Smoked Turkey and Cranberry Stuffed ABT’s

You may know what ABT’s are.. jalapeños stuffed with cream cheese, wrapped in bacon and smoked for about 3 hours. They are so amazingly delicious and one of my favorite appetizers.

Take this same concept and add some leftover smoked turkey and some cranberry relish and you have smoked turkey and cranberry stuffed ABT’s. This is a great way to use up some of that leftover turkey.

• Preparation time: 30 minutes
• Cook time: 3 hours
• Smoker temperature: 225-240°F (107-116℃)
• Meat finish temperature: N/A
• Recommended wood: Cherry

• 16-24 jalapeno peppers*
• 8 oz cream cheese
• 1 cup leftover smoked turkey, pieces, chunks, etc.
• ½ cup cheddar cheese, shredded
• 2 TBS cranberry relish
• 1/3 cup Jeff’s Original rub (Purchase formula here | Purchase bottled rub)
• Bacon, cut in half or center cut

*(don’t worry.. I’ll also show you how to make these more mild if you don’t like the hot flavor)

Wash the jalapeños..

Cut off the stem end

Use a thin blade knife or even an oyster shucker to scrape the inside of the peppers and remove the seeds and veins.

If you do not like any “hotness” in your jalapeños, consider soaking them in a citrus flavored soda for several hours to remove some of the capsaicin (the chemical in peppers that makes them taste hot)

After cleaning them, place them in a bowl and pour citrus soda over them to cover.

 

Soak them in this for 3-4 hours or even longer depending on how mild you want them to be.

I recommend tasting of a small bit of the stem end that you cut off to see how hot they are before deciding whether they need to be soaked or not. Some jalapeños are extremely mild while others can be a little less tame.

When the peppers are finished soaking, remove them from the soda. Save the soda if you wish to flavor brines, soups, whatever needs a little jalapeño flavor.

Hopefully you left the cream cheese on the countertop for an hour or so to soften. This will make it easier to work with.

Turkey Cranberry Cream Cheese Stuffing

• 8oz of cream cheese
• 1/2 cup of shredded cheddar
• 2 TBS cranberry relish
• ¼ cup of Jeff’s original rub (Purchase formula here | Purchase bottled rub)
• ¾ to 1 cup turkey pieces

Place all of the ingredients into a mixing bowl and use a spoon to fold all of the ingredients together so that it is well combined.

Use a spoon or your fingers to press the stuffing into the open end of the jalapeño peppers making sure they are completely filled and running over the edge.

Lay a piece of bacon on the cutting board

Place one of the stuffed peppers onto one end of the bacon about 1 inch from the end.

Wrap the short end of the bacon over the top of the pepper.

Wrap the long end of the bacon over the top of the pepper and all the way around again to seal the pepper and to use up the piece of bacon.

Note: it is ok to cut the peppers in half so that you have boats. This makes it easier to stuff and wrap but allows the cheese to leak out a little more and gives you less jalapeño flavor.. your choice.

Once all of the peppers are stuffed and wrapped, place them on a pan with a rack for easy transport to and from the smoker.

Add a little more of my original rub (Purchase formula here | Purchase bottled rub) to these just before placing them on the smoker.

Set up your smoker for cooking at about 225-240°F (107-116℃) for approximately 3 hours.

Use the water pan if you have one in your smoker and be sure to have enough dry wood chips, chunks for at least 1.5 to 2 hours. It is also ok to continue the smoke throughout the entire process.

I used cherry wood but almost any good smoking wood will work.

Place the pan of peppers in the smoker. You can also place the peppers directly on the grate making sure they are not able to fall through.

Cook smoke the peppers for about 3 hours or until the peppers are nice and soft and the bacon is done to your liking.

Serve the turkey and cranberry stuffed abt’s right away while the cheese is still oozing and hot.

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Note: You can also order the formulas for my rubs and sauce and make these yourself at home. Grab those HERE and download immediately.