Smokey, meaty, cheesy umami filled spice bombs. Our fallowpeno venison poppers are the perfect bite sized morsel, all wrapped up in their own blanket of bacon. A little bit of effort is needed to get your chillies ready for stuffing – but once they hit the smoker, you can start cracking open those beers.
Removing the seeds and white pith from the chillies will help to damp down the heat on those fiery jalapeños. There’s no hard and fast rules on which cheese you should use, a mix of sharp cheddar and gooey mozzarella will set you off in the right direction – but whatever you love most will almost definitely work well!
In our recent blog post, we delve into the delights of eating Wild Venison, where you can source it from and our favourite recipes, where we hope to inspire you to eat more of this plentiful meat.
12 jalapeños or any mild green chilli
400g cream cheese
100g grated cheese
1 tsp BBQ Barn Blend seasoning (or another BBQ mix)
12 rashers green streaky bacon
250g fallow venison mince
To start, warm a skillet over a medium heat.
Add in the fallow venison mince and brown lightly.
Add in ½ a tsp of the BBQ seasoning and cook out for a minute or two – then remove from the pan and allow to cool.
Place the cream cheese, grated cheese and cooled fallow mince into a bowl and mix together.
Split the jalapeños in half lengthwise, then scoop out the seeds and pith.
Stuff each jalapeño half with the cream cheese and mince mixture.
Cut each rasher of bacon in half, then using the back of a knife stretch out the rasher.
Wrap each jalapeño tightly with the bacon, then secure with a cocktail stick if needed.
Sprinkle over the ½ a teaspoon of the BBQ seasoning, making sure each fallowpeno popper is evenly covered with seasoning.
Depending on your kitchen set up, there’s a couple of options.
Option 1: Hot Smoke
You can hot smoke the poppers using a handful of your favourite smoking wood at 110℃, until the bacon is starting to take on colour and piping hot all the way through (or the core temp is reading 75℃ with a temperature probe – we recommend the Thermapen. Crisp up the bacon over the embers of the fire until the bacon is a deep golden colour.
Option 2: Grilling
Place the fallowpeno poppers on the grill of a kettle bbq, set up for indirect cooking. Add in a handful of your favourite smoking wood and cook until the bacon has crisped and the centre piping hot (or the core temp is reading 75℃ with a temperature probe – we recommend the Thermapen).
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Here at The Salt Box, Venison features heavily in our courses and feasts. One of our most popular day courses is our Wild Venison Butchery & Cookery Course – where we spend the day breaking down a carcass in the fur, learning how to make the most of the whole animal from nose to tail, and turning it into a selection of delicious dishes.
If you enjoyed this recipe, love what we do and would like to support us, we’d appreciate it ever so much if you could ‘buy us a coffee’ through Kofi!
Removing the seeds and white pith from the chillies will help to damp down the heat on those fiery jalapeños. There’s no hard and fast rules on which cheese you should use, a mix of sharp cheddar and gooey mozzarella will set you off in the right direction – but whatever you love most will almost definitely work well!
Wild venison is at the heart of many of our feasts and courses. An incredible wild meat available in abundance, it is not only nutritious and flavourful, but also the most sustainable meat we can source here in the UK. Here, we explore why we should all eat more venison, where to find it and how to cook it to enjoy at home with your friends and family.
Disclosure: We only recommend products we have extensively tried and tested and all opinions expressed here are our own. This page may contain affiliate links that at no additional cost to you, we may earn a small commission.
