Video Transcript

Hi, I'm Chef Jeff Trombetta from Norwalk Community College in Norwalk, Connecticut. And today, we're going to make stuffed jalapeno poppers with cream cheese. So, we have cream cheese in this bowl and we're going to soften it up with the paddle.So, we could blend in our other ingredients. What are our other ingredients? We're going to put chopped ham, it's actually a pancetta, o.k. You don't have to, you could keep it vegetarian. I just think the ham provides wonderful flavor. We're going to put some scallions, alright, put them in there. This will help keep the cheese from melting too, because it kind of hold it together, gives it some structure. We'll put a little bit of green pepper in there. Just get enough of the jalapeno going on there and I'm going to put just a touch of onion, here we go. And I'm going to put a little bit of breadcrumbs, not much, just to kind of help tighten it up. And let's put a little salt and a little bit of pepper, white pepper, ground white pepper. And let's mash it up. So, it's well blended and I'm going to taste it just to make sure everything's in balance. So, to fill the jalapeno, you want to cut out the core, this is the way I like to do it. You could slit down the center and open it up. But when you fry it, you have a tendency for leakage. So, I prefer, I prefer this method. So, we just get the knife in there and I'm going to cut away all the seeds. And kind of dig it out, hollow it out, don't be bashful. And you know, if you leave some seeds in there, it's not a crime but it'll be hotter. So, now we're going to fill the jalapeno pepper that I hollowed out with the cream cheese filling. So, we just take a little tap of that and push it down in there, a little it at a time. These are a great tool, these little, they're for intricate pastry work, little, tiny spreaders. But I like to use them for a lot of kitchen work. Now, you can even use it a pastry bag without a tip. Now, we will run our filled jalapeno poppers with the cream cheese with a standard breading procedure. Now, what is that procedure? Well, it's a standardized way to bread a product. You always start out with the product, it's supposed to be a little bit wet, these aren't that wet. It goes into flour which is dry. And it goes into egg wash which is just eggs thinned with a little bit of water. And then, that adheres to the dry flour, and breadcrumbs adhere to the wet egg wash. So, now we're going to pop our breaded poppers into the 360 degree fryer. And we're going to fry them till they're a nice brown, we have nice, clean oil. Our oil is perfect and I can tell because I can see the oil's a little wavy, it's not smoking. O.k., it sizzles, be careful, don't be afraid of it though. So, get close because you don't want to you know, throw it in there and splash. And don't move it right away, until it has a chance to crisp up. O.k., now I could kind of move it over. Be gentle because the breading will slide off. Now, it cooled down a little bit, the oil by putting the poppers in there. So, what I'm going to do, is I'm going to crank it up a little bit to recover the heat. and actually it doesn't need that much. And the popper's going to stay a little bit crisp, but just tender, the cheese will melt very quickly. All you want to do is, just get a crisp outer breading and then, just heat it through the center. So, I put the fried jalapeno poppers on some paper towel to absorb the excess grease, very important.And we're going to hold these in an oven while I prepare a nice corn and tomato salsa. So, we're just going to chop up some bell pepper and a little bit of tomato. I'm going to finish our salsa with corn and chopped jalapeno, a little bit of chopped onion and I put a little fresh basil on there. So, let's get our jalapeno poppers out of the oven and go ahead and plate them with the salsa. So, we're just going to put a little bit of tomato sauce down as a garnish, and we're going to take our salsa. And we are going to take our jalapeno poppers, we're going to cut them, so you can see that gorgeous center. And here is your final presentation. That is unbelievable. I'm Chef Jeff Trombetta from Norwalk Community College, Norwalk, Connecticut. And remember, it's just good cooking.