Roasted Corn Dip

There are few appetizers in my arsenal that are not only my particular favorites but ones my family or friends request again and again as well. This is one of them….roasted corn dip. It’s variation of Emeril Lagasse’s Fire Roasted Corn Dip – but I don’t always fire roast the corn and I changed up a few ingredients too, so I simply call mine – roasted corn dip.

Now, when I was young, corn wasn’t to be on or in anything ‘cept a cob or my mouth! It couldn’t be creamed and it couldn’t touch anything else on my plate. Funny – as an adult I now love corn in just about anything! I will say I pretty much gotta have sweet white corn as opposed to yellow. I love the crisp bite to the little, white kernels...yellow corn seems big and chewy to me!

This dip is creamy and the sweet taste of the corn comes through the gentle spice of the peppers and jalapeno – but it’s the garlic that makes it sing. It’s not a ‘garlicky’ dish at all….but the combination of all thee flavors together with the cheese and the sweet and the heat is just darn near prefect. There’s never any left when I make it for a party. Key to a successful corn dip is in the details….make a nice, fine dice on your veggies. Nothing I dice is any bigger than the kernels of corn into which they’re mixed – most of them are smaller. This allows a prefect marriage of flavors in your mouth rather than a big ol’ chunk of pepper and only three corn kernels. Are you pickin’ up what I’m puttin’ down? I mean…if you’re gonna make something delicious – why not make it as delicious as it can be??

So – we start with veggies – these are the bigs – and you’ll need about ½ of each one shown as well as the name sake ingredient….

…..Super Sweet White Corn! Now like I said, I don’t always fire roast in which case I do use the corn shown above. Come corn season though, I’m all about getting the corn onto the hot grill to pick up some nice fire roasted flavor. Since I can’t wait for corn season to have this addictive & savory snack, a bag’ll do just fine.

Get all your peppers diced – you can use a yellow in place of the orange if you want…..

…then try not to cry when you finely dice up that ½ onion.

This is one whole jalapeno pepper, seeded, matchsticked and VERY finely diced. You want it’s flavor throughout so dice it super small so it gets well distributed throughout the dish.

We add in sliced green onions into the mixture as well as a few on top of it.

I ask you – is there any better food than cheese? Jack melts beautifully – you’ll need about 12 oz. total – 8 to mix in and 4 for the top.

And of course – the garlic. Mince or press about 4 large cloves so you have a good, fat tablespoonful.

Add 1 T of butter to a hot skillet and pour in the corn. I like to make ‘holes’ in the corn ‘mass’ so heat gets through so it doesn’t just steam in the pan. Leave the corn to roast for a few minutes at a time and then stir. If you stir it the whole time, it won’t get any caramely colors to it ands won’t be as yum-tastic!

See? It’s getting there! I don’t wait for every kernel to get the golden brown color – but want a very good amount of them to be. Once it’s reached the desired ‘roastedness’, I empty the corn into a large bowl to wait while I finish cooking up the other veggies.

Next up, put the peppers (not the jalapeno) and onion in the hot pan. Add salt and pepper and stir-fry for about 2 minutes.

Mmmm....it’s all hot and steamy and smelling good! Steam doesn’t make for such a good picture though!

After two minutes, add the corn back to the pan and season with salt and pepper once again. Stir until combined…..

….then put the jalapeno and garlic in! OMG give this a good stir and you will immediately know what I meant about the garlic just ‘making’ this dish. The smell is unbelievable! Cook the mixture another 2 minutes, then transfer the lot of it to a large bowl to cool just a bit – maybe 20 minutes or so.

Once the mixture has cooled a little, stir in ¾ of the green onions and the mayo.

After those are well combined, add in ¾ of the cheese and mix well.

Spread in a casserole dish – size is sort of up to you… This is a Pampered Chef oval stoneware pan – it’s about the equivalent of a 9x13, but oval. I’ve used a big, round corningware dish as well and a dish a bit smaller so the dip was a bit thicker – but the above dish is my fave to use. The stoneware keeps it piping hot too – awesome. I think an 8x11 rectangle would be really close to this if you’re using a rectangle pan. Craaaapp….for something totally uncomplicated I’m making it way too complicated! Just use yer fave shallow-ish casserole dish!

Top with the remaining cheese and green onions. At this point, you can put it in the oven or, if you’re going to bake it within an hour or two, just cover it and leave it on the counter – no point in chilling it, making it take longer once you do bake it. If you won’t be needing it for several hours, cover it, chill it, then remove from the oven a good hour before baking. Bake at 350-degrees for 25 minutes if not chilled – or approx 50 minutes of it is chilled. The top should be golden and bubbly and the center should be good-n-hot (stick a knife in the center then feel the blade between your thumb and forefinger).

And Presto! Not only is it bubblin’ hot but the dish changed color and size as well! Okay –here’s the deal…I made the dish in all the prep pics a week ago but because guests were already at my house when it came out of the oven, I put it out onto the counter without taking a picture of the finished product! Oops! So, when the hubs had a friend to dinner this past Sunday (he brought the fresh-caught salmon in the dinner pic with the spicy green beans), I used the rest of the peppers and a smaller bag of corn to make a slightly smaller version of the original – and that’s it abov

Yum – hot and full of flavor……….That sweet corn with the peppers and garlic….OMG………

This dish is a home run – heck, you could probably eat is as an actual corn side dish and forget about scooping it up with chips! It takes a fair amount of dicing prep – but it’s SO worth it. Enjoy!

Roasted Corn Dip

Ingredients:

1 regular-sized bag frozen super sweet white corn

1 tablespoon butter

salt & pepper (pinches here and there to taste)

1/2 medium/large onion – finely diced

1/2 red, yellow and green bell pepper diced small

1 medium jalapeno, stemmed, seeded and diced very fine

1 tablespoon chopped garlic

1 cup mayonnaise

12 oz grated Monterey Jack Cheese

4 finely sliced green onions

Directions:
Heat a large skillet to high heat and melt 1 T of butter then add frozen corn. Allow corn to cook between stirrings to caramelize and turn golden on most kernels – about 7 minutes. Remove from pan to large mixing bowl. Add the onions and peppers. Season with salt and pepper. Sauté for 2 minutes. Add the corn back in and continue to sauté for 2 minutes – season with a little more salt and pepper. Add the jalapenos and garlic. Continue to cook for 1 minute. Remove from the heat and cool slightly, turning the mixture into the large mixing bowl. Once cooled a bit, stir in the mayonnaise and 3/4 of the cheese. Mix well. Stir in the ¾ of the green onions. Season with salt and pepper once again if necessary. Pour the mixture into a 6 cup oven-proof oval baking dish. Spread evenly and top with the remaining cheese and green onions. Bake for about 20 - 25 minutes or until bubbly (if you chill it after making it rather than putting it right into the oven, cook for approx 40 - 50 minutes)

Serve hot with tortilla chips

Spicy 'Chinese Take-Out' Green Beans

My baby's 16th birthday is coming up and she's requested her favorite dish - homemade pork fried rice. We're expecting quite a few people at her party....about 22 to 26 - so we're filling in the dinner with egg rolls and salad and, deciding we needed one more item to round out the whole meal - I went searching the internet for an 'asian-type' green bean dish. We all like beans and can take some spice so that seemed the perfect fit. I found a few different recipes, and morphed them to fit our palette. I made them Friday night to test'em out....they were so good! Two friends happened by while I was making them and one said they were the best beans he'd ever eaten! So - need a really good and spicy (not too spicy) green bean? Here you go ;-)Ingredients are simple - you probably have all of these in your kitchen already... Oyster sauce, sesame oil, green beans (blanched), soy sauce (I like low sodium), red pepper and garlic (and salt and pepper of course) - oh...and red pepper flakes too, I just forgot to put them in the pic!

In a medium skillet over medium high heat, heat the sesame oil and add the red pepper and stir in hot oil for approx 2 minutes - add garlic and stir another minute. Next, add in the blanched green beans and toss. Pour in oyster & soy sauce and season with salt and pepper and continue to toss beans to coat and heat them through - about 4 to 5 minutes.

Serve hot alongside your favorite meat or fish and other side dish :-) I promise the yum-factor on these beans is WAY high!

Spicy 'Chinese Take-Out' Green Beans

Ingredients:

1 lb green beans - blanched (add beans to boiling water - boil for 4 - 5 mins then transfer beans to ice water bath to cool and stop cooking. Remove cooled beans from ice water to colander to sit until ready to use)

1/2 T sesame oil

1/4 of a red pepper - finely diced

3 to 4 big cloves garlic - minced

2 T oyster sauce

1 T low sodium soy sauce

salt and pepper to taste

teaspoon or two of red pepper flakes (opptional)

Directions:

Pour sesame oil into hot medium skillet and add red pepper, stir-frying for about 2 minutes - add garlic and cook for additional 1 minute. Add in blanched green beans and toss. Pour in oyster & soy sauce and toss well to coat beans. Taste and season with salt and pepper. Add in red pepper flakes if you choose and continue to toss until beans are heated through - approx 4 to 5 minutes. Serve hot!

Guacamole - Freshness at it's best!

Would it be way conceited to say I freakin' love my guacamole? It's pretty unreal for me to say that at all since up until about a year ago, I wouldn't eat any guac no matter who made it. Funny enough, I've been making it for about 5 years now but always had to have the hubs and daughter tatse it to adjust seasonings because I didn't like avacados! Then, one day, I finally took the plunge and tried it myself because I didn't want to be a weenie my whole life - and dang....my guac was good (but I still can't eat an actual, plain avacado)! It's super easy, super fresh and super tasty. The following recipe makes about 4 cups worth if not a bit more. Enjoy!I start with 6 regular-sized avacados (not those huge ones). I halve them, remove the pit, scoop'em out and toss'em in a big mixing bowl.

This picture skews the appearance of the amounts of veggies I prep - it looks like a lot of jalapeno! But shown is actually 3 roma tomatoes, diced small...about 1/2 of a good sized onion, also in a small dice, 4 cloves of garlic put through a press and one biggish jalapeno (seeds and membrane removed from one half), diced waaaay small.

Now, I don't know what happened to the pic of the beautifully dark green, fragrant cilantro that I chopped, but you can see remnants of it here! I chopped about 4 tablespoons worth - cilantro makes the guac, my friend :-) Speaking of beautiful...look at this lime! It was so incredibly juicy! Big, beautiful lime got squeeeeezed....

.....and gave me almost 3 tablespoons of wonderful juice - about twice what is shown here (I wanted to get the pic mid-squeeze ;-)

Once everything gets prepped, the avacados get the pastry blender treatment! I love my Pampered Chef pastry blender and using it is so much easier than using a fork. I feel like the avacados are sorta slippery under the pressure of a fork....

I leave the avacados a bit chunky as it they get more broken down/creamier when the other ingredients get stirred in. Sorta like leaving pasta al dente if you're gonna finish cooking it in the oven for mac-n-cheese, ya know?

The prepped veggies and all the lime juice get dumped in . Now, I always leave a palm-full of tomato, onion and 1/4 of the jalapeno out of the first mix-in, just in case I feel like there's plenty to start. And although I usually end up adding in the remainder, I just can't bring myself to toss it all in from the get-go. You know the old addage "you can always add but it's hard to remove"? It haunts me with the guac!

Mmmm..almost there....fold it all in....

...marry, marry, marry.....

YUM! Season with salt and pepper to your liking and if you feel like it, add a dash or two of Tabasco - I usualy don't like to, but if I'm feeling like more heat than the jalapeno offered, I'll dash twice, stir, taste and add another dash or two from there...

This guac is so, so good! Your chips will be diving into it without you!

Maryn's Guacamole

Ingredients:

6 ripe avocados
3 roma tomatoes, seeded and diced small
2/3 medium onion finely diced
1 jalapeno pepper – remove half of the seeds and (leave them all in for a little more heat), very finely diced
4 Tblsp finely chopped cilantro
Approx 1 -2 Tblsps fresh lime juice
3 -4 garlic cloves – minced or put through garlic press
Salt
Pepper
Few dashes Tabasco (optional)

Cut avocados in half, remove pit and spoon flesh into a mixing bowl and smash well with a fork or pastry blender (leave it as chunky as you like). Add diced tomatoes, onion, jalapeno, cilantro, lime juice and garlic. Mix thoroughly to combine. Taste, then add salt and pepper to your preference. If you prefer a little extra heat, add a few dashes of Tabasco. Serve immediately or cover with plastic wrap (press the wrap down ONTO the guac...no air in between), and chill until ready to use.

Got fried, but not by the sun….

Just look at those golden round of goodness! We got a little fried this weekend :-)

A really nice man with whom we recently became acquainted, gave us a plethora of zucchini and we didn’t want it to go to waste. Zucchini bread is in the works for some of the bigger zucs, but we’d never tried fried zucchini so we used the smaller ones to give it a go on Saturday. They were super easy and tasted awesome. ‘Course, if you’re gonna be doing some dippin’ and breadin’ you may as well get some onion rings into the mix and that’s just what we did on Sunday along with a second round of fried zuc… Warning…too much fried anything is NOT a good thing (read: tummy ache!) – thank goodness for neighbors who are willing to share in the leftovers!

Get your prep station ready with well-seasoned flour, egg-wash and panko bread crumbs. You don’t have to have pankos…but Lord knows they are the BEST bread crumbs!

Cut your zucchini into ¼ inch slices and coat them in the seasoned flour. I seasoned my four with salt, pepper, garlic powder and cayenne.

Next, let them take a bath in the whisked egg. Make sure they get thoroughly covered with the egg.

Then place each round into the pankos and press the crumbs onto each side to coat the well.

Continue till all the rounds are breaded.

Unfortunately, I failed taking a pic of the frying process! But you can trust in me when I say that canola oil heated to 375-degrees while the zucchini rounds were being coated with yum-ness. Then approximately 5 rounds were place in the fry basket and lowered into the hot oil. As always…remember to not over crowd your fry vessel which will cause the oil temp to drop! You don’t want your food to sit in the oil…you want them to sizzle and fry! They’ll do that sizzlin’ and fryin’ for about 3 minutes or so – you can judge by the golden-brownness that occurs. Oh...and you’ll want to flip the zucs after about the first minute and a half. Bamboo skewers work great for this. Once out of the fryer, the zucchini rounds were immediately sprinkled with a little salt and Emeril’s Original Essence for a little kick.

Resulting in these beautiful, crispy, crunchy, golden rounds of yum!

And did I mention that fried zucchini rounds like to take a nice cool dip in fresh-made ranch?

Mmmmmmmm…….Soooo good…

And looky here….

These onion rings were made almost the same way…but they were first soaked in buttermilk that was spiced up with salt, pepper, cayenne, garlic and some previously mixed spice rub that I’d thrown together for a hunk of meat we’d smoked. Dress your buttermilk with whatever spices you like! Then drain in a colander (but don’t wipe’m off for heavens sake!). The they get the same treatment – seasoned flour, egg-dip, pankos, then just a little salt – no Emeril’s this time. Serve hot or keep warm in the oven till all are fried. Now those are golden rings everyone can afford!

Roasted Ricotta Romas

This first photo is misleading...the above are not roasted toms! Keep reading ;-)

I frequent the website Pioneer Woman. So much of the food she makes, make my mouth water – a lot…like, I become a droolin’ fool.

I’ve made a few of the recipes she’s posted on her site – Bacon-Wrapped Jalapeno Thingies (her name not mine...and her pic, not mine, shown above). I sometimes follow the exact recipe and other times adapt them to what fits my family’s tastes a bit more.

Some things she makes I’ve known about for years like these French Breakfast Puffs (again, this pic is from her site). I grew up making these – they were one of the first ‘from scratch’ items I ever baked- and I made them way more often than I should've – very often with my best friend Lynette. The nutmeg in them is heaven (!).

Pioneer Woman is friends with Pastor Ryan – a young, hip, tattoo-adorned pastor who, like her, is a creative and awesome cook. A couple of weeks ago, I came across his Roasted Ricotta Roma Tomatoes and knew I had to make them! By this posting I’ve already made them four times – they are easy and delicious and my husband and daughter love them as much as I hoped they would.

These are my roasted romas…the pic doesn't do them justice -they got yummy and brown on top...camera too close? Too much light?

Anyway....

I add two extra ingredients that Pastor Ryan doesn’t, parmesan and a little grated mozzarella – because everything’s better with more cheese!

Follow this super simple recipe for a totally yummy (and impressive looking!) side dish that everyone will love!

Roasted Ricotta Roma Tomatoes

Ingredients:
1 handful fresh parsley - chopped
1 handful fresh basil - chopped
2 -3 garlic cloves – crushed/minced
8 roma tomatoes – halved/gutted (see below)
1 ½ cups (approx) ricotta cheese
½ cup grated mozzerella cheese
¼ cup Panko bread crumbs or crushed Ritz
¼ cup grated parmesan cheese
Kosher salt
Salt-n-pepper to taste
Olive oil (I usually skip this ingred.)

Directions:
Wash, dry and halve the romas. Use your fingers to extract the seeds and then use a small paring knife, spoon or strawberry huller to scrape out the ribs/membrane inside to leave a hollow ‘half-shell’. Sprinkle the insides of the tomatoes with the kosher salt, then place the halves upside down on a t-towel to drain (they won’t emit a lot of liquid, so don’t expect a watery mess or anything).

Add the chopped herbs, garlic, mozzarella cheese to the ricotta and mix well. Add salt-n-pepper to taste. Heap each roma half with the cheese mixture. Once all are filled, combine the pankos or crushed Ritz with the parmesan cheese in small bowl and dip the romas – cheese side down – into the crumb mixture. Place the romas – cheese side up – on a baking sheet and drizzle with a little olive oil if desired.

Bake in a 375-degree oven for about 20 minutes when the tops will be golden brown and bubbly. Serve while hot and most gooey and delicious!!