Jalapeño Popper Meatballs

Prep Time: 40

Cook Time: 30

Servings: 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.