Jalapeno Popper Pizza, Hold the Guilt

Ingredients for Jalapeno Poppers:

• Bacon
• Cream cheese and/or cheddar cheese
• Jalapenos...
• Batter
• Deep fryer
• Heart attack
• Extra 10-15 pounds of body fat

Yummmyyyy! Except those heart attack and body fat parts...

The notion of Jalapeno popper pizza was mentioned to me by Bobbie (shout out!), who follows What's Gaby Cooking on twitter, who pinned an image of jalapeno popper pizza from Heather Cristo Cooks. Did you follow that?

I immediately accepted the personal challenge to healthify that shit. 

Here ya go, peeps. Healthy jalapeno popper pizza. Eat your hearts out. But don't, cause that's gross.

Jalapeno Popper Pizza, Hold the Guilt

for 4

Ingredients

• 1 package whole wheat pizza dough from TJ's or Whole Paycheck (Whole Foods)
• 2-4 tbsp whole wheat flour
• cooking spray
• 1/2 c. light whipped cream cheese
• 3 jalapenos - 2 finely diced, 1 chopped into half moons
• 4 pieces turkey bacon, cooked until crispy and crumbled
• 5 oz. cooked chicken breast, sliced (optional)
• 1/2 c. shredded light cheddar or mexican blend
• 1/4 c. panko bread crumbs

Instructions

• Preheat oven to 450 F (or whatever the pizza dough package recommends)
• Cook turkey bacon in oven for 15 minutes or until super crispy

• Meanwhile, on a clean surface, sprinkle 2 tbsp flour
• Remove dough from package and place on counter or surface of choice

• Let it chill for 20 minutes. There's nothing more annoying than trying to roll out cold, elastic-y pizza dough
• This is a good time to do your prep work 
• Crumble turkey bacon
• Dice and chop jalapenos (be sure to remove white ribbing and seeds, or your face will burn off starting with your mouth)
• Chop chicken

• After prescribed time has passed, roll out pizza dough into a rectangular 12x18 shape using a rolling pin and a sprinkle of flour to keep the pin from sticking to the dough

• The dough will be thin. This is a good thing. It's called carb control.
• Spray a baking sheet with cooking spray and transfer dough to sheet

• Par bake in oven for 4 minutes, or until dough is just barely cooked through
• Remove from oven
• Spread cream cheese on hot crust. The heat will melt the cream cheese and make it nice and spreadable.

• Sprinkle over diced jalapeno and turkey bacon. 

• Then add chicken slices big chunks of jalapeno. You know, for good measure.

• Sprinkle over shredded cheese

• Bake for another 6-8 minutes, or until cheese is melted, bubbly, and all toppings are sizzling hot
• Remove from oven and sprinkle over panko breadcrumbs

• Slice into 8 pieces and serve with a big salad or something with nutritional merit
• And tabasco, cause it's not hot enough

 Seriously, don't fear the jalapenos. If you're using fresh jalapenos and are careful to remove all seeds and white membrane, they really are sweet and like spicy bell peppers. It's not a bad idea to taste your jalapenos first to make sure you don't have a super spicy bunch. Also, DO NOT use canned jalapenos. You will experience the Colorado Rockies Nacho Disaster of 2011. I don't want to talk about it.

Also, I like protein and fear carbs, which is why I added chicken to my recipe. You can omit if you want a more classic jalapeno popper.

And the panko? Well, poppers are usually fried, so this recipe is missing that breading crunch. The panko takes care of that. But it can also be omitted too if it creeps you out. People are weird with food. If you're weird with food then you probably won't like this blog, cause I'm not afraid of any sort of food. Except eel. Ick.

But, hello! Light cheeses, whole wheat, thin crust dough, turkey bacon? All delicious things! You don't need that extra saturated fat! I promise you that you will love this pizza. 

And it is super good with tabasco, so don't be shy.

Side note! This is my 100th post! If this were the Ellen show you'd all get $100 or something like that. But since it's not, you can just make yourself some pizza and be grateful.