Melty, Cheesy, Beefy, Juicy, Crispy Patty Melt

Hello, delicious patty-melt-on-sour-dough-because-I-don’t-like-rye….you are beautiful ;-)

Why no….I have no idea why my ass is currently 3 feet wide….do you?

Who doesn’t love a hot, melty, stringy, cheesy, crispy, grilled……..anything?! I didn’t grow up a fan of the patty melt – I hate rye bread. But at this stage of the game of life, I should consider myself lucky that I didn’t thank about swapping breads long ago- ‘cuz my caboose would be even bigger!

I don’t think y’all need to be told how make a patty melt – after all it’s just a patty of juicy ground beef (fyi, press it thin and make it a good inch all-around bigger than the bread if your meat is 80/20); lip-smackingly caramelized, grilled onions; Swiss cheese, 1,000 Island dressing and good bread. Yes, yes…..traditionally rye, but in this case – it as sour dough….about ¾ inch thick sour dough. The loaf was heavy, but we could tell the bread was ‘airy’ which told me ‘this will get totally crispy on the grill!’ (as opposed to a more dense bread that could get soggy on the inner sides).

What makes a patty melt different from a ‘grilled cheese with hamburger in it’? I don’t really know – but I can tell you this: it IS different! I think the trick to this awesome, juicy, cheese-oozing sandwich was time and temp on the griddle. The heat was not too high (you don’t want your sandwich to burn before the inside has gotten sufficiently melty) and not too low (butter on the outside takes so long to melt is hardly gets crisp ands golden…just more yellow). You want a good, medium heat and then, if you have a cast iron press (I used a cast iron bacon press), layh it on top of the sandwich to help concentrate that heat and get the most crispy, uniformly melted, hot sandwich ever!

Yeah, yeah, I know….my bacon press allowed me to create a ‘poor mans panini press’. If you have an actual panini maker, I’m sure this post will sound rather like a grandparent telling you how to crank up the old Victrola – but I beg you…indulge me.

Thanks much ;-)

You know…if you were making three or four sandwiches on a griddle, I imagine you could press the tips down with a bog ol’ cast iron pan and do all four at once! Who needs Oprah’s favorite Breville Panini Makes (at $119) when you can slap a pan on yer sammich?!

Anyhoo – on one of these cold days, treat yourself to a toasty hot, cheesy, dreamy, juicy patty melt – pick your own bread………….you know I will :-)

Maple Bacon Pan-Cake

So many great things about this dish…. It’s easy, it’s fast, it’s cheap, it’s something different and it’s good! It’s got the sweet/salty thing going on and what’s better than that?

This hot and tasty breakfast dish came to me from allrecipes.com about two months ago. I clipped it together with all the other recipes I’ve printed off myriad recipe sites that I one day mean to make – but this one called to me way more than any of the others. I mean, the thought of bacon and maple syrup together was enough to make me print it in the first place, but those things nestled in a hot, oven baked pan-cake – with cheese no less…finally this past Sunday I could ignore it no longer!

I must admit – I changed things up just a titch…I had ‘Hormel Real Bacon Pieces’ on hand so I used those instead of cooking up actual, raw bacon – which I didn’t have. I don’t think it made one bit of difference with the exception of it being faster and easier than if I’d had fried up the bacon myself. Also, the original recipe calls for cheese in it as well as on it – but I didn’t want my daughter to freak out about the se cheese before she had a chance to like this dish, so I left it off the top. She never knew it was inside and even though I figured I’d tell her afterward, I thought, “why?” Because I want her to continue to like it! Matter of fact, she asked me to use sausage next time in place of the bacon……done ;-)

Mapley-Bacony Pan-Cake

Ingredients:
8 oz/ 1 cup bacon (REAL bacon ‘bits’ NOT ‘Bacos! Or actual cooked bacon, chopped into small pieces) - divided
1 cup baking mix – like Bisquik
¾ cup cheddar cheese – shredded
½ cup milk
1/3 cup maple syrup
2 T white sugar
2 eggs, slightly beaten
Additional maple syrup for drizzling

Directions:
Preheat oven to 250 degrees and spray a 9” pie plate with non-stick cooking spray. Cook and crumble/chop bacon if necessary. Mix all ingredients – save for 1/3 of the bacon – in nixing bowl until combined. Pour into pie dish and bake on middle rack of oven for 12 minutes. Sprinkle top of pancake with remaining 1/3 cup bacon and bake an additional 5 to 7 minutes or until puffed and very light golden brown. Meanwhile, warm the additional maple syrup. Serve ‘pan-cake’ hot drizzled with hot maple syrup.

I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For......Scones!

OMG….this is my new favorite scone – orange-cranberry. The flavor of these scones is so incredible….delightfully orange, but not over-powering and the slight tartness/chewiness of the cranberries….OMG…just let me say, Yum!

These orange-cranberry scones are SO DAMN GOOD and truly look and taste like they came from a first class bakery. I originally got the recipe from a poster on the Tasty Kitchen blog site (Godchild of The Pioneer Woman blog). The only change I made was to totally cover the top of the scones with large-granule decorating sugar. I mean encrusted them! I adore a crunchy, sweet top on a scone plus...it’s makes them so pretty! They actually sparkle!

I made these scones for the first time for Father’s Day this past June. But because the hubs isn’t 100% a ‘sweets’ kinda guy, I also made these….

Bacon-Cheddar-Onion Scones!

These were also super good…and especially nice with coffee if you happen to drink your java kinda sweet (I use ½ packet of Spenda and a little fat free hazelnut creamer). I’ve come to find that I’m not a huge fan of the ‘sweet food/sweet coffee combo’. I once had a pumpkin scone with a pumpkin latte from Starbucks and afterward I thought I’d die – like, for reals! Anyway….

This recipe originally came from Ina Garten – her Cheddar Dill scones. But I changed it up by omitting the dill (I like dill, but wasn’t nuts about it being in a breakfast scone) and adding cooked, chopped bacon and sliced green onions. These were savory and bacony – really good. But where I could eat one after another of the orange-cranberry (not that I did!)…these scones…no way. They’re more like a little meal in one flaky – yet slightly heavy and very filling – triangle. Eating two of these would be like eating two omelets – and that’d be crazy! ;-)

Both of these scones are super easy to make. And they’re so warm and homey…they’re perfect for a cozy, fall, weekend morning. Store leftovers in an airtight container or freezer-type bag so you can eat them throughout the week or take one to work each day for your morning break! They are Deeeeee-licious!

Orange-Cranberry Scones

Ingredients:

2 cups All-purpose Flour

7 teaspoons Granulated Sugar

2 teaspoons Baking Powder

½ teaspoons Salt

⅓ teaspoons Baking Soda

1 Tablespoon Grated Orange Peel

⅓ cups Cold Butter

1 cup Dried Cranberries

¼ cups Orange Juice

¼ cup Half-and-Half Cream

1 whole Egg

1 Tablespoon Milk

¼ cup large-granule, decorator sugar

Glaze:

½ cup Powdered Sugar

1 Tablespoon Orange Juice

Directions:

Sift together flour, 7 teaspoons sugar, baking powder, salt and baking soda. Stir in grated orange peel. Cut in butter until mixture resembles course crumbs; set aside. In a small bowl, combine dried cranberries, orange juice, cream and egg. Add to the flour mixture and stir until a soft dough forms. On a floured surface, gently knead 6-8 times. Pat dough into an 8-inch circle. Cut into 10 wedges. Separate wedges and place on an ungreased baking sheet. Brush with milk; sprinkle with decorator sugar. Bake at 400 degrees for 12-15 minutes or until lightly browned.

Glaze:

Combine powdered sugar with 1 tablespoon orange juice. Brush glaze over scones and give one more dousing of decorator sugar if desired.

Bacon-Cheddar-Onion Scones

Ingredients:

4 cups plus 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour, divided

2 tablespoons baking powder

2 teaspoons salt

3/4 pound cold unsalted butter, diced

4 extra-large eggs, beaten lightly

1 cup cold heavy cream

1/2 pound extra-sharp cheddar cheese, grated

6 - 8 slices cooked, chopped bacon

1/3 cup sliced green onions

1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water or milk, for egg wash

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Combine 4 cups of flour, the baking powder, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Add the butter and, using a pastry blender or two forks, incorporate butter into flour mixture until butter is the size of small peas. Mix the eggs and heavy cream and quickly add them to the flour-and-butter mixture. Combine until just blended. Toss together the cheddar, bacon and onions, and 1 tablespoon of flour and add them to the dough.. Mix until they are just incorporated. Do not over mix.
Dump the dough onto a well-floured surface and knead it for 1 minute, until the cheese, bacon and onion are well distributed. Roll or pat the dough into a 3/4-inch thick disc. Cut into 6 or 8 ‘pie-wedge’ triangles. Brush the tops with egg wash. Bake on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper for 20 to 25 minutes, until the outside is crusty and the inside is fully baked.

Fast & Easy Cinna-Minnys

Who doesn’t love a hot, gooey cinnamon roll?! My daughter and her BFF love them. Said BFF spends one night at our house just about every weekend and we really like having her. I know lots of moms/parents let kids fend for themselves as far as breakfast when a sleepover has occurred, but I’ve never felt comfortable with that. As a mom I feel like it’s my job to start their day off nicely with a hot breakfast. Not necessarily a nutritious breakfast, but a hot one that they’ll like ;-) While they enjoy pancakes, waffles, french toast and eggs/browns/bacon, by far they like hot cinnamon rolls the most. My daughter’s nickname is Minny, so, seeing as they’re her favorite, I named the tiny treat after her!. I’ve made real, yeast, homemade cinnamon rolls a few times and they are heaven – but that means having lots of cinnamon rolls around the house for days which is really bad for me! Then, I fell into the habit of buying the Pillsbury ones in the can – these are fine, but they’re far from great. So….a few months ago, not finding a can of the regular cinnamon rolls in the fridge, yet seeing a can of crescent rolls, I was able to make the most melt-in-your-mouth, fast & easy cinnamon rolls that have become the girl’s top choice for breakfast (and a side of bacon never hurts). So, still with a little help from Pillsbury, I present my Fast & Easy Cinna-Minnys! FYI – because I made these up on a whim, measurements are approximate. There is really no way to screw these up though, so check out how I make’m and then have faith in yourself to throw them together :-)

You’ll need 1 tube of Pillsbury Crescent rolls. The kind shown above is the new, one full sheet kind – but you can buy the regular rolls, just unroll them into one big sheet and press them together at the seams. Also gather some brown sugar, cinnamon and butter.

The rolls are pretty buttery tasting already, but begin by spreading a very thin layer of butter on the dough just to help the filling adhere a little better.

You can see the butter is very thin – I bet there’s only about a 1 ½ tablespoons total on there. Also, leave a good half inch unbuttered along one of the long sides to make sealing easier after rolling.

Next comes the filling – Yum! My filling is simply brown sugar and cinnamon. Again, I’ve never measured, but I’m gonna say I use about 1/3 cup (packed) or ½ cup un packed brown sugar and approx 1 ½ tablespoons of good cinnamon. Stir the two ingredients together well, in a bowl, then pour it down the middle of the buttered dough.

Then spread the filling mixture evenly from end to end and to the edge of one, buttered, long side leaving the other, unbuttered long edge free of filling.

Starting at the long side where the filling is right up to the edge, begin rolling the dough – taking care to keep the roll as snug as possible (as opposed to loose and floppy). Then, pinch and seal the dough along the unbuttered edge. Seal it well so the rolls don’t Unroll while baking.

Cut the into individual slices – about ¾ inch thickness. Using a good, serrated knife and a sawing motion makes this a snap.

Place each slice on a baking sheet. I use well-honed stoneware to bake my rolls – if you’re going to use a metal baking sheet, you’d do well to use parchment paper or a silpat as the sugary filling will be a nightmare for you, burning the rolls on the bottom and making cleaning impossible!

Yes these cinnamon rolls are smaller than the ones you pop out of a can, but you get way more and I guarantee, they taste WAY better! Put your filled baking sheet into a preheated 350-degree oven for 12 – 14 minutes. Again, I’ve only ever baked these on my stoneware, so if using a regular backing sheet, please keep eye on them – checking for doneness after ten minutes the first time you make these – then increase baking time by one or two minute intervals until light golden brown.

Mmmmm….baking is done….

Puffy, tender and all cinnamonny in the middle! See the filling that oozed? That’s why you’ll need a silpat or parchment on a metal sheet!
Now….what’s a cinnamon roll without cream cheese icing? It’s not complete – that’s what!

This is super simple…grab a bowl and dump in ¼ brick of cream cheese (nuked to make it soft), 2 or 3 teaspoons of butter, about 3 tablespoons of powdered sugar and a tiny splash of vanilla. Stir it up good with a fork or mini-whisk…..

….until velvety smooth and use an knife or small off-set spatula to smear about a half teaspoon-worth if icing on each hot cinnamon roll.

Eat’m while there hot! Soooo good! I tried to take a picture of one of the little, delicious, cinnamon treasures – but the hot filling was burning my fingers before I could get a picture worth saving! But trust me – these are dreamy, tender & flaky and full of cinnamony-brown sugar & buttery flavor. The twang of the cream cheese icing is the perfect compliment to the deep cinnamon. The best semi-homemade cinnamon rolls :-)

Fast & Easy Cinna-Minnys

Ingredients:
Rolls:
1 can/tube Pillsbury Crescent roll sheet or rolls (seams pressed to form one sheet of dough)
1 ½ tablespoons soft butter
1/3 cup (packed) or ½ cup (unpacked) light brown sugar
1 ½ tablespoons cinnamon

Icing:
¼ brick cream cheese (softened)
2 -3 teaspoons butter (softened)
3 tablespoons powdered sugar
Tiny splash vanilla

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350-degrees. Butter dough sheet leaving ½ inch of one long side of dough butter-free. Stir brown sugar and cinnamon together in a bowl, then pour on top of buttered dough spreading filling evenly over butter but be careful to leave unbuttered strip along that one long side filling-free. Starting at long side where filling meets the edge of the dough, roll up dough jelly-roll style, keeping roll snug and pinch & seal log along the opposite, unbuttered/unfilled long edge. Cut into ½ inch slices and place cut-side down on stoneware or silpat/parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for 12-14 min or until light golden brown. Stir together all icing ingredients and smear the top of each mini-cinnamon roll with approx ½ teaspoon of cream cheese icing. Serve immediately.

"Oo la la! Le Toast Frenchais!" As Spoken by Darlene Conner

I love the TV show Roseanne - well, the older episodes, mostly. Those are the fun ones, when the kids are younger (before they 'jump the shark and win the lottery) - and my favorite one is where Roseanne has gone home to help her mom after her dad has had a heart attack. While she's gone, Jackie comes to stay at the house to help Dan take care of the kids and upon seeing french toast on the table one morning, Darlene exclaims, "Oo lala! Le toast frenchais!" I love it!

Anyway... I like giving my babydoll a hot breakfast and this morning, after deciding to make my toast frenchais, I thought, why not post it?! Some poeple don't really know how to make french toast and my daughter swears by mine so.... here we are ;-)The ingredients are simple, eggs, milk, sugar, vanilla, cinnamon.......

......and a pinch of salt.

Whisk it all together with a fork.....

Then, grab your bread of choice - which in my case this morning, was plain old, week old, white bread left over in the bread drawer. Melt some butter in a pan over medium heat.

Place the bread in the egg mixture and use a fork to poke the bread to help it soak up the sweet, eggy gooodenss.

Flip it over and do the same to the other side......

...then lay it in the hot pan and listen to it sing!

Then slide in a friend 'cuz it's just better that way.

After about 2 minutes (when the toast has browned nicely on the bottom and dry to the touch), flip each slice over to cook another minute or so on the raw/wet side. Mmmmmm....look how golden it is....

Sprinkle on some powdered sugar - my daughter likes it that way :-) Then pour on yer hot syrup. You MUST warm the syrup....you wouldn't serve hot mashed taters with cold gravy woud'ja?! That's crazy talk!

Mmmmm...it's hot, crispy and tender....just the best.....!

But the other best part? Having my daughter say, "Thanks, Mom...that was sooo good!" :-)

My true pleasure, baby - I love you!!!

French Toast

Ingredients:
1 pat of butter
4 slices white bread (stale-ish)
2 eggs
2 Tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1-2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 Tablespoon sugar
pinch of salt

Directions:
Whisk all ingredients except the bread in a shallow pan or pie plate. Melt 1 pat of butter in a skillet over medium heat. Place 1 to 2 lsices of bread (whatever fits) into the beaten egg mixture and poke at bread with fork to help absord mixture. Flip slices over and do the same to the other side. Lay slices into melted butter in hot skillet and cook approx 2 minutes or until cooked-side of bread is golden and dry-ish to the touch. Turn slices over and cook an additional 1 to 2 minutes. Plate and serve with warmed syrup, powdered sugar and butter if desired.

Brand New Leftover Stuffing....

What's better than fresh-made stuffing on Thanksgiving day? Crispy, fried stuffing the next day! I made the stuffing for this year's feast. We had fewer people than normal and let's face it, I didn't think two bags of stuffing bread cubes (I'd bought three) would make so much! A good amount of stuffing went home with family in plastic containers, and there was still some left to bring home for ourselves. I didn't want to simply reheat the stuffing, but wanted to make it seem new and different for a whole new dinner.

While heating about 2 tablespoons olive oil along with 1 tablespoon butter in a large, non-stick frying pan, I put aproximately 2 to 3 cups of leftover stuffing in a mixing bowl, added one egg and mixed it by hand to combine it well. I then formed a medium, palm-sized ball into a patty shape (about 3 inches diameter) and gently pressed each side in regular-joe bread crumbs (woulda loved to use panko...but I was out). I then fried each side over medium heat until golden brown...about 3 to 4 minutes per side.

The insides were creamy and full of clasic stuffing flavor while the outsides had just the right amount of crunchy crust to contrast the inner, hot, fluffiness. These were awesome with a hot veg and small steak but I gotta say I think they'd be awesome with a fried egg on top for breakfast! Have to try that next time!

Sick and twisted

We had a little of both happening in our house this past weekend. A little of sick and twisted I mean. Actually – the little sick turned into big sick and the little twisted was more twisted than I’d planned.

Let me explain….

I’d planned on making homemade soft pretzels with my daughter on Saturday afternoon. I’d stayed home with her on Friday as she wasn’t feeling well and was glad to see her feeling better – albeit not 100% by Saturday morning. We ran a few errands together and though she was feeling a bit ‘off’, she had a friend over (chatting with a friend over their Home Coming dance pans took precedence over the pretzels – that was cool…I was young once too :-)

I will say the pretzels turned out so yummy and chewy and the spinach cheese dip I made to go along with them was SO entirely like a restaurant version I’ve had…oh my gosh, yum - it was perfect. More info on making those pretzels & dip in a sec…

By the time we’d all eaten and watched a movie together, my daughter didn’t look so good – her temperature was 102.4 – so the Hubs ran her friend home and I started the medication and cold compress. Long story short, by the time the next afternoon rolled around, her temp was at 103.8! We more or less ran to the house straight to the doctors office. At this posting, she’s cooled a bit, but is not out of the woods yet. It made for a pretty scary Sunday, but hopefully within a day or two, she’ll be solidly on the mend.
Meanwhile, let me tell you how to make the most scrumptious, warm-n-soft-n-chewy pretzels y’ever had!

This recipe comes from the Food Network’s Alton Brown. Thanks Al! Not only were they easy to make on my own, but having my mom over on Sunday to make them a second time was a real treat.You start with yeast, water, salt and sugar, let all that sit for about 5 mins to activate the yeast, then just add the flour and some melted butter. Mmmmmm….butter……

This picture makes it look like I beat the heck out of the dough, but I assure you this is only speed 2 on the ol’ Kitchen Aide. After all the flour was incorporated (on speed 1) I let it run on speed 2 for 4 minutes straight. I then rolled it out into an oiled stainless bowl & covered it in plastic wrap.

Now, we don’t keep our house very warm – only had the heat on once so far this year, so I filled a bowl half full of pretty warm water and set the bowl with the dough, atop it to catch it’s cozy toastiness

After one hour, this beautiful puffed up dough was begging to be wo-‘man’ handled!

So we lined two baking sheets with parchment and then lubed up the parchment very lightly with olive oil

We did the same with one naked baking sheet as well, then….

…I turned the dough out onto that sheet (look at all those yeasty holies! It smelled SO good!

I then cut it into eight pieces. It was sticky, I ain’t gonna lie, but I’d just cut the knife down in and run my finger along the edge to separate the dough from the blade. This pic doesn’t exactly show it because I cold take the picture and run my finger alongside the knife – but it worked really well – take my word for it :-)

Now, the dough was fairly fragile – but we finagled each piece into a rope about 28 to 24 inches long. As soon as it was close to the length we wanted, it was laid on the oiled parchment in a ‘U’ shape, then the middle was twisted and the ends were gently pressed/massaged in.

While twisting the pretzels into shape, a big pot of water boiled. The recipe calls for 10 cups of water and 2/3 cup baking soda added. I eyed balled mine and had my pot filled about half way and I put in a good, healthy couple-a shakes of baking soda. When all the pretzels were formed, we carefully laid them one at a time into the boiling water and let them bathe for about 1 minute. The we used a slotted, flat 5” round ‘spoon’ to lift it out and rest it once again on the oiled parchment.

On the left is an unboiled pretzel, the one on the right just came out of the bath. The boiling makes the tiniest bit of a ‘skin’, if you will, on the dough. I know, I know….the word skin should not be associated with anything to eaten unless it’s chicken! But the boiling DID leave SOMEthing…..not a crust, they weren’t hard….certainly not tacky…. They just had a skin!

After all were boiled, they were brushed with egg yolk beaten with a little water, then salted and baked for 14 minutes. I baked two sheets at once, trade levels and rotated them halfway through for the most even baking. And here are the golden beauties now!

I made this warm and cheesy spinach dip to go with the pretzels and it was SO creamy and cheesy and fattening – translation – Heaven!

Mmmm….cheesy-spinachy-chewy-yummy!

Recipes!

Alton Brown's Homemade Soft Pretzels

Ingredients: (yields 8 pretzels)

1 1/2 cups warm (110 to 115 degrees F) water

1 tablespoon sugar

2 teaspoons kosher salt

1 package active dry yeast

22 ounces all-purpose flour, approximately 4 1/2 cups

2 ounces unsalted butter, melted

Vegetable oil, for pan

10 cups water

2/3 cup baking soda

1 large egg yolk beaten with 1 tablespoon water

Pretzel salt

Directions:

Combine the water, sugar and kosher salt in the bowl of a stand mixer and sprinkle the yeast on top. Allow to sit for 5 minutes or until the mixture begins to foam. Add the flour and butter and, using the dough hook attachment, mix on low speed until well combined. Change to medium speed and knead until the dough is smooth and pulls away from the side of the bowl, approximately 4 to 5 minutes. Remove the dough from the bowl, clean the bowl and then oil it well with vegetable oil. Return the dough to the bowl, cover with plastic wrap and sit in a warm place for approximately 1 hour or until the dough has doubled in size. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F. Line 2 half-sheet pans with parchment paper and lightly brush with the vegetable oil. Set aside.
Bring the 10 cups of water and the baking soda to a rolling boil in an 8-quart pot. While waiting for the water to boil, turn the dough out onto a slightly oiled work surface and divide into 8 equal pieces. Roll out each piece of dough into a 24-inch rope. Make a U-shape with the rope, holding the ends of the rope, cross them over each other and press onto the bottom of the U in order to form the shape of a pretzel. Place onto the parchment-lined half sheet pan.

Place the pretzels into the boiling water, 1 by 1, for 30 seconds to 1 minute. Remove them from the water using a large flat spatula or spoon. Return to the half sheet pan, brush the top of each pretzel with the beaten egg yolk and water mixture and sprinkle with the pretzel salt. Bake until dark golden brown in color, approximately 12 to 14 minutes. Transfer to a cooling rack for at least 5 minutes before serving.

Spinach Cheese Dip

Ingredients:

1 onion, chopped

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 (14.5 ounce) can whole peeled tomatoes, drained and chopped

1 (4 ounce) can diced green chilies, drained

1 (10 ounce) package frozen spinach, thawed and drained and chopped well

20 ounces shredded Monterey Jack cheese

2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened

2 cups half-and-half cream (mine was non-fat)

salt and pepper to taste

Tabasco - just a dash or two – optional (I opted not)

* Note - you can substitute two cans of Rotelle diced tomatoes with green chilies in place of the two separate cans of tomatoes and chilies - but the spice from the chilies will be less and it's not all that spicy anyway).

Directions:

Sauté onion in skillet over medium heat in oil until softened, about 4 minutes. Stir in tomatoes and chilies, let cook 2 minutes. Pour in cream and add cream cheese, spinach and shredded jack cheese. Season with salt and pepper (and Tabasco if desired) to taste. Stir until combined – serve hot* Note – you can also make this ahead of time, spoon mixture into a baking dish and when ready, bake in a preheated, 400-degree oven until the dip is bubbly and the top is light brown, about 35 minutes.