Bacon Wrapped Mini Peppers

These are built like bacon-wrapped jalapeño poppers, but with mini sweet peppers in place of the jalapeños. If you don’t love spicy food, they give you the same bacon and cream cheese combination without the heat.

The sweet peppers are stuffed with seasoned cream cheese, wrapped in bacon, then baked until crispy.

They work for a holiday party or game day. You can prepare them in advance. They also travel well in a container with a lid.

If you have more mini peppers to use up, try my Everything Bagel Mini Pepper Boats and Bacon And Chive Mini Pepper Poppers next.

💛 Why you’ll love this recipe

• A less spicy alternative to the crowd-favorite jalapeño poppers.
• The Everything Bagel dip comes together while the peppers bake.
• Can be made and served in less than 1 hour.
• A fun and easy party appetizer.

➡️ Ingredients

Bacon Wrapped Mini Peppers:

• Bacon slices
• Mini sweet peppers
• Cream cheese
• Finely shredded cheddar cheese
• Salt-Free Everything Bagel Seasoning (do not use traditional storebought Everything Bagel seasoning; if you do, the peppers will be too salty. You can buy salt-free seasoning on Amazon (linked) or see the FAQs section or the Notes section in the recipe card below for how to make an easy homemade salt-free version)

Everything Bagel Dip:

• Mayo
• Sour cream
• Heavy cream
• Salt-Free Everything Bagel Seasoning

(Need ingredient substitution suggestions? See that section below for my recommendations.)

⏲ How to make bacon wrapped peppers

This is an overview of the recipe’s instructions. The full instructions can be found in the recipe card at the bottom of this post.

1. Prepare And Start Cooking Bacon: Bake the bacon slices in a 425°F oven for 7 minutes.
2. Prepare Mini Peppers: Cut the mini peppers in half lengthwise then de-seed and de-vein them.
3. Prepare Cream Cheese Filling: Mix together some cream cheese, the shredded cheddar cheese, and Everything Bagel seasoning (salt-free).
4. Fill Each Pepper Half With Cream Cheese Filling: Using a small spoon, fill each pepper half with the filling. (If you have extra filling left over, set it aside for now.)

5. Take Bacon Out Of Oven: Remove the slightly-cooked bacon from the oven, but don’t turn the oven off. Transfer the bacon to a paper towel-lined plate and allow it to cool slightly.
6. Wrap Slightly-Cooked Bacon Around Stuffed Mini Peppers And Bake: Wrap each pepper half with a slice of bacon and secure it with a toothpick. Make sure the toothpick is inserted horizontally, then set each filling side-up (to ensure the filling remains inside of the pepper while baking) atop the same baking sheet used to cook the bacon. Transfer the baking sheet back to the oven and bake until the bacon is crispy, 18 to 25 minutes depending on how thick the bacon is. If you want the bacon to be crispier, you can broil it in the oven. Carefully transfer the baking sheet to the highest oven rack, turn on the broiler, and broil for 1-2 minutes. Be sure to watch the peppers very carefully if you do this, because they can burn quickly (as can the parchment paper) under the broiler.
7. Prepare Everything Bagel Dip: Meanwhile, while the peppers bake, prepare the Everything Bagel dip by stirring together some mayo, sour cream, heavy cream, and Everything Bagel seasoning (again, be sure this is salt-free seasoning). If you had extra cream cheese filling, you can mix it in with the dip, so long as you’re sure it didn’t come into contact with any raw or undercooked bacon. Transfer the dip to the refrigerator to chill while the peppers finish baking.
8. Final Steps Then Serve: Once the bacon is crispy, you can remove the peppers from the oven, remove the toothpicks from each pepper, and then serve with the prepared dipping sauce.

👉 Ingredient substitution suggestions

• Bacon: Turkey bacon will work, or you could try pancetta. Note that either of these options may be thinner than pork bacon, so you may need to use more than 1 slice.
• Cream Cheese: You can use vegan cream cheese or, if you can eat nuts, almond cream cheese at a 1:1 ratio.
• Cheddar Cheese: Use any finely shredded cheese you have on hand. Shredded Colby or Colby-Jack would be my suggestions.
• Salt-Free Everything Bagel Seasoning: I buy mine on Amazon. If you don’t want to purchase it online, you can make your own salt-free seasoning at home by following the instructions in the FAQs section below. Alternatively, you can altogether omit this ingredient; if you do, you’ll probably want to add a sprinkle of salt and pepper to the cream cheese mixture and to the dipping sauce.
• Mayonnaise: Full-fat Greek yogurt can be used here.
• Sour Cream: Use full-fat Greek yogurt in place of sour cream.
• Heavy Cream: Use 1 tablespoon of melted butter in place of heavy cream.

✨ Variations

• Skip slicing the peppers in half and, instead, stuff the peppers using a piping bag. If you do this, I would suggest doubling all of the ingredients in the recipe so that you’ll yield 10 mini peppers (instead of 5).

〰️ How to serve the peppers

• If you’re serving these at a party, arrange the prepared peppers on a platter with the prepared dip in a small ceramic bowl. It would be easiest to have a small serving spatula alongside the platter so that guests can easily grab 1 or 2 of the peppers, but toothpicks in a dish for them to grab would work, too. Be sure to also have a spoon in the dip bowl for guests to serve themselves.
• This appetizer also goes well with a refreshing holiday drink like this champagne margarita, bourbon lemonade, passion fruit mojito, or lemon drop shot.

➜ Cooking and recipe tips

• Sweet mini peppers are often sold in bags at the grocery store in the produce section. When you’re choosing which peppers to use from the bag, try and pick the biggest ones, which will make stuffing the cream cheese filling into them a lot easier.
• You don’t need to remove every seed and vein of the peppers. It’s totally safe to eat these parts of the pepper. Plus, since mini peppers aren’t spicy like jalapenos, leaving a few seeds won’t affect the spice level of the stuffed peppers.
• If you want the peppers to be on the softer side, you can choose to parboil them before stuffing them, but this isn’t necessary. If, however, you want to go this route, bring a pot of water to a boil, pour in the halved mini peppers, and boil for about 2 minutes. They won’t need long. Then, using a slotted spoon, transfer the peppers to an ice bath (a bowl of water with lots of ice cubes in it). Let the peppers fully cool before stuffing them with the cream cheese mixture.
• Use thinly-cut bacon. This will ensure the bacon cooks up quickly and is crispy. If you can only find bacon that is thicker-cut, increase the cooking time of when you initially cook it by about 5 minutes. Then, once the peppers are wrapped in the bacon and have finished baking, you can consider turning the oven broiler on and placing the bacon-wrapped peppers under the broiler for 1-2 minutes to finish crisping up (just be sure to watch them very carefully, because they can burn easily).

💬 FAQs

📚 More appetizer recipes

• Halloumi Fries
• Bacon Pickle Boats Stuffed With Cream Cheese
• Buffalo Chicken Tenders
• Chicken Bacon Ranch Poppers
• Taco Dip With Cream Cheese