others do it, so here I am.
Recipies (instructions) are what make the world go round. Imagine trying to change a tire on a car without knowing the instructions.😅
My wife blew up a potato one time.. I couldn't believe it. Rare but it happens
Dan, I primarily use a microwave, but I might try oven baking to finish the skins. I'm already following the other tips you mentioned, save racking them (for obvious reasons).
I've had a few potato explosions. We were doing some outdoor cooking in a field. We were cooking the potatoes individually in a large thick-walled PVC pipe that was sealed off at one end. We would use aerosol hair spray as the cooking fuel, spraying some into the pipe for about 5 seconds, then shove our potato into the end of the PVC pipe. Then would ignite the fuel via the small drilled hole at the top of the sealed end of the PVC pipe. The potatoes shot out of our PVC oven. When we found them a couple hundred yards away from our cooking site they were exploded all over the ground. We lost dozens of potatoes via this method.
I had one potato explosion in an air fryer — messy to clean up.
Who needs a recipe for a baked potato!?
I’ve always poked my baked potatoes and never had an explosion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vr-o01qiRYI
I was looking through different baked tater recipes anyway. 😬
Are you and Lan Lam an item??? Cause ya should be!
Never had one explode in the oven, had one that I forgot to pre spike explode when I went to slice into it.
Is there any purpose to baking in a salt bed? Is it supposed to do the same thing as cooking them with the salt brine?
Who needs a recipe for a baked potato?
I can pretty reliably get a potato to explode in the microwave, but I don't know if that counts! My seven year-old and I love watching "What's Eating Dan" together – he is also a big fan, and you are helping him to consider trying some new foods. Thank you!
a tasty, fully dressed up baked potato is arguably one of the best things to eat…and I absolutelylove Lan.