• Preheat oven to 400 F, line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
• Slice the tops off the jalapenos, reserving one with a stem. Seed the peppers and cut into strips.
• Arrange the bacon slices and jalapenos on the prepared baking sheet, bake for 20 minutes or until the bacon is as crispy as you’d like it.
• Note: The bacon will crisp up a bit after it’s out of the oven.
• Blot bacon and jalapenos with a paper towel to remove excess grease. Finely chop bacon and peppers, set aside.
• Beat cream cheese until smooth. Add garlic powder, onion powder, and smoked paprika, stir to combine.
• Stir in the chopped jalapenos and bacon, stir well.
• Add shredded cheese, stirring well to combine. Note: I’ll usually do this in two batches, half the cheese m get that stirred in, then add the rest.
• Season with salt and pepper, to taste.
• Lay out 2 rectangles of plastic wrap, in an X shape. Using clean wet hands, form the cheese mixture into a ball, place in the middle of the plastic wrap.
• Gather the plastic wrap up around the ball of cheese, securing at the top with a twist tie, elastic, or twine.
• Use 3 wide-ish elastics to divide the cheese ball into 6 segments. They don’t have to be perfectly even, pumpkins rarely are!
• Chill for at least two hours.

Immediately before serving:

• Blitz Cheezies in a mini food processor to form a fine meal, place in a shallow bowl.
• Remove cheese ball from the fridge. Carefully peel off the plastic wrap, place the cheese ball in the bowl of Cheezie dust.
• Gently pack the Cheezies dust over the exposed surface of the entire cheeese ball. You can go as heavy or as lightly as you’d like, we sort of gave it a light dusting.
• Place cheese ball on serving plate, top with the reserved jalapeno stem, and serve with crackers.