Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
Guest Chef Heather
That’s not advice you will traditionally find in a fortune cookie but as a card carrying member of the ‘smoke your own meat’ fan club, I promise you that you will never hear a truer statement.
In many families the man is the primary carnivore and the one for playing with large instruments of fire. In this house, that person would be me.. but on a much smaller, I dare say petite, scale. We have a big, beautiful gas grill on our deck that has never once been lit just for the simple fact that I am convinced that I will blow the house up if I light it. Don’t think I haven’t Googled the proper way to light a gas grill or that I don’t have a neighbor who hasn’t offered to show me the proper method, including all rules, etiquette and handling of accessories. No, I just have an irrational fear of hearing that Ka-Boom and watching my wood planked house go up in a fiery ball of my own bad judgement.
And oh my goodness, wouldn’t I never hear the end of THAT from Big Scary Mike.
All that being said, what lives next to my big, beautiful gas grill is a little black domed apparatus that I break out the first day that temperatures warm up and Spring weather arrives. My smoker! It’s small and charcoal briquette driven, nothing that I could possibly explode or cause inferno mayhem in the neighborhood. I bought my smoker on a whim, one of those “Hey honey, we should buy a smoker” random moments, assuming that my husbands testosterone would quickly take the little smoker away from me and I would be served delicious varieties of smoked everything by my hard-smoking husband as I floated my raft around my pool, sipping margaritas.
Reality check.
My husband works 65 hours a week and hates being anywhere that air conditioning is not.
So, with that dream squashed, I moved on to the next. Talk about trial and error… you can read as many instructions on how to smoke meat as you want, until you resign yourself to making mistakes, you will never learn. As a very impatient person, the hardest lesson I have had to learn in relation to smoking food is this … time. You can’t throw a pork butt on the smoker and expect it to be done in three hours. Clear your day, buy a six pack and plan on babysitting that piggy for ten hours, minimum. At the end of the day, you will be rewarded with a level of deliciousness that you will brag about for weeks. Your Facebook friends will quickly tire of your pictures and boasting but who cares???? You have smoked pork!!!
So all of this is leading up to the recipe I am about to share with you. I smoked a pork butt earlier in the week and wanted to try something new with the leftovers. They usually are delegated to Nacho Patrol (don’t get me started on how good smoked pork is on a big plate of cheesy nachos) but I wanted to come up with something different this time. The idea of egg rolls seemed like a logical one and since they are primarily made with chicken, using pork instead would be daring new adventure. Yes, yes… I just elevated the egg roll up to a James Bond movie type experience.
Try these and tell me they’re not!
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
A Guest Chef Recipe
Start by making your egg roll filing. Add all ingredients, except the egg and egg roll wrappers, into a large bowl and combine until all items are evenly incorporated.
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Roll Stuffing
In a small bowl, break open the egg and lightly beat. Lay your egg roll wrappers in front of you at a diagonal angle.
Egg Roll Wrappers
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
A Guest Chef Recipe
Spoon a heavy amount of filling into the middle of the wrapper and spread it out across until it almost reaches the sides of the wrapper.
Add Stuffing
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
A Guest Chef Recipe
Fold up your bottom, then each side and then dip a finger into the egg and run it along the edge of the top corner.
Fold
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
A Guest Chef Recipe
Fold
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
A Guest Chef Recipe
Roll until sealed and set aside until you have made all of your egg rolls.
Lookin Good
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
A Guest Chef Recipe
Pour the canola oil into a large pan and heat to medium high. When your oil is hot (very hot!) add in your egg rolls one at a time, seam side down. You don’t want to over crowd the pan so be sure to work them in batches. Every minute or so turn your egg rolls on a different side until they are all golden brown and delicious. Remove them to a drain on a paper towel lined plate.
I absolutely love this recipe! Now, obviously not everyone has a smoker so you can just as easily use pulled pork that’s been simmering in your crock pot all day or baked chicken or even leave the meat out all together and go vegetarian style. One added bonus to this recipe is that you also don’t need to fry them. If you are not a fan of frying, these are delicious baked. Set your oven to 400 degrees and bake them on a greased cookie sheet for about 20 minutes, turning them over half way through.
I hope you give these a try and if you enjoy the taste of smoked food and don’t already own a smoker, please look into purchasing one. They are not very expensive and trust me, you will never have a better summer.
Plus there is nothing better than torturing your entire neighborhood with the smell of smoking pork for 10 hours, knowing all they have to look forward to is calling for pizza. Opps.. that was mean, wasn’t it? Ha!
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
A Guest Chef Recipe
- 2 1/2 cups smoked pork, diced
- 1 – 15 oz can corn, drained
- 1 – 15 oz can black beans, drained and rinsed
- 1 – 4 oz can green chilis
- 1/2 cup red onion, diced
- 1 jalapeno, diced – seeds and membrane removed
- 2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese
- 6 slices crispy bacon, diced
- 1 pkg frozen spinach, thawed
- 1/4 cup cilantro, diced
- 1 tsp chili powder
- 1 tsp cumin
- 1/2 tsp ground red pepper
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp pepper
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 1 egg, beaten
- 1 package 6 inch egg roll wrappers
- 1/2 cup canola oil
Instructions
- Add all ingredients except the egg and wrappers into a large bowl
- Combine until all ingredients are well mixed
- In a small bowl, break open the egg and lightly beat.
- Lay your egg roll wrappers in front of you at a diagonal angle.
- Spoon a heavy amount of filling into the middle of the wrapper and spread it out across until it almost reaches the sides of the wrapper.
- Fold up your bottom, then each side and then dip a finger into the egg and run it along the edge of the top corner.
- Complete rolling your egg roll until sealed and set aside until you have made all of your egg rolls.
- Add canola oil into a large pan and heat to medium high.
- When your oil is hot add in your egg rolls one at a time, seam side down.
- Turn your egg rolls in the pan until they are golden brown on all sides.
- Remove them to a drain on a paper towel lined plate
Smoked Pork Southwest Egg Rolls
A Guest Chef Recipe
Let’s Eat !!!
Hi!! My name is Heather and I am the happy (and very tired!) Momma of three boxers … Nova, Haley and Ziva aka The Baby and a big ole hooch dog named Porkchop. My day job consists of doing full-time medical collections for a large, nationwide hospital corporation and when I am not chained to my cubicle, the rest of my life is dedicated to my husband and my pack of pups. I am an avid Halloween junkie, an amateur photographer, a lover of good food, a die-hard Florida State Seminoles football fan and a firm believer that the world stops making sense for seven months of the year when there is no college football to be watched .
