I just created my own Jalapeno Madness!

Hey Y'all! Welcome back to Que-Licious!

 I just created my first sweet heat dessert and wanted to share it with you! I don't even have a name for this recipe yet so for now we will go with the obvious...

Stuffed Chocolate Covered Jalapenos

Ingredients
15 oz. container of Ricotta Cheese
8 oz. container of Mascarpone Cheese
1 stick of butter (softened)
20 Jalapeno Peppers
14 oz. Semi-Sweet Chocolate
3 tablespoons Crisco
6 ounces white chocolate
Cayenne Pepper to taste

In a medium mixing bowl, beat butter with a wire whisk until smooth.
Next blend in Ricotta with whisk until smooth. This may take just a little longer because of the consistency of the cheese. Then add Mascarpone cheese and continue mixing with whisk until all ingredients are blended smooth. The mixture will resemble runny mashed potatoes with tiny little lumps. (from the ricotta) Sprinkle in cayenne pepper to your taste. Refrigerate until ready to stuff peppers.

In a medium stock pot, bring 2 quarts of water to a rolling boil on high heat. While water is reaching the boiling point, cut the tops off of the jalapenos and place in a bowl and set aside. These will be used later for display purposes.

Next, keeping the rest of the pepper intact, seed and remove the membranes from the inside of the pepper. I used an Avocado Peeler from The Pampered Chef. This works perfectly with out cutting the skin as a knife would, but allows you to remove all of the insides effortlessly.

Once the caps are removed and the peppers are seeded, the water should be at a full rolling boil. Keep the water boiling on high heat and drop peppers in water. This blanches the peppers and helps remove the remaining seeds. Do not keep peppers in water longer than 2 minutes. You want the peppers to be bright in color and still have most of the crispness. Place peppers on a baking sheet and let cool. When peppers are cool to the touch, spoon in cheese mixture into each pepper until full.

Once the peppers are stuffed, place the peppers on the cookie sheet and place in the freezer for about one hour. Once the peppers are slightly frosted on the outside and the center is set, they are ready to be dipped in chocolate.

Place the semi-sweet chocolate and 2 tablespoons of Crisco in a microwavable bowl and heat on your microwaves highest setting for 1 minute. Stir mixture and repeat hight heat setting for an additional 1 minute. Repeat as often as necessary until the chocolate is melted smooth. Dip each jalapeno into the melted chocolate coating each side and place on wax paper to cool. You may refrigerate if you want to speed up the cooling process.

In a separate smaller microwavable bowl, place the white chocolate and 1 tablespoon Crisco. Repeat the melting process and stir until chocolate is melted smooth. Once the jalapenos have cooled and the chocolate has hardened to the pepper, hold the jalapeno over the white chocolate and drizzle the white chocolate over the jalapeno with a spoon in a small stream or you can dip the tip in white chocolate. Your in charge of the creative process here.

Alternative Filling: I also found this to be a slightly sweeter version of the filling and cuts the heat of the pepper quite a bit. So if you are a fan of more sweet and less heat this would be a good alternative filling for your peppers. Also, look for the mild jalapeno peppers in your produce section as well.

Mascarpone Cream Filling:1 stick(s) unsalted butter, softened
1 container(s) (8-ounce) mascarpone cheese , softened
3 cup(s) confectioners' sugar, sifted
1 teaspoon(s) pure vanilla extract

Either version will give you an exciting twist on dessert that is sure to impress! Enjoy

Keep cookin' y'all!