1 large potato, baker preferred
Olive oil or butter, depending on taste
Cheese, depending on preference
Bacon, streaky smoked preferred
Your unlimited imagination

Don't laugh, this can be a snack or meal complement that offers a lot of fun. Basically, it involves openin a hole in a large potato and then stuffing it with whatever ingredients you decide may suit your tastes or your interest in invention. After all, even it turns out bad (unlikely) you've only wasted a spud and a small bit of added ingredients.

First off, wash the potato well, leaving its peel on. With an apple corer carefully burrow a hole thorugh the middle of the spud. It probably won't go all the way through unless you're using small potatoes, so go as far in from one side and then aim your corer at the other side of the potato. Do not throw away the plugs of potato you pull out with the corer.

Now, I recently saw a Jamie Oliver recipe for stuffed potatoes in a newspaper supplement. But he didn't invent it, by any means. His suggested ingredients, by the way, were streaky smoked bacon, cheddar cheese and a sage leaf. He says the obvious: stuff those items into the hole in the potato push a half-inch section of the 'plugs' into each end of the potato and put the spud into the oven at 200c for 45 minutes or until it is soft on the outside.

There's nothing wrong with the above recipe, but you can augment it in all sorts of ways.

One thing you can do with a large potato is this: when you have your central hole bored through the potato, angle your corer up and down into the potato from either side, hollowing out as much of innards as possible without punching through to the outside of the potato. This allows you to put a lot more things into the potato.

Try a bit of spicy chilli. Chilli and cheese. Two or three types of grated cheese, including a stilton or blue. Or chop up some Italian salami or ham and sink that into the potato's recess with parmesan and/or cheddar cheeses. Fresh basil, coriander, parsley are just a few herbs that can be added.

For snacks, make and bake a variety of stuffed potatoes. Remove them from the oven when done, cut into half-inch slices and arrange on a tray. Add salt and pepper to taste.

If you're serving them with dinner, you can surprise your guests by not telling them what to expect when they tuck into their bakers.

Or make a version of the baked potatoes being sold at snack stands. Fry or microwave two slices of streaky bacon until they's crispy. Chop them into small bits and add insert them into the potato with grated cheddar. Cook the potato as above. When done, remove from oven, slice down the middle to unfold your bacony cheese potato. Add some sour cream, salt and pepper and enjoy.

Again, this recipe is bounded only by your interest interest in experimentation and your imagination.

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