Stuffed Jalapeno Peppers
Plan Z Phase: This is a Z3 (ZReboot) recipe.
Serving Suggestions: Makes 32 for a party or cut the recipe in half for fewer people.
Ingredients:
- 2 pounds of loose sausage. I used mild Italian but I can see you being able to use many types of sausage. You could use chorizo for a Mexican appeal and even more spicy heat. Or Andouille for the Cajun slant. Or I even thought about using breakfast sausage that has a bit of maple in it for a sweet-hot version. If the sausage you choose is in casing, just cut the casing and take it out. In most cases it comes out very easily.
- 1-1/2 packages of cream cheese. 12 oz, softened.
- 1-1/2 cups of shredded cheese. I used the 5 cheese Italian blend but yet again, I can see all kinds of options. You can use cheddar, pepper jack, some Parmesan, blue cheese crumbles, or others. I do suggest one of the cheeses you choose be a creamy one so the peppers will have some gooey texture, so if you use Parmesan include a gooey one from the list above to go with it.
- 16 large, fresh jalapenos, halved lengthwise and seeded*
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Put the sausage in a sauté pan and begin browning it on medium high. I constantly cut up the sausage while it cooks because I want brown edges all around and I want to make sure I have teeny bits rather than larger chunks. While the sausage is cooking you can begin the work on seeding your jalapenos. Just stir the sausage regularly and keep breaking it up. Cook until there is no pink left in the sausage bits.
When the meat is cooked and broken up add the cream cheese and the other cheese(s) of choice. Stir to get it fully mixed.
Then here’s another trick. Rather than stuffing the peppers right away, I put the mixture in the refrigerator and chill it. When the mixture gets cold it hardens up and makes it easier to work with to stuff the peppers. Use a spoon to take out a mound of it, form the mound with your hands into a cigar shaped piece and pop it into the jalapeno shell and set them on the cookie sheet. (In the picture you can see them ready to go into the oven). They can go into the oven now or go back in the refrigerator to bake them later. When you are prepping for a party this is very handy. You can prep them the day before and cover them, put them back in the refrigerator and bake them during the party.
Bake for 20 – 30 minutes or until the peppers are roasted and the filling is warmed through and gooey but not running out of the pepper shells.
Serve hot from the oven.
Depending on the size of your peppers you might have filling left over. You can keep this for later. It will make a lovely stuffing for an omelet.
*Hints: Be very careful when you seed jalapenos. Use rubber gloves or be careful not to get any jalapeno juice in your eyes. The easy way to seed them, once cut, is to take a small knife and cut around the vein edges and then use the small side of a melon baller to slide out the guts. This makes fast work of seeding. The pepper juice will be invisible on your fingers so before you get some in your eye, was your hands thoroughly.
Enjoy!
Cheers,