I don’t make too many salads because they are generally a more expensive veggie side. Since I found a bag of lettuce at the store for just $.50, I thought I’d try to pull it off!
Oh yeah, I updated the “About Me” tab on the site. If you are reading in a reader or by email, click on the site and click on “About Me” to learn more about me and how $5 Dinners.com came to be!
Twice Baked Potatoes with Salad
Double baked for double delicious-ness!
Servings - 5 servings
Ingredients
- 5 large potatoes
- 3 Tbsp butter
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1/2 cup milk
- Salt and pepper to taste
- 1/4 tsp garlic powder
- 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
- Dole salad bag
- 1/2 green pepper diced
- 1/2 cucumber
- 1 slice swiss cheese cut into tiny squares
- Homemade Salad Dressing
- 1/2 cup frozen green beans for the boys
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400.
- Scrub and pat dry potatoes. Slit potatoes lengthwise. Place them directly onto oven rack. Bake for 50-60 minutes, until soft. (Larger potatoes may take longer to cook through.)
- When potatoes are cooked, remove from oven and let cool about 10 minutes. Open them up and scoop out the insides. Set the “shells” aside for refilling later.
- In a large mixing bowl, mash the potatoes and add butter, milk and sour cream. Mix with spoon or blend with hand mixer. Add spices and stir through. Other mix-in ideas would be chopped bacon pieces, chopped chives, chopped green onions or diced ham.
- Scoop “mashed” potatoes back into the “shells”. Sprinkle each potato with shredded cheese.
- Bake the potatoes again at 350 for 20-25 minutes.
- Make dressing . Prepare salad. You whatever toppings you have! The green pepper, cucumber and swiss cheese were what I happened to have in the fridge.
- Serve twice baked potato with a side salad.
Click here for the GFCFSF variety of Twice Baked Potato! This is my new site! It’s not really ready for its introduction, but you’ve got to start somewhere! If you are on a GFCFSF diet or know someone who is comptemplating the diet, this is the blog that will help out!
Michelle says
I hear ya on the salads, but if you watch you can find good bag salad or lettuce deals…and I am able to keep the dressing cost down a lot because I don’t use nearly the amount of oil…healthier that way too!
We have them 3-4 times a week, and manage to keep the cost down. I also never use a full bag- gets me 2-3 dinners generally.
$5 Dinner Mom says
You’re right Michelle! We only ended up using about half the bag. Will eat the rest of lunch tomorrow.
Potatoes on the other hand: Gone!!!
And the GFCFSF potatoes were quite tasty too!
Jolene says
I like to add frozen chopped broccoli bits to my twice baked potatoes.
And if I don’t have any sour cream, I substitute ranch dressing.
I have some leftover baked potatoes in the fridge right now, maybe I’ll make some tonight…
Kat says
mmmm that sounds good. Dinner was “clean out the fridge” tonight – so it was leftover stew and left over chicken parm. then I made some rice for either – should be all gone when the last 2 get home for dinner.
Upstatemomof3 says
Looks fantastic!! Everyone in our house is a big fan of baked potatoes. Will have to make this soon.
Org Junkie says
Thanks for letting me know about the new site, what a great resource!!
Mel says
I’m excited to see your recipes on your new site! My daughter can’t have milk and your creative recipes are helpful!
Renee says
Thanks for the GFCFSF link, I’m wheat free and have had a long learning curve with homemade wheat free items. It’s great to see recipes that I don’t have to try and modify. I appreciate it!!!! Wheat free = extra expense and it’s very disheartening when the modifications flop.
Rona's Home Page says
I was always wondering how salads fit into your $5 budget. Thank you for commenting on it.
FromThe Creek says
That is a great way to eat and save money.
Noah's Mommy says
That looks so good….and free sour cream…crazy…
Melissa says
That dinner looks good! I think I will have to make that this weekend:)
Christine says
You can also microwave the potatoes for about 10 minutes each (be sure to poke with a fork to vent). Fill them accordingly then broil them for a few minutes after filling them. Save lots of time!!!
Martha A. says
I find salad actually for us to be one of the cheapest sides, but i generally buy 6 heads of Romaine for anywhere from $2.89-$3.25.
then you can add a grated carrot, a part of a cucumber, but I add whatever i have thatis cheap that week and we eat a salad everyday, mainly for health reasons, but also we find it cheaper….so check around. I find that if I buy my own heads of lettuce then it is cheaper than the bagged stuff!
Crystal says
I love twice baked potatoes. However, my question is whether or not everyone gets full with this meal? Maybe my boys are just little pigs but I don’t think this would be very filling for them. However, maybe that is just a casualty of having four boys. 🙂
Anonymous says
A tiny salad and potato as a dinner? Really? How can you expect a family to actually eat this as a “dinner”? Half of these dinners I’ve seen wouldn’t feed a child, let alone a family. My husband might like this as an appetizer tho.
Kristi says
Love this website! I came across this tonight and made it for my hubby and I. Diced up a couple of smoked sausages and browned them and added with ranch dressing and green onion from the garden. The salad was some red leaf lettuce and cucumbers, onions and tomatoes from the garden. Since the potatoes I had on hand were small (half the size of a baker), I made three thinking we could each have one and a half. However, one potato each was plenty filling! Hubby’s taking the extra for lunch tomorrow. For the folks worried that this won’t be enough for a meal, try it and see! We’re both very active people who train at the gym 3-4 times a week and we both have hearty appetites.