Jalapeño Popper Meatballs

    This one is a crowd favorite. I’ve brought this meatball to a bunch of different parties and everyone loves them! Who wouldn’t love a meatball with the great heat and creaminess of a Jalapeño Popper.

    Jalapeño Popper Meatballs

    Prep Time: 40 minutes
    Cook Time: 30 minutes
    Servings: 21 Meatballs
    This recipe is one of the more interesting and unexpected ones that I’ve come up with. We love Jalapeño Poppers and I really wanted to make a meatball that has all the components of a Jalapeño Popper. When thinking about how to do this I thought about maybe adding jalapeños to the meat, adding a frozen bit of cream cheese to the middle of the meatball, and knew that I would need to wrap them in bacon. With this recipe, I ended up with the idea of having the jalapeño and cream cheese be the stuffing and wrapping the hamburger in bacon. It’s kind of like a Jalapeño Popper bite-sized burger.
    I was really surprised that on my first try these little meatballs turned out exactly the way that I imagined them. The jalapeño has a good bite to it and they aren't over-cooked and the cream cheese is good and melty inside the meatball, just like a good jalapeño popper. They do take a little longer in the oven to cook to get the bacon nice and crispy but the extra fat helps keep the meatballs moist and prevents them from being overcooked.
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    Ingredients

    • 1 lb ground beef
    • 1 cup Italian Style breadcrumbs
    • 2 eggs
    • 2 tbs Worcestershire Sauce
    • salt & pepper to taste
    • 5 small jalapeños
    • 3 oz cream cheese
    • 7 strips of bacon cut into thirds

    Instructions

    • Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit
    • Cut the jalapeños in half, remove the ribs (the white part) and the seeds. Cut each piece of bacon into thirds and set aside in the fridge until you’re ready to use.
    • Spread the cream cheese in each of the jalapeño halves. Then you can slice the jalapeño’s into 1/2″ – 3/4″ slices. Set aside in the fridge until you’re ready to stuff your meatballs.
    • In a bowl combine ground meat, breadcrumbs, eggs, Worcestershire Sauce and season to taste with salt and pepper.
    • Take the meat mixture and flatten it in your hand. Take one of the chilled jalapeño’s filled with cream cheese and place it in the middle of the meat mixture. Gently wrap the meat around the jalapeño cream cheese slice and roll it into the shape of a ball.
    • Roll out all of you meatballs and set them on a plate. Take your bacon slices out of the fridge and wrap each meatball with the bacon slices. To help the bacon stay in place during cooking you can secure the seams with a toothpick.
    • Place your meatballs on a greased baking sheet. Bake for 30 mins or until the bacon is done to your liking.
    • Once the meatballs are done cooking let them drain on some paper towels and serve warm.
    Bowl of ingredients for Jalapeño Popper Meatballs not mixed with a plate of bacon and cream cheese stuffed jalapeños in a bowl.

    I really love this meatball recipe. I love anything spicy and jalapeño poppers always make me think of summer whenever we eat them – which is great because I love summer. Having the jalapeño and cream cheese on the inside of the meatballs is a nice creamy and spicy surprise. Wrapping the meatball in bacon gives these meatballs a nice crunchy contrast in texture than your typical meatball. I have made other recipes where I chop up cooked bacon and add it to the meat, but for this recipe I think it’s more fitting to have the meatball be wrapped in bacon to mimic how jalapeño poppers are made.

    One thing that I think is fun about this recipe is that stuffing the meatball with the jalapeño cooks the pepper just enough where you keep some of the integrity of the texture of the jalapeño which I think works well with the softness you get from the meatball itself. The more interesting dishes I make have some contrast in textures and flavors and this jalapeño popper meatball has a lot of different textures going on. The other fun thing is you can pick your favorite bacon to wrap the meatballs in.

    A greased tinfoil lined baking sheet with raw Jalapeño Popper Meatballs wrapped in bacon on it.

    I try to prepare the jalapeño’s stuffed with cream cheese ahead of time so they have some time in the fridge to set and chill before I stuff the meatballs with them. If you are using cold cream cheese and cold jalapeños and stuffing the meatballs right away this isn’t as important. If you are struggling with getting the jalapeño slices in the middle of the meatball or are a little nervous about it, prepping them before time and chilling them will help the stuffing process.

    I mention to put the bacon in the fridge too before you wrap the meatballs. This not only helps a little with the bacon not getting too sticky to work with – it happens with the bacon fat some times, but it’s always a good idea to keep any meat that you are working with cold before putting it in the oven.

    Jalapeño Popper Meatballs served on a plate with celery and blue cheese dressing and potato chips.

    I know that this meatball sounds a little weird given that you are stuffing an entire meatball with a cream cheese jalapeño slice – it kind of seems like it wouldn’t work in a way. Well that’s at least what I thought when I was conceptualizing this meatball. I thought it would be a neat way to make a meatball into the popular appetizer.  I threw all of the ingredients together and  somehow it all came together and worked out!

    One thing I will mention when making this meatball and any of the stuffed meatballs that I make is to have a delicate touch when rolling the meatballs. Some of the items I use to stuff meatballs – including this jalapeño stuffed with cream cheese are a little delicate. I have a couple recipes that call for softer cheeses to and if you take your time and be gentle it’s easier to keep all the ingredients from mixing together and getting muddled.

    Jalapeño popper meatballs with one cut open to show the cream cheese stuffed jalapeño center with a side of celery and potato chips.

    Another thing that I’ve found helpful when making these meatballs is once you are done wrapping each meatball in the piece of bacon that you cut into thirds is to secure the seams of bacon with a toothpick. It’s really easy to do and that extra step helps the bacon stay in place during the cooking process. As we all know bacon shrinks during the cooking process and securing the ends with a toothpick in the meatball helps with this problem. The toothpicks also help if you want to move them off the baking sheet to drain on the paper towels. If you are sharing these meatballs (or just eating them yourself) when they come out of the oven you can leave the toothpicks for easier serving options. The most important thing is to make sure your guests know they have toothpicks in them to make sure no one hurts themselves.

    I have made these meatballs for a bunch of different events. The first time I made them was to bring to a neighbors annual party in the fall. I was a little concerned about how well they would travel in a crockpot only because they were wrapped in bacon and you would hate for that to get soggy by sitting in a warm crockpot and traveling. I chose my neighbors party for that reason – not as far to travel and I was really interested in getting people’s impression of these meatballs. I will say they were a hit! I got a lot of great feedback and people loved them. One reason I think they traveled so well is we didn’t have far to go and they were gone pretty quickly after we arrived. One thing you could do if you do want to travel somewhere a little far away with these is pop them back in the over once you get to your destination to heat them back up and crisp up the bacon again. We’ve done this for these meatballs to reheat leftovers.

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