Asian Bacon and Pork "Pops"

Here is another great recipe inspired by FN's magazine. We eat a lot of Italian and Mexican food, so I was excited to make something with an Asian flair. And the lemongrass skewers made it seem just a little bit gourmet!

Asian Bacon and Pork "Pops"

adapted by Erin from The Food Network Magazine

1/2 lb bacon, trimmed of excess fat

1 lb ground pork

1 t sesame oil

2 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped

1/4 c loosely packed fresh cilantro

1 to 1 1/2 inch piece of ginger, peeled and cut into small chunks

1 lime, zested

1 1/2 T low-sodium soy sauce

lemongrass

store-bought sweet chili sauce, for dipping

Preheat broiler. In a food processor, combine, bacon, pork, sesame oil, garlic, cilantro, ginger, lime zest, and soy sauce. Pulse to finely chop and combine well. Pause to scrape down sides as needed. (By using a food processor, the meat mixture is very fine and somewhat crumbly. If you want it to be chunkier, you can finely chop everything by hand. With a baby, I didn't have time to do that!)

Mold the mixture into golf ball sized meatballs. Thread a skewer about halfway through the meatball and press the meat mixture down the skewer to form a torpedo-shaped meat patty.

Place the pops onto a foil covered baking sheet and broil 3-5 minutes per side or until golden browned. Serve with store-bought sweet chili sauce for dipping.

*If you're using lemongrass, trim the stalks into 4-inch pieces. If the stalks are thick, you can slice them lengthwise to create more skewers. My lemongrass skewers got a little singed while broiling. As an experiment, I used some wooden skewers (that I had soaked in water for about an hour) since lemongrass can get expensive when you need so much of it. The wooden skewers caught on fire in the first few minutes, and I had remove them from the oven. So don't use wooden skewers! Next time if I feel like the lemongrass is too expensive, I'll probably just roll them into meatballs and forego the skewers altogether.