beef sliders with pepper jack, bacon, guacamole, and the hottest d*@# poblano peppers i’ve ever had

I learn something new nearly every time I cook, and this week, I learned that poblano peppers can be extremely hot. And that when you handle hot poblano peppers and touch your eye, your eye will begin to burn. And when you get in the shower to rinse your eye, the water can transfer the burn to the lower part of your face. It was an eventful evening. There I was with one hand holding an ice pack to my eye and the other snapping photos of food on the grill. Am I a dedicated blogger or what? See, I go through all the trials and tribulations and fall into all the cooking pitfalls so you don’t have to. You’re welcome. 🙂

I wonder if other bloggers undergo these trials…

The pain in my eye subsided after a couple hours, but the burning in my hand burned well into the night. At midnight, I finally plunged my hand into a bowl of cold milk, which helped immensely. I had never had hot poblano peppers in my life—these were jalapeno-level spicy.  I love spicy food, but there’s spicy food and then there’s just pain. And when your mouth is in pain, the pain definitely overwhelms any taste there might be in my humble opinion.

Other than the near-ER visit, everything else went smoothly, and the beef sliders were tasty though very messy. If there’s a trick to eating a burger without all the toppings falling off, I have yet to learn it. This slider has all my favorite foods: creamy tangy guacamole, crispy BACON, a sliver of crunchy poblano pepper (I’m still bitter!), and pepper jack cheese atop a ground beef burger with spicy and creamy chipotle mayo. We utilized our grill for the bacon, peppers, and beef patties, which gave them a delectably smoky flavor. This is a slider recipe to keep! Enjoy! Oh, and if anyone wants to take these poblano peppers off my hands, you’re welcome to them! Just be sure you have some milk in the house.

So, we made the sliders with grilled corn with butter, chili powder, and salt (recipe), pasta salad with marinated tomatoes (recipe), and iced peach tea with mint (recipe). The pasta salad and iced tea recipes you can make ahead of time. Since the corn is also cooked on the grill and takes a little longer to cook than the beef patties, I would start with the corn and then move to the slider recipe. This gets you nice hot burgers.

Happy grilling!

guacamole

Ingredients:

3 avocados, smashed

2 roma tomatoes, diced

½ onion, diced

1/2 bunch cilantro, chopped

1 jalapeno, diced

Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

Smash avocados with a fork. Add tomatoes, onion, jalapeno, cilantro, salt, and pepper. Refrigerate guacamole while making other ingredients. Serve on slider.

chipotle mayo

This was very good! Justin isn’t a big fan of mayo and he liked it. Don’t go overboard on the chipotle powder—a little goes a long way.

Ingredients:

½ cup mayo or sour cream (I used light mayo)

1 tablespoon water

1 teaspoon lime juice

1/8 teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon chili powder

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

1/8-1/4 teaspoon chipotle powder

Directions:

Mix all ingredients in a bowl. Refrigerate while making the burgers. Serve on slider.

 

sliders

Serving size: 12 sliders for 4-5 people

Ingredients:

1 bag of slider buns

1 – 1.5 pound ground beef

6 Pepper jack cheese, sandwich slices cut in half (one half per sandwich)

6 slices bacon, cut in half

3 seared poblano peppers, cut into fourths (a little goes a LONG way)

Gloves! For the hell-fire poblano peppers

Lots of napkins!

Directions:

Thaw meat and mold into 2-3 inch oblong disks. Season lightly with salt and pepper or your favorite seasoning. When ready to grill, preheat grill to 400-500 degrees Fahrenheit.

We like to grill our bacon so it doesn’t smoke out the house. We use a flat grill plate with holes to drain the grease (use temporary aluminum catch tins to make for easy grease cleanup). You may want a spray bottle of water to help with flare ups. Each time we turned the bacon, a flare up occurred. If this scares you (like it did us), the stove top and skillet method work well too.

Place the bacon on the grill and cook for about 5-6 minutes or to desired crispiness. Remember bacon will become crispy as it cools. Be careful not to overcook.

If your grill is large enough, place burger patties on the grill just after starting the bacon. Grill burger patties for 3-4 minutes or until desired doneness. We generally cook to medium well.

We seared the poblano peppers last and grilled them for about 2 minutes per side at 450 degrees. Full peppers cook pretty quickly and will begin to peal the outer skin, if cooked too long.

Take each item off the grill as they finish.

Place a slider and on the bottom bun and add a nice layer of chipotle mayo. Then add mayo, half a slice of pepper jack cheese, and top with the bacon. On the top bun, spread a healthy layer of guacamole and then add on the poblano pepper. Marry the top and bottom, then chow down!