If there is one immutable law in this house, it is that finger food is always going to disappear like David Copperfield. Anything that is bite-sized, little, on a stick or otherwise easily portable, or shove-into-the-mouth-able is going to be an easy sale.
With Super Sunday—the crowned jewel of the snack food calendar—right around the corner, I’m assembling my master plan for feeding my football-crazy crew keeping them happy, whatever the outcome of the game. We have some tried and true recipes that cannot be left off of the menu (chicken wings, soft pretzel wrapped smoked sausages, dill pickle dip, and more…), but each year we add a fun new recipe or two to the rotation. This year’s star addition is Cheeseburger Bites from the Land O’Lakes Big Game Recipe Collection of simple, crowd-pleasing recipes.
I made this recipe to have on hand for the webinar I co-hosted with Amber from the Land O’Lakes test kitchen this past Friday. A girl has to keep her energy up while she’s chatting up a virtual room full of fabulous bloggers, right? Hi. I’m Rebecca, I’m a stress eater.”
Here’s the point. I made them, put them on the counter, and found five little men at my elbows giving me the usual shake-down: “What’s that?”, “Is that meat?”, “Can I eat one?”, “Can I eat four?”, “Can I eat all of them?”
Before I knew what had happened, three-quarters of the platter was empty.
I only had a handful of Cheeseburger Bites and a bowlful of dark chocolate chunks and pretzels in my lap to sustain me. Poor me.
Crispy, simple wonton cups filled with melty, cheesy good cheeseburger filling. Garnish with chopped pickles and sesame seeds for a super Super Bowl (or any game day!) treat.
Ever so gently adapted from and with thanks to the Land O'Lakes Test Kitchen recipe
Ingredients
- 36-48 wonton wrappers trimmed to 3-inch squares
- nonstick cooking spray
- 1 pound lean ground beef
- 1/2 cup finely minced or grated onion
- 1 clove of garlic, peeled and minced or pressed (or 1/4 teaspoon of garlic powder)
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper, preferably freshly ground
- 1 cup finely chopped dill pickles, divided
- 1/2 cup milk
- 14 slices Land O Lakes Deli American
- toasted sesame seeds, for garnish
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350°F with a rack positioned in the middle of the oven.
Lightly spray mini-muffin pans with non-stick cooking spray. Gently press one trimmed wonton square into each muffin cup.
Place pan in the center of the oven rack and bake for 5-10 minutes, watching carefully as they burn easily!
Immediately turn the wonton cups out onto a cooling rack to cool completely. While they cool, turn your attention to the filling.
Add the minced onion, garlic, and black pepper to a small frying or sautee pan. Use your hands to break up the ground beef over the onion and cook over medium heat, breaking the beef down into very small pieces with a sturdy spoon, until it is cooked through and browned. Tear up the slices of American cheese and add them to the pan along with the milk. Continue cooking, stirring to help the process, until the cheese is completely melted and the mixture is creamy. At this point, you can remove some of the mixture for anyone who is not a pickle fiend. To the remaining cheesy beef mixture, add about 1/2 cup of the chopped pickles and stir them in well. Spoon the mixture into the wonton cups and garnish with the rest of the chopped pickles and a sprinkling of toasted sesame seeds.
Serve immediately.
Notes
I made a couple of tweaks to the original Land O'Lakes Test Kitchen recipe to suit our family's tastes. Instead of lettuce, we garnished the cheeseburger bites with additional chopped pickles. Because of this added salty component, I omitted the salt called for in the recipe. Additionally, I upped the cheese, because really? How can you go wrong with more cheese? And for no reason other than that I love my cheeseburgers with a hint of garlic and a belt of black pepper, I added garlic and increased the amount of black pepper. We loved it!
Lack of snacks for me aside, the webinar was a hoot. It was my first time on the co-hosting end of one and I have to say it was a real treat to get to interact with so many talented people from the blogosphere.
I really showed my true nerd colours and I admitted to “MacGyvering” my way through dinner parties by using a garden-variety heating pad disguised by a not-yet-ruined-by-boys hand towel to keep a platter of hot appetizers warm. Yeah. I did that. And not only did no one tell me I was nuts, someone actually told me it was a good idea.
My word, you people are the whole package.
Speaking of packages, participating bloggers were given a sweet prize package to give away to readers, self included! These prize packages -I think you’ll agree- are pretty darned fabulous.
- One large serving platter, one Emile Henry pizza stone and one coupon for
Land O Lakes® Deli Cheese and one insulated shopping bag. As Amber from the Test Kitchen shared with us, she uses the insulated grocery bag to carry hot appetizers to friends’ parties. BRILLIANT!
Would you like to win one of these packages for yourself? Here’s how to enter!
MANDATORY ENTRY: Leave a comment here sharing your favourite munchies for game day or any occasion. If your family is insane over the dish, maybe you could even leave some instructions here. Hint hint…
OPTIONAL ENTRIES (Be sure to leave a separate comment for each method you use so you’re sure to get credit for each one.)
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The Pick Giveaway Winner plugin chose ‘seas’ as our winner on Wednesday, January 30, 2013. Please check your email for details!
Hungry for more chances to win? Visit any of these fantastic bloggers who participated in our webinar to enter their giveaways!
Disclosure: I’ve partnered with Land O Lakes® Deli Cheese. This blog post is sponsored by Land O’Lakes.
Sounds like my kind of game day snack – among many! I like to make a hot cheesy artichoke dip when we celebrate.
I just adore mini food! The cheeseburger bites look delicious. As for game day snacks, hot queso and chips is pretty hard to beat!
7-layer dip
Great superb bites. Too good.
Ground beef and cheese nachos.
Mexican Cheesecake (actually a dip).
Little spinach balls.
Cheese and crackers.
Hot artichoke dip.
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My family loves spicy pigs in blankets, I make them with Sriracha sauce and serve them with ranch for dipping.
Liked you on Facebook as Elena Vo
Chicken Curry Puffs. Oh my, they are good. You assemble and then toast them for 5 minutes before serving, and they are gone in a flash!
and I superlike you on facebook! Oh yeah, I tried some of that happy lady crunchy chile sauce on some jap chae, let me tell you, a little goes a LONG way. Cleared the sinuses!
ooh, and I now follow you on pinterest. Whoo-hoo! One of my go-to potluck contributions to a superbowl festivity is the restaurant style salsa (with restaurant style tortilla chips, of course). Love it! Have two bottles of it in the fridge now. Mmmm.
We love to make plantain fritters with cinnamon and brown sugar and pancake batter for game day!
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i love making spinache and artichoke dip for the big game
guacamole, I don’t think game day would be the same without it!
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It has to be good old 7 layer bean dip.
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I LOVE Ina Garten’s guacamole, with chips of course…
I like to make a taco salad and sometimes I make taco wonton bites. your bites sound really good, I will have to try them.
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I like crab dip with crab, cream cheese and diced onions.
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This reminds me of a recipe I got from Parade magazine years ago. It was circles of white bread, flattened and toasted (like the wonton wrappers), and then filled with what was basically sausage gravy–heavy on the sausage. That’s comfort food.
This looks so fun…thanks for posting it. One of our favorite snacks is to do the Tostito scoops as mini taco bites.
we love lil smokies wrapped in bacon
Chili !
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