Matt's ABTs

ABTs, or Atomic Buffalo Turds have been around for awhile. They are especially popular with the owners of smokers because they can be cooked low and slow and get a nice smokey flavor added to them. That does not mean you can not do them on your Weber kettle grill or gas grill too, just remember to try to cook them slowly and make sure to account for the bacon fat that will render out of them.



This recipe will make between 32 and 40 servings, depending on how many slices of bacon you get out of your package. You may want to count them, and then go get the jalapeno peppers in the produce department. Remember, you will be cutting the bacon slices in half just like you will be cutting the peppers, so you need the same number of whole peppers a whole bacon slices.

INGREDIENTS

   16-18 Jalapeno Peppers, medium size
   1lb Thick Sliced Bacon, 16-18 slices
   14 oz. Hillshire Farms Beef Lit'l Smokies (about 40 sausages)
   1 lb Cream Cheese
   2 Tbs. Hot Sauce
   2 tsp Garlic powder
   dash finely ground Cayenne Pepper
   Toothpicks (non colored)

DIRECTIONS

Take the cream cheese out of the fridge and unwrap and place in a bowl to allow it to come to room temperature while we prepare the peppers. Use kitchen shears and snip off any stem that is left on the peppers. Take each pepper and split it in half lengthwise with a knife.

Use a teaspoon or grapefruit spoon to scoop out the white membranes and seeds from the pepper halves.

Add the hot sauce, garlic and cayenne pepper to the cream cheese and use a fork to mix it up. Taste and see if it needs more cayenne pepper or hot sauce. If you prefer mild ABT, leave out the cayenne pepper and substitute milk for the hot sauce.

Open the package of bacon and cut the entire package in half. Open the package of Lit'l Smokies and drain.

ASSEMBLY

Use a small butter knife and spread some of the cream cheese mixture into each pepper half, leaving a little trough for the sausage to fit in. Place one of the mini sausages onto each one of the filled pepper halves. Then take one of the 1/2 slices of bacon and wrap the pepper/cream cheese/sausage with it. Use a tooth pick at the start shoved in diagonally to secure the start of the bacon and another one diagonally again to secure the end of the bacon. Do this for each 1/2 pepper.

COOKING (SMOKER)

Setup your smoker for 225 °F and smoke the ABTs for about 2 1/2 hours over any type of smoke you prefer. Make sure that you put them over a drip pan. When done, the peppers will be soft but not mushy and the bacon will be pretty crispy.

Remove them from the smoker and let them cool for a little while. Twist and slide the tooth picks out and then place the ABTs on a tray for serving (if you can get them that far).

COOKING (ALTERNATE)

If you have a gas grill or a webber kettle, you can use that too, just setup your grill for indirect cooking.
If you do not have a smoker or grill, you can bake them in the oven at 225 on a rack, they won't be as smokey, but they will still be good.