Bacon Wrapped Potatoes with Queso Blanco Dip

♥  Happy Valentine's Day, my loves! ♥

While I'm not sharing a Valentine's-related recipe today, I do love you. So I had to bring you something good to eat to show you just how much I love you.  

No those are not bacon-wrapped apples you're seeing. Though that's not a bad idea....

 

























































Those are bacon-wrapped potatoes.

 

Bacon + Potatoes + Cheese. These are a few of my favorite things. *In my Sound of Music singing voice. 

Side note, I watched like 5 minutes of the new Sound of Music musical and man, I like Carrie Underwood and all, but it was pretty bad. Can't replace Julie Andrews.

Anyways, back to my favorite things.... Bacon + Potatoes + Cheese.

We made these for Super Bowl and I'm just now posting them! Silly me. I've been holding out on you guys. Sorry bout that. 

But they're worth the wait. I mean, can you really go wrong with bacon-wrapped potatoes dipped in a queso cheese dip? 

The answer is no.

Bacon Wrapped Potatoes with Queso Blanco Dip

adapted from Southern Living December 2012

• 2 medium red potatoes, cut into 8 wedges each
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• *16 center-cut bacon slices (we used 8 long slices, cut in half)
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1/2 red onion, diced
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 12 ounces Velveeta Queso Blanco pasteurized prepared cheese product, cubed
• 1 (8-oz) block pepper jack cheese, shredded
• 1/2 cup half and half
• 1 (4-oz) can chopped green chiles
• 1 Roma tomato, diced
• 1/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped

Line a baking sheet or jelly roll pan with aluminum foil. Lightly grease a wire rack and place it in the foil-lined baking sheet.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Sprinkle potato wedges with salt. Wrap each potato wedge with 1/2 or 1 bacon slice (your preference). Arrange potato wedges in a single layer in prepared pan. Sprinkle with pepper.

Bake for 35-40 minutes or until bacon is brown and cooked through.

Meanwhile, saute onion in butter in a medium skillet over medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until tender. Add garlic and cook for another minute. Remove from heat.

Combine queso blanco, shredded pepper jack cheese, half and half, green chiles and onion mixture in a large microwave-safe bowl. Microwave for 2 and a 1/2 minutes. Stir and microwave 2 and a 1/2 more minutes or until cheese is melted and mixture is smooth, stirring at 1-minute intervals.

Stir diced tomato and cilantro into queso blanco mixture. Serve dip with potato wedges. 


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I can't believe I'm about to say this, but I used less bacon than the recipe called for. **GASP!** I know, I was in shock too. I don't even know who I am anymore. I use center-cut bacon that are really long slices so I just cut them in half and wrapped them around each potato wedge, so I only used 8 slices of bacon instead of 16. A grad student's gotta save on money when she can! But there's also no such thing as too much bacon. Next time I think I'm gonna splurge and try each wedge with one whole slice of bacon each.

I burnt my potatoes a little bit because I just baked em for the whole time without checking them first, plus I baked them for the full 45 minutes the recipe called for. I changed the timing in this recipe to 35-40 minutes. Even if they burn a little bit, they're still good. But you don't want that bacon to get too dried out. Even cooked the whole 45 minutes, these were still gobbled up in no time.

I could seriously eat the bacon-wrapped potatoes alone, but the queso dip definitely brings it up a notch. See for yourself.


Linking up here.


Peace, and bacon grease!