A lot of people I know whip the ingredients into the soft potato flesh using the skin as a sort of container to create a sort of delicious more consistent mashed potato with a crispy skin you can also eat around it.

I fucking love baked potatoes

Who invented this

The Irish, if I had to guess.

As someone who loves potatoes, I kinda hate this post and I'm surprised it's not in an Unpopular Opinion comm.

Okay so first of all, the potato has to be baked right. If it's too tough, it's ruined. It's gotta be fluffy and soft inside.

Second, and this part is divisive, I gotta have the outside crispy. I line my aluminium foil with olive oil, sea salt, crushed red pepper, garlic seasoning, and hot sauce. My potato skin marinates in awesome and gets crispy while the inside is soft. Some don't like it crispy.

Third, some people scoop the potato filling out first, then mix it with the ingredients, and put it back in. That makes more sense. I'm lazy though. I just put room temp butter over it, some pepper, and if I'm feeling fancy, I grate some cheddar over it. My wife slathers hers in sour cream. That's too much IMO, and gets it cold faster. I like mine hot. If I cooked with a heat gun, I'd use it to melt the cheese. I suppose broiling it is also an option.

I hope that someday you can enjoy a baked potato as I do. If not... I hope you enjoy something else just as much. We don't have to agree on what food is good. But we should enjoy good food while we're here.

I mean it's kind of the whole reason all food isn't just palatable nutrient mush. A good baked potato has a good distribution of texture and flavor. A crispy, salty skin, buttery, creamy flesh, a green pop of scallions, crunchy bacon bits and gooey cheese. You are supposed to kind of mash the toppings together a bit with the tater flesh.

I rarely bother because it's a lot of work, but an actual crispy, loaded baked potato is an S tier food.

My daughter always gets her baked potato in a bowl and just makes mashed potatoes with her fork.

I think this is a case of Autistic hypo vs. hyper sensitivity - we are all different in how we experience things. Texture is another important factor.

Baked potatoes have a lot of flavour - our family (all neurodivergent) love baked potatoes, but we all like different toppings and presentations. One likes just salt on it, one just baked beans, and so on. I like margarine, salt and pepper, beans and cheese. I find the potato is a nice contrast to the more flavoured ingredients.

Are not breaking up the inside and mixing up the taste good bits? Are you just eating the butter and seasonings by the spoonful? That's not how this works, that's not how any of this works!

What is stopping you from dicing your baked potatoes into appropriately sized chunks and distributing the flavor? That is how I normally eat a baked potato.

i know what comm we're in but you are allowed to mix the toppings up with the potato before eating

So there have been some valid comments, but one part no one has mentioned is that the type of potato makes a huge difference. If you use a russet potato it will probably be bland, but golden potatoes have a lot more flavor and make for better baked potatoes. They do tend to be a but smaller though.

Cuz it's easy. And it tastes good.

There’s also milder fillings. I prefer butter and black pepper.

Then again I like buttered bread and buttered noodles and buttered rice …. Basically any starch

You may have had terrible potatoes. Homegrown potatoes are anything but bland or tasteless.

I love potatoes but baked potatoes are my least favorite form of them. Twice baked, French fries, hash browns, whipped, etc are all superior.

It's a simple and calorie-rich food that requires very little preparation and no complex techniques. The fact that you can throw a bunch of stuff on it to actually make it taste good comes as a bit of a luxury add-on.

I like butter, sour cream, cheddar cheese and chives.

Really, you eat your baked potatoes with no salt or flavoring? I put tons of stuff on mine. My favorite is usually butter, salt, sour cream, and crumbled bacon, but I've never eaten a baked potato plain and I've eaten a lot of them in my lifetime.

most rices dishes are as you describe. All carbs are heavily flavored on the whole.

The interior of properly baked potato is fluffy and delicious, and is unlike roasted chunks of potato (though I like those too). I do like the toppings as well, butter, cheddar, sour cream, scallions - but I would put the same in mashed potatoes, that's separate from the baked potato question.

Would you like a lump of unsalted, uunflavored starch?

Yep - any day, every day. I'd much rather have a plain baked potato than one with anything on it.

Try twice baked potatoes