Recipe: Jalapeño Chicken Poppers

Join Big Juicy outdoors as he smokes up one of his favorite appetizers — Jalapeño Chicken Poppers. These are chicken thighs stuffed with jalapeños and cream cheese, wrapped with bacon, and smoked to perfection.

Jalapeño Chicken Poppers

Ingredients

6 boneless skinless chicken thighs, trimmed and cut into 3rds

1 teaspoon of cajun seasoning (Tony Cachere’s)

9 strips of bacon, cut in half

3 jalapeño peppers, stemmed, seeded and cut into 3rds (6 pieces)

8 oz cream cheese

toothpicks

1/2 cup of your favorite BBQ sauce

Directions

Get fire started in your smoker, and bring to about 250-300 degrees. If you are using an oven, adjust a cooking rack to the middle position and place a bakers rack inside a rimed baking sheet Preheat the oven to 300 degrees.

Season chicken thigh pieces with cajun seasoning and prep other ingredients.

Working with one piece at a time, stuff jalapeño pieces with cream cheese. Wrap chicken piece around jalapeño and secure with a toothpick. Take a piece of bacon, stab it on the toothpick and wrap it around the chicken securing the other end on the toothpick. This should be 90 degrees to the direction the chicken was wrapped (this helps hold things together). Repeat with the remaining components.

Smoke at 250-300 degrees for about 1 hour or until brown and crisp. Lightly glaze the poppers with BBQ sauce and continue to smoke for another 15 minutes. 

Remove from the smoker and serve.

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