Making Jalapeno Poppers without the Breading

Original Post Date: August 29, 2013

 

I usually enjoy almost any type of pepper, whether it is hot, mild or sweet. However, the common cheddar jalapeno poppers don't really float my boat. I mean, they are good in a way, but to me, they usually have too much breading and cheese. In fact, they usually have so much extra crap on them, I can barely taste the jalapeno! Well, today, I went out to the garden and snagged about 8 decent-sized peppers. I felt like doing a little culinary experiment in the kitchen today; you know, a little pre-supper snack; ha!

Anyway, I washed the jalapenos off, cut the tops off, sliced them in a vertical fashion, so now I was left with 16 pepper halves. From there, I bored out the centers, removing the seeds and some of the membranes. Then, I threw them (or placed, depending on your speed) into a pot of boiling water to soften them up. I boiled them for about 5 minutes. I already had the oven pre-heated to 400 degrees. I took my boiled peppers, placed them on a cookie sheet that was lightly oiled, then filled the centers with little bits of American cheese, since I didn't have any cheddar. I sprinkled some black pepper on top of the semi-stuffed peppers, and baked them in the oven for about 7 minutes. I let them cool down for about 2 minutes, and watched them disappear. Oops, I forgot to take a picture of the finished product though, since they were already gone before I thought about posting this; ha! Bottom line: I liked them much better than the standard cheddar jalapeno poppers, as I could actually taste the yummy jalapenos and I didn't have all that grease, breading and excess cheese getting in the way; cheers!

Side Note: Since all the seeds and the membranes were removed, along with boiling the peppers in water first, they were fairly mild as far as heat is concerned. I suppose that if you wanted them to be hotter, you could leave some seeds in there and skip the boiling part. However, that might add to your baking time, which could then burn the cheese.  Well, it is up to you. I must say, though, the original method I used in this post worked really well...

Photo Credit: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jalape%C3%B1o

---End of Post "Making Jalapeno Peppers without the Breading"