How to Make Baked Potato Soup
1. Prepare potatoes for baking: Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Scrub and rinse potatoes well under cool running water (you want them very clean as peels will be used later for the soup). Pierce each potato several times with a fork.
2. Bake potatoes til soft: Place potatoes in oven and bake until tender all the way through when pierced with a knife, about 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes. Remove from oven and let rest until cool enough to handle.
3. Cook bacon: Meanwhile in a large pot cook bacon over medium heat until it’s just crisp, remove bacon while leaving rendered fat in pot. Transfer bacon to a paper towel lined plate.
4. Saute aromatics, make roux: Return pot to low heat, add light portions of green onions and saute 1 minute. Add flour, cook and stir 30 seconds, add garlic and continue stirring 30 seconds longer.
5. Add liquids and potato flesh: While stirring slowly pour in chicken broth, then pour in milk. Scoop out as much potato flesh (white portion) as possible while leaving just potato skins, reserve skins and transfer potato flesh to soup.
Season soup with plenty of salt to taste and black pepper to taste. Bring soup to a light simmer over medium-high heat stirring frequently. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover and simmer soup about 5 minutes stirring occasionally.
6. Smash potatoes, add other dairy: Off heat use a potato masher to mash potatoes into smaller chunks. Stir in sour cream, cheddar cheese, parmesan cheese. If desired stir in up to 1 cup more cheddar to boost cheesy flavor if desired.
7: Chop and fry potato skins: While soup is cooking you can prepare the potato skins (using about 3/4 of them). Dice them into small pieces (first rows then squares).
Heat the olive oil in a 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat. Add potato skins, season with salt and pepper and cook tossing occasionally, until golden brown and crisp, about 7 to 10 minutes.
8. Serve loaded with toppings: To serve the soup ladle soup into individual bowls, top with more cheddar, cooked bacon, fried potato skins, and some of the green onion greens.
How to Store and Reheated the Soup
Please continue to the next page (>) for the full list of ingredients and complete cooking instructions. Enjoy this meal!
The most important part is just ahead — click NEXT »»
