Tired of Turkey? Spinach-Bacon Twice Baked Potatoes

Thanksgiving is over and friends and family are gone.  You have had a few sandwiches, a leftover meal or two, and you are sick of turkey for the time being.  What to do.  Make yourself twice baked potato and a steak!

This recipe is loosely based upon this one that I found on Pinterest:

Spinach and Onion Stuffed Potatoes

First, I took a nice sized potato and baked at 425 for 50 minutes, turning the potato over in the oven after 25 minutes.  Let cool for about 10 minutes, then cut in half lengthwise and scoop out the potato.  

My first change was to add bacon.  I fried up four strips, then pulled out of the pan to cool and crumble.

In the bacon fat, I then caramelized some diced sweet onion and minced garlic.  

Change #2, fresh spinach and garlic.  Instead of frozen spinach, I then added about 3/4" of a one pound package of fresh spinach, placed the lid on the pan, and cooked until tender and wilted.  

Change #3, incorporation of bacon.  I took my smashed potato and incorporated the spinach mixture along with the crumbled bacon, a grinding of salt (not too much) and pepper (a generous grinding), fresh grated Parmesan cheese, and enough low fat sour cream to make the mixture come together.  

Then then stuffed back into the potato skins and topped with more fresh grated Parmesan cheese.  

Change #4, The potatoes then went on the top rack of my smoker at 350 F for 30 minutes.  I had some hickory chips in the ash pan for some flavor.  While the potatoes were getting happy in the smoker.  While in the smoker, two rib steaks were being cooked to perfect medium. The steaks were plainly seasoned with salt, pepper, and granulated garlic.  

I served the steak and spinach-bacon potatoes with the leftover wilted spinach.  Hope and I loved the potatoes.  This was a nice twist on a traditional twice baked potato.  This is on the repeat list for sure.  

Thanks for stopping by,

Bill

Cornish Hens, Stuffed Two Ways...

Well, over the weekend, Hope and I were on the same wavelength for a Sunday dinner idea: smoked and stuffed Cornish hens.  I was thinking sort of a Greek style, rice stuffing.  She wanted home style, Thanksgiving stuffing, so we did both.

I looked for fresh Cornish hens, but I could not find them in my travels.  So, I settled for your standard 22 oz frozen hen from Tyson.

First, I made my standard poultry brine...


BOS's Chicken Brine:

Ingredients:
1 gallon Water
¾ cup Kosher Salt
¾ cup Brown Sugar
2 Tbsp Granulated Garlic
2 Tbsp Chili Powder
¼ cup Orange Juice
⅛ cup Worcestershire Sauce

... and put the hens in the pool for a 7 hour swim.  Make sure to fill the body cavity with brine so they sink and not float...

Next, the stuffing.  For the rice stuffing, I did the following:

Made one box of Uncle Ben's Wild Rice Blend.
Tore up a handful of fresh spinach leaves into quarters.
Added about 2 Tbsp of crumbled feta cheese.
Added 2 heaping soup spoons worth of wild rice mixture, then mixed well.

For the bread stuffing, Hope made a batch of her mothers homemade Thanksgiving bread stuffing.  You could use the same or, if you do not have a homemade recipe, boxed instant stuffing will work as well...

Next, we stuffed the hens.  Do not pack the stuffing into the hen tightly as the stuffing will not cook in the time that it will take the bird to cook...

Once stuffed, the hens get a coating of suntan lotion (olive oil) and healthy grind of sea salt and fresh black pepper...

The smoker was already pre-heated to 350 F.  So, I added four chunks of pecan into the ash pan.  Once I had nice blue smoke rolling out of the chimney, I put the hens on the third rack down on a four rack Stumps Baby.  Here they are after 30 minutes...

After 50 minutes total, the hens had reached 165 F internal.  So, time to pull...

Nice golden brown skin.  Just what we like.

For a side, I caramelized some sweet onion and garlic.  Then, added a bag of fresh spinach and covered with the lid.  Stir the spinach every 5 minutes or so while on low heat until cooked down...

A surely tasty meal for sure...

The Cornish hen had a nice nutty taste from the pecan.  Juicy and moist.  Not dried out at all.  The meat was so good, Hope even ate the dark meat!  But, the hen was a bit on the salty side.  Next time, I will reduce the time the hens have in the brine down to 4-5 hours down from the 7 hours in this instance.  The rice stuffing was nice and creamy due to the added feta with a slight, spinach taste.  A perfect accompaniment to this hen for sure.  We will definitely be making this again in the future.

Thanks for stopping by...

Bill

P.S.  Special thanks go to Chilebrown over at Mad Meat Genius for saying that you can smoke a stuffed bird...