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When I first saw the recipe for grilled bacon wrapped onion rings a few years ago I was intrigued. Since most of you know by now I’m not one that has mastered the grill (kinda hard when Mr. Fantabulous and I go round and round about my buying a BBQ and him saying he’ll just build me one… for the past 8 years) a girl has to improvise those grilled techniques. I’ve made bacon wrapped onion rings a bunch of times, and while they were good – I mean seriously it’s bacon after all and ANYTHING WRAPPED IN BACON is awesome. I think I’d even like cucka bleu cheese wrapped in bacon.. maybe. Heck I might even try a bacon wrapped cherry.
Um… on second thought. No, no I wouldn’t. Cherries are just the seeds from Satan. *shudder* Anyway, recently another site posted the grilled version of the wrapped onion ring and all of you kept asking me where was my version since you know Sriracha and bacon are my two food loves. As I said, I tried and tried a few times but it just was.. okay. And you all know me, I don’t do just ‘okay’ when it comes to food. I want to blow your mind and rock your world. Well FINALLY I figured out what was missing and seriously I literally said “OMFG” out loud in my kitchen this morning when I took that very first bite. That was it! The missing ingredient! Funny thing was, I had this flavor combination for years. Heck, it’s one of my most popular recipes and has been featured on countless cooking shows, food blogs, repinned, downloaded and shared millions of times. What was it? MAN CANDY baby! Man Candy II to be exact!
Yeah… see that plate?
Yeah I ate the ENTIRE plate for breakfast and I am not apologizing one stinking minute! I’d do it again (and most likely will!).
See every other single time I made these it was just bacon, onions and Sriracha. It was heat and salt but there was no balance. It was off kilter. It was good, don’t get me wrong, but the flavor profile wasn’t finished. It was like being at a hockey game, eating your nachos with cheese, finishing up a hot dog and stopping. No beer to finish off that meal. It just wasn’t … done.
You were left with that “it’s missing something” taste in your mouth. And if you’re a cook like me, that’s enough to drive you nuts.
Now I will give you a fair bit of warning, just like I did when I posted the Man Candy II recipe, as this cooks the heat from the Sriracha sauce can make your eyes water, when you stick your head in the oven to flip these (like I did.. stupid move). Take the pan out of the oven, close the door and then flip (carefully). Let’s just say my waterproof mascara was put to the test but dear God it was so worth it!
As these cook the onions get soft to the point they seem like the almost melt inside the bacon when you bite into them. I mean you still have your full onion but they are so soft and tender which is perfect for me who has texture issues. See I like cooked onions but I still get wigged out (hello early 2000’s calling, we want our phrase back!) when I bite in to an onion ring, the breading breaks and I’m left with this chunk of onion sticking out of my mouth. This gags me to the point I can’t eat anymore of them.
However with these, I had NO problem engulfing these puppies! Trust me, if I had more I would have eaten the entire lot of ’em.
*mental note* get 5lbs of onions for next weekend!
As these cook, the bacon renders its juices and the brown sugar starts to caramelize. The Sriracha flavors are infused into the onion and what comes out of your oven is pure perfection! Now I’m going to tell you this now (and in the recipe), you NEED to let these rest for a few minutes after you take them out of the oven. Just like the Man Candy, they are soft but will crisp up very quickly when you remove them from the cooling rack. I know it’ll be hard but just wait a few minutes. Plus they are hot as can be! Trust me, you don’t want to burn the roof of your mouth as you won’t be able to enjoy these.
Hmmm.. on second thought, if you burn your mouth I can give you ice cubes… and eat these for you. I mean I wouldn’t want them going to waste! *wink*
Okay seriously as I’m sitting here writing up this post my stomach is GROWLING .. and I had dinner! I’m so kicking myself in the butt right now for not making a double batch of these! This is one of those recipes where I cannot wait to people over to make these! These will be the hit of your summer parties guaranteed! HA! Wait who am I kidding? I don’t need company to make these! Monday night baby – we have a date! I’m so craving these right now!
I see this recipe going viral overnight an rightly so! This is a game changer when it comes to creating recipes! GAME ON folks! It’s BACON TIME!
- Author: The Kitchen Whisperer
Find more fantabulous recipes, tips and tricks at www.thekitchenwhisperer.net. Also, join our TKW Family on Facebook
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Ingredients
- 2 large Vidalia onions, peeled and cut into 1/2” rings (do not separate rings)
- 3 tablespoon Sriracha
- 1 1/2 cups light brown sugar
- 16 slices of bacon
- Wooden skewers (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400F, rack in the middle.
- Line a baking sheet with foil and place a cooling rack on top.
- Lightly spray the cooling rack.
- Place the brown sugar in a pie tin.
- Place the Sriracha in a bowl.
- Gently separate the onion rings leaving 2 rings together (you want to double up on the onions when you wrap them). For this dish you want the larger rings. The smaller, inner rings you can set aside and use in another dish.
- Take 2 strips of bacon and coat each side with brown sugar (doesn’t have to be caked on but coated evenly).
- If your hands are sensitive, put on plastic gloves and using a pastry brush or rubber tipped brush, baste the Sriracha on all sides of the onion rings (leaving the 2 together).
- Starting at one end of the bacon, snuggly but gently wrap the bacon around the onion ring slightly overlapping itself. You should be able to get half way around (again, depends on how big your rings are).
- Take the second piece of bacon and place one end over top of the previous piece of bacon (where you left off) and continue wrapping until you have completely wrapped the onion ring in bacon.
- If you wish at this point you can skewer the bacon in place (I didn’t).
- Place end side down on the rack and continue wrapping the rest of the rings. For the smaller rings I used 1 1/2 slices of bacon. You really don’t want to overload this with bacon as you want the bacon to cook evenly.
- Once all the rings are wrapped, place in the oven and bake for 20 minutes.
- Using tongs GENTLY flip over.
- Cook for another 15-20 minutes. The last 3 minutes I broiled them as I wanted that charred appearance.
- Remove from the oven and immediately plate. They will be soft so be careful but the bacon will crisp up and they will become crispy crunchy.
Notes
Side note: To help with cleanup, have a sink of hot soapy water ready that you can immediately put your cooling rack in. Don’t let this stuff dry on the rack as it’s a pain to get off. Soaking it for 15 minutes will take it off really easily.
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