On a bun. As a dip. In a wrap. On a cracker. It doesn’t matter how you serve this slow cooker creamy bacon chicken, you’re going to love it. Tender, moist chicken. Creamy cheese. Bacon. Ranch dressing flavors. Bacon. Oh, I said that already. I love bacon. There’s no reason that you couldn’t add a bit more bacon to the crockpot. Kinda slip an extra piece or two in for that extra bacon-y flavor.
Creamy Deliciousness
Slow cooker creamy bacon chicken is mighty darned good as it is. Now, you know me (or well, maybe you don’t) but I like a little kick to my food. I would not be afraid to use jalapeno cream cheese instead of the plain stuff. And I wouldn’t be afraid to add a few squirts of Sriracha or my favorite hot sauce, either. Heck, throw in some diced roasted jalapenos too. You can always make two versions. One nice and mellow and one nice and spicy.
Shredded vs Cubed
If you want your chicken to have a bit more texture than the shredded version in the recipe, just cut into small cubes instead. Same great taste with a little bit different bite.
In my world there’s nothing better than a burger cooked on a super hot flat top griddle. Boy do I love that nice little char you get on the patties. These pepper crusted bacon cheeseburgers amp up that great flat top (though you can certainly grill them!) flavor even more.
Nice And Peppery
The patties are loaded with sweet onion and lots of black pepper. Lots of black pepper. Crispy bacon, lettuce, smoky cheese and a fantastically garlicky aioli top it all off. Every bite of these pepper crusted bacon cheeseburgers is loaded with flavor.
Do not be shy with the black pepper when you roll the burger patties in it. You really want a good strong pepper flavor. I used smoked pepper but any good freshly cracked pepper will do. For extra smoky flavor used smoked garlic instead of regular raw garlic.
I like to use a burger press just about any time that I am making burgers. i just weigh out the meat (usually into 4 to 5 ounce-sized balls), then place onto the press. For easy cleanup I’ll put patty papers on the bottom and top of the press. Then I just press down and boom! A perfectly shaped burger patty appears!
In my world there’s nothing better than a burger cooked on a super hot flat top griddle. Boy do I love that nice little char you get on the patties. These pepper crusted bacon cheeseburgers amp up that great flat top (though you can certainly grill them!) flavor even more.
Baked bacon is one of my favorite things. A little time, a little seasoning and I’ve got a wonderful treat. I like my bacon to not be super-duper crunchy. Just a little bite is perfect. For me, baking is easier than cooking bacon in a skillet. I also get a more-consistently cooked product (with minimal curling!). With less mess, too.
Bacon. Glorious Perfectly-Cooked Bacon.
When I worked at the cafeteria at a large army base outside of Washington DC we would bake an unbelievable amount of bacon. And specially for Saturday morning’s buffet. Rack after rack after rack of bacon. I started as a dishwasher. Nothing was harder than scrubbing stack after stack of large sheet pans that had pieces of bacon stuck to them. I avoid that now by lining my pans with foil. A teen making minimum wage was probably cheaper than foil back in the day, so we didn’t line the pans at the cafeteria. We also didn’t season the bacon, something I really love to do.
Save The Drippings
If you’re planning on draining off the bacon drippings to use for other purposes, you might want to skip the seasoning all-together, or strain it first to remove any spice pieces.
Cleanup Is Easy
For cleanup I take the paper towel that I drained the bacon on and toss it onto the baking sheet to absorb any grease. I fold up the sides of the foil and seal it tightly. This creates a packet that can be tossed into the bin without having to worry about it leaking.
Use Up Your Spices
Baked bacon is also a great way to use up those last bits of the spices you have in the pantry. You know the ones, they’ve been in there forever waiting for you to figure out what to do with them. Well, now you know!
Baked bacon is one of my favorite things. A little time, a little seasoning and I’ve got a wonderful treat. I like my bacon to not be super-duper crunchy. Just a little bite is perfect.
Course Side
Cuisine American
Keyword bacon
Cook Time 35 minutesminutes
Total Time 35 minutesminutes
Servings 6
Calories 315kcal
Ingredients
16ouncesbaconthin- or thick-sliced
seasoningssee notes
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350 F. For thick or crisper bacon you can go as high as 400 F.
Line a large rimmed baking sheet with aluminum foil.
Lay the bacon out onto the baking sheet. Do not overlap the pieces or let them touch.
Sprinkle the top side of the bacon with the seasoning.
Bake for 20 minutes. The bacon will still be mostly uncooked.
Flip and season the other side. Return to the oven for 15 minutes or until the desired doneness is achieved. I like my bacon done, but only lightly crispy. Thin bacon usually takes a total of 35 minutes, while thick can take 45 minutes or longer.
Remove bacon to paper towel-lined plate to drain then serve.
Notes
Do not use seasonings that contain a lot of sugar. If your seasonings contain a lot of salt I recommend using them sparingly as the bacon is already salty to begin with if it has been salt-cured.I usually use Grill Mates from McCormick. Todd’s Dirt is also a favorite, along with any of the mixes from AlbuKirky Seasonings.Sometime bacon, specially thinner slices, can be hard to separate when removing it from the packaging. I freeze my bacon for a few minutes to make the pieces easier to remove. Just don’t put the bacon in the freezer and forget about it!
I’m lucky in that I usually love darn near everything I make. These Mississippi Mud cheesy potatoes are definitely no exception. In fact, love may be an understatement. My wife and I both devoured them. You just can’t beat the tender potatoes, ooey gooey cheese, crunchy smoky bacon, and green onions. It’s a lot like having a loaded baked potato, and yep, you guessed it, I love loaded baked potatoes too.
Spice ‘Em Up
The only possible change (and really, it’s a stretch perhaps) I would make to these Mississippi Mud cheesy potatoes would be to add a roasted jalapeno or two. Actually, that’s not a stretch at all. Or maybe a pinch or two of smoked paprika or chipotle powder. Yeah, I’m going that for sure now! It’s not that this dish NEEDS some spicy kick to it. It’s that I like things with a little heat more that things without it. So why not add just a bit? I figure anything I would add to a bake potato, I can add here too!
I almost always use Blue Plate mayonnaise in the dishes I make. I think it is the best around. If you can’t find it locally you can pick it up online for a fair price.
Messy and spicy. That’s all I need to know. Plenty of crispy bacon too. And a little of ‘garden’. Nothing really that fancy, just a good juicy spicy bacon burger with plenty of kick. Thanks to the spicy cheese and a very spicy sauce. It’s not over-the-top crazy spicy, but it definitely has some kick!
Delicious Burgers With The Perfect Kick
I usually cook my spicy bacon burger on the grill, but not on the grates. Instead I use a griddle insert that is made of cast iron. The insert gets screaming hot, like a griddle from a diner. You know, the diners that make great burgers. When you cook on grates the juices drip down into the grill, lost forever. When you cook on the griddle the juices hang out, flavoring the patties and keeping them moist. You can’t go wrong griddling burgers in my opinion. You can also cook the bacon on the griddle, but I usually bake my bacon.
I like to use a burger press when I make burgers. It, in combination with some patty papers, enables me to crank out a whole bunch of equally-sized burger patties in no time at all with little cleanup.
Messy and spicy. That’s all I need to know. Plenty of crispy bacon too. And a little of ‘garden’. Nothing really that fancy, just a good juicy spicy bacon burger with plenty of kick.
Divide the ground beef into 3 equally sized patties. Season well with salt and pepper.
Place bacon slices on a baking sheet lined with aluminum foil. Bake for 40 minutes, flipping once, until done but not overly crispy. Remove to a paper towel-lined plate to drain.
Fire up your grill and cook the burgers until the desired doneness is reached.
Toast the buns if desired.
Top patties with cheese and melt.
Slather the buns with the sauce. Add the patties, lettuce, tomato, red onion and cooked bacon.
For the sauce
Whisk together all ingredients until smooth.
Notes
Add a few pinches of red pepper flake to your ground beef before forming the patties for even more kick!
I was digging around in the bottom of the fridge when I came across a tub of pizza dough. A quick check of the freezer found that I didn’t have any pizza sauce. And no ‘normal’ pizza toppings in the fridge, either. Well, I figured that this was the opportune time to make a breakfast pizza. I can’t say I went into the project with great optimism. Well, I’ve been wrong before. This breakfast pizza was easy to make and came out tasting fantastic. It was a welcomed twist on a regular ole pizza.
Have It Your Way
Of course you can add more toppings. Such as crumbled cooked breakfast sausage. Roasted red bell peppers. Salsa. Hot sauce. Jalapeno slices. Use my version of breakfast pizza as sort of a canvas for whatever you want to do. You can’t mess it up. Also make my breakfast po boy and my egg McMuffin casserole.
I highly recommend that you shred or grate your own cheese at home. Don’t buy the pre-shredded or pre-grated stuff. It has stuff added to it to keep it from sticking together. That ‘stuff’ affects how the cheese melts. Shred it yourself and use the good stuff.
I absolutely loved these bacon cheese-stuffed peppers. Every bite was full of my favorite things, like cheese and bacon. And a bit of sharp onion and sweet roasted bell pepper. I left the onions fairly crunchy because I was looking for a great crunch (along with the crunch of the bacon) to contrast the soft pepper and gooey cheese. You can cook yours further if you want but don’t go overboard. Crunch here is a good thing.
Add A Bit Of Heat, If You Want
For a spicier version, substitute habanero jack cheese for the cheeses, and use poblano peppers instead of red bell peppers. A sprinkle or two of red pepper flake on top isn’t going to hurt anything either. You can’t go wrong with bacon cheese-stuffed peppers no matter how you change them up (if you do). And for me, spicier is better!
I highly recommend that you shred or grate your own cheese at home. Don’t buy the pre-shredded or pre-grated stuff. It has stuff added to it to keep it from sticking together. That ‘stuff’ affects how the cheese melts. Shred it yourself and use the good stuff.
I absolutely loved these bacon cheese-stuffed peppers. Every bite was full of my favorite things, like cheese and bacon. And a bit of sharp onion and sweet roasted bell pepper.
Bake for 30-40 minutes until crisp, turning once. Remove to a paper towel-lined plate to drain.
Cut peppers in half vertically. Remove any seeds.
Place peppers on a baking dish and fill the halves with the beer. Cover with foil and place in the oven for 20-30 minutes or until tender.
Meanwhile, crumble the bacon into a bowl and add the onion and cheeses.
Uncover the peppers and pour off any remaining beer. Fill cavities with the bacon mixture and return to the oven, uncovered, until the cheese is melted.
Notes
User pepper jack cheese instead for a little kick!
What’s better than spiral ham? Bacon-glazed spiral ham, of course. It’s spiral-ham-sale-time here, so I backed up the truck and grabbed a nice big smoked ham. Of course, they’re easy to reheat. And just as easy to glaze during the last 30 minutes. The bacon glaze adds a bit more smokiness, but also some sweetness, a little tartness and a little tang thanks to two different kinds of mustard. I don’t usually use the bag of glaze that comes with many hams. It kinda scares me, to tell the truth. I’d rather use something that I made at home so I know what’s in it!
A Great Tasting Glaze
You can substitute pretty much any jelly you want in place of the Creole mustard, but I’d stay away from ‘darker’ ones, such as blueberry or the like. Go for lighter colors. And don’t be afraid to use a spicy jelly such as jalapeno pepper jelly. You may also want to double the amount of bacon-glaze, serving any leftover glaze as a drizzle over the sliced ham when you serve it. Bacon-glazed spiral ham is a wonderful thing and more glaze is… more wonderful!
I bought a case of Hatch chiles the other day. Most of the chiles ended up being roasted, but I kept a few for these sausage-stuffed Hatch chiles. Now I’m wishing that I’d kept a bunch more of the un-roasted peppers on hand because they sure make some fantastic dishes.
Very Different. And Very Good.
I could’ve served this as an appetizer or as a main dish. I went the main dish route, and backed up the truck. And I wasn’t shy about how many I put on my plate. There were no leftovers. Sausage and bacon, with a hint of fennel on a grilled chile with just a bit of cheese. Smoked low and slow. Like a fancy jalapeno popper, sort of.
For a kicked-up version substitute spicy sausage and add a few good-sized pinches of red pepper flake to the meat mixture. Oh, and use a nice pepper jack or even habanero jack cheese for that extra creamy kick.
For a healthier version, skip the cheese and bacon and use turkey sausage. You might want to up the seasonings though.
