Creamy Jalapeno Sauce

On a lark, I tried Starbucks’s Chicken Jalapeno Pocket. It was earth-shatteringly tasty and became a hyperfixation food for me.

Orange tortilla pita of creamy jalapeno chicken

I immediately looked up copy-cat jalapeno sauce recipes online. I cobbled together rough estimates of how to recreate it with more Greek yogurt (lower calorie) and using an airfryer (I don’t trust myself to not set my house on fire by roasting pepeprs over the stove).

It’s so yummy, I don’t even bother with pepperjack cheese on my tacos anymore, though that certainly enhances the wonderful jalapeno flavor.

I’m not a cooking blogger with ads, so here’s the recipe:

incredients laid out on a counter that include 2 poblano peppers, 5 jalapeno peppers, a cilantro bunch, a knife, a cutting board, a tupperware, olive oil, a mason jar, non-fat plain greek yogurt, philadelphia jalapeno cream cheese, garlic powder, siesel's seasoning, and a blender

Art in the background by Naomi Vandoren

INGREDIENTS:

I make 2 batches at once, and it yields about 20 ounces of sauce. It takes about 40 min to make, but 15min of that is the airfryer just cooking, and 2 batches lasts me roughly 2 weeks of daily use. If you want to make 2 batches, just double everything below:

1 poblano pepper
2 jalapenos (2.5 per batch if doing 2 batches)
6T non-fat plain Greek yogurt (I use Fage brand)
4T Philadelphia spicy jalapeno cream cheese (it’s the lowest calorie brand I could find at my store)
Cilantro to taste (doesn’t need a ton, but it’s to taste–if you have the soap-taste gene, it’s perfectly fine without cilantro)
A neutral oil (I use olive oil)
A pinch of garlic powder
A pinch of salt/pepper (I use Siesel’s seasoning on everything instead of salt/pepper because it’s *chef’s kiss* (and local to San Diego!) – made of garlic salt, onion salt, celery salt, and pepper)

PROCESS:

Roast the jalapeno and poblano peppers

Cut the jalapenos in half and de-seed them. In making the batch for pictures, I tried 1 poblano with the end cut off, and one whole. I recommend whole because the seeds just fell out like goop afterwards, while the cut open one’s seeds were toasty and stubborn. It’s not a difference in flavor that I noticed, purely efficiency.

Coat the outsides of the peppers in oil and, if you’re using an airfryer, put them in at 400 degrees Farenheit for 15 minutes. Turn the poblano peppers over about halfway through to help with toasting. If you forget, it’s fine (trust me, I’ve forgotten).

Bottom left picture: halfway point: the Jalapenos still look fresh and firm.

Bottom right picture: after 15 min, they’re well and truly roasted.

Take the peppers out and chuck them into a lidded tupperware or ziploc bag to steam a bit. This makes them easier to peel later. I use tupperware because they always come out really hot and I don’t want to risk melting the bag. Probably wouldn’t be an issue (since every cooking site suggests a bag), but you do you, boo.

Steam the peppers

I (personally) don’t see much of a visual difference before and after steaming, but I also like to give them a chance to cool down since I’ll be mixing them with cream cheese and Greek yogurt anyway.

peppers fresh out of roasting in the airfryer and into a tupperware container to steam

Steam the peppers to cool and loosen their skins for peeling

Peel the peppers

I HIGHLY recommend gloves for this. Mainly because it’s gooey (and the peppers are still hot–especially inside the poblanos if you didn’t cut the top off).

Yeah, just peel the skins off like a bad sunburn. Super gross, but worth it. Below there’s a comparison of an unpeeled and a peeled poblano. If you have a small blender, sort them out by batch (2.5 jalapeno to 1 poblano). If you have a big blender, chuck it all in together.

Peel the skin off the peppers as best you can

Comparison of an unpeeled and a peeled poblano pepper

Separate the peppers into batch quantities (2.5 jalapeno to 1 poblano)

Add the ingredients to the blender.

If you’re using a small bullet blender like me, just know that the cream cheese is really dense, so I recommend putting it in the middle, with looser/softer items at either end. It may take some shaking to get everything blended. It turns more liquid-y the longer you blend it. Trust the process!

For some reason, the first batch I make always ends up looking like less than 10 ounces, but the same ingredients 2x always makes 20 ounces for me. Probably just because it’s slowly dripping down the inside. I don’t know; it’s magic.