An incredible appetiser, side and/or party food recipe. I’m also going to show you other awesome ingredients you can add to the filling, and different cheeses you can use!
A super tempting dish if I say so myself. These baked jalapeno poppers have an awesome creaminess from the cheese, a bit of spice from the jalapeno, saltiness from the bacon and a beautiful texture from the panko breadcrumbs!
How to make these Stuffed Jalapenos
Couldn’t be easier! So first, we need to remove both the seeds and the white pith, because a lot of the heat is in that pith too. The most effective way to do that would be to cut the jalapeno in half lengthways.
Use a small spoon to scrape out the pith and the seeds.
Next, you just mix the cream cheese and the parsley together and then use that mixture to stuff the jalapenos.
You then sprinkle a generous layer of panko breadcrumbs on top.
Wrap a weave of bacon around each stuffed jalapeno.
And finally, I grill them and then bake them.
Could I expand on the filling?
You absolutely could! There are 3 different ingredients that are often added to the cream cheese filling. And I will also give you a cool vegetarian spin-off.
Chicken– Now, you could cook the chicken yourself or you could just buy pre-cooked chicken. Buying chicken that is already cooked may help a lot if you’ve got other food to prepare. I like to shred the chicken before I add it to the cream cheese.
Shrimp– With the shrimp, I just got a few fresh ones, peeled and de-veined them of course. I chopped them up finely and added them to the cream cheese filling.
Crab– Now, if you’re someone who buys the raw, fresh crab, shells them from scratch and chops up the meat, I absolutely applaud you. However, for me, this stuffed jalapeno recipe is about keeping it quick, easy and cheap, so I bought the tinned crab.
And I soaked that tinned crab meat on a sheet of kitchen paper, just to get rid of some of that brining liquid. I don’t want that liquid interfering with the texture of the cream cheese.
Vegetarian– And of course, I want you vegetarians joining the party as well, so I made a salsa filling! I added diced tomato, a sprinkle of ground cumin and some finely chopped up coriander. You obviously want to leave out the bacon wrapping part of this recipe too.
What other cheeses can I use?
Cream cheese seems to be the cheese of choice, but there are 2 other kinds of cheese you can use to stuff the chillies with.
Ricotta cheese– Very light and not as rich, you could even try and ricotta and spinach filling. However, I recommend seasoning the filling with a generous pinch of salt before stuffing the chillies.
Mascarpone cheese– Also lighter in flavour, however, it’s still quite a rich cheese. Again, I recommend seasoning the filling if you’re going to use this cheese.
Pro Tips:
- If you add extra ingredients, remember that a little goes a long way. You don’t need a huge amount.
- When you’re at the market/supermarket buying the ingredients, try to select the larger jalapenos, you will be able to fill them up more, they don’t shrivel up like small ones do after baking and they usually aren’t very spicy. Sometimes the small chillies have an unexpected hit of heat to them.
- If you’re gluten free, make sure you swap the panko breadcrumbs for gluten free breadcrumbs.
- If you find that the bacon weaving is too fiddly, just finely chop the bacon up and mix it through your filling. Or you can sprinkle it over the top with the breadcrumbs.
Other amazing appetisers
Vietnamese Spring Rolls with Spicy Peanut Satay Sauce
Prosciutto Wrapped Prawns With Pesto Dip Appetizer
Arancini Balls Recipe with Tomato and Red Pepper Dipping Sauce
Mini Caprese Skewers Appetiser with Balsamic Glaze
Potato Cakes Recipe with Smoked Salmon, Sour Cream and Chives
I guarantee that any one of these appetisers will rock your world.
Thanks so much for the time you spent on this post lovely people. If you decide to make this recipe, feel free to tag or message me on Instagram (@blogtastic.food.photography) letting me know what you thought of it. Feel free to subscribe as well to receive weekly recipe posts sent to your email. Have an incredible day!

Bacon Wrapped Stuffed Jalapeno Recipe with Panko Topping
Ingredients
- 10 jalapenos
- 150 g of cream cheese softened
- 1 handful of parsley roughly chopped
- 30 g panko breadcrumbs
- 250 g of streaky bacon
Instructions
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Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C.
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Cut the jalapenos in half length ways
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Use a small spoon to scrape out all of the seeds and the pith.
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Mix the cream cheese and parsley together in a bowl.
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Fill the jalapenos with the cream cheese mixture.
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Sprinkle a good amount of panko breadcrumbs on top and then wrap the streaks of bacon around the stuffed jalapenos.
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Preheat a grill over high heat, then add your jalapenos (making sure the cheese side is face-up).
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Grill the jalapenos for about 2-3 minutes until you have some nice marks, and until the bacon is nice and crispy at the bottom.
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Transfer the jalapenos on a lined baking tray, then bake the jalapenos for 20-25 minutes until the panko breadcrumbs are golden and the bacon is crispy.
Recipe Notes
- When you scrape the seeds out of the jalapeno, make sure you scrape out the pith too, because that white pith is also a very hot part of the chilli.
- If you're on a gluten free diet, make sure you use gluten free breadcrumbs to make this recipe.
- I like to grill the stuffed jalapenos before baking them so that the bottom doesn't go soggy.
- If you want to expand on the filling you can add some shredded chicken, chopped shrimp, some crab or you can make a vegetarian salsa filling by mixing coriander, diced tomatoes and some ground cumin through the cream cheese.
- If you want to use different cheeses, you can use ricotta cheese or mascarpone. However, the flavour of these 2 kinds of cheese are much lighter than cream cheese, so I recommend seasoning the filling with a generous pinch of salt if you do use one of these cheeses.
- Buy the largest-sized jalapenos you can find when shopping for the ingredients.
Looks so delicious that I wanna try it😊
Wish I could give this a like but the page doesn’t seem to load completely. Tasty appetizer.
Mmm, oh so delicious! Great idea!
It looks amazing and so so tasty!!
So good! Can’t wait to make these!
Thank you Alexandra!! You’re the best!!