This 2-Ingredient Appetizer Starts With Bacon And Makes Hosting Easier Than Ever

Bacon makes most things better, whether it's a loaded baked potato or a cheeseburger. So, a two-ingredient appetizer that starts with bacon is already a promising endeavor. And the other ingredient is cheese! Not only is the combo of cheese and bacon already a famous flavor pairing, but these are also two high-protein and high-fat ingredients that are carb-free and keto-friendly. Both ingredients crisp up beautifully in the oven, making them the perfect duo to transform into crackers.

To make these keto-friendly, two-ingredient cheese and bacon crisps, preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. You'll need pre-cooked bacon and shredded cheddar cheese to make these crackers. You can shred your own cheese for maximum freshness or use pre-shredded cheese for convenience. Chop the bacon with a knife or food processor before adding it to a bowl with the shredded cheese, mixing to combine. Then spread a thin layer of the cheese and bacon mixture to the bottom of a silicon muffin tin for uniform cracker shapes. Slide the muffin tin into the oven to crisp up for 6 to 9 minutes. After letting the crackers cool, pop them out of the muffin molds and enjoy!

You can also make the crisps larger, using a parchment paper-lined baking sheet if you don't have a silicone muffin pan. You can use a cookie cutter or your own hands to form larger rounds with the cheese and bacon mixture; however, you'll want to increase the oven temperature to around 400 degrees to maximize their crispiness.

Cheese and bacon are the only ingredients you need to make a shatteringly crispy, ultra-savory and salty cracker that's completely devoid of carbs. And these crackers are addictively delicious to munch on their own, but you can make them into a bonafide appetizer with the help of dips and toppings. Serve these crackers with cooling, mayo-based dips like an aromatic ranch or green onion dip. A softened block of cream cheese doused in your favorite grocery brand of barbecue sauce would also make for the perfect sweet, tangy, and creamy dip for these bacon and cheese crackers. For that matter, you could choose a jalapeño-flavored cream cheese to slather over the crackers, topping them with a pickled jalapeño for a fun take on jalapeño poppers.

Of course, while the crackers are still piping hot, you can hit them with the seasonings of your choice. Bacon and cheddar go particularly well with a sprinkling of ranch seasoning. If you want to bring liquid flavor-agents into your crackers, you'll need a dry binder like flour; blend flour with butter into the bacon and cheese mixture, adding spices, and umami-rich Worcestershire sauce to form into cracker batter log that you'll slice into thin rounds and bake. Note that they'll no longer be keto-friendly after this step.

Otherwise, you can elevate the two key ingredients themselves. For example, you can bring some zesty heat by swapping shredded cheddar for Monterey Jack cheese. Even by choosing a flavored maple-smoked bacon, you'd be bringing more depth of flavor to the crackers without needing extra ingredients.