Well, this was just fantastic.

Betsy and I went to a very fun birthday party a few weeks ago that was a fondue party – great idea for a party. A few people were in charge of bringing large quantities of cheese and everyone else brought booze or things to dip in the cheese.

The standard fondue recipe is normally based on Gruyere or some other swiss cheese mixed with white wine and cooked until melted and smooth. It’s very good, but also a bit on the pricey side.

So, I thought it would be fun to try to come up with a fondue-ish dish that’s a bit easier on the wallet but still delivers in the flavor department.

The secret: Port wine cheese.

The second secret: Stout.

Port Wine Cheese Fondue

Yield: Serves 8-10.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

24 ounces port wine cheese
1 12 ounce stout beer
1/2 teaspoon fresh nutmeg, grated
Crusty bread for dipping

Helpful Equipment:
Microplane

Directions:

1) Pour stout into a medium pan and heat over medium heat.

2) Once stout is steaming, start whisking in port wine cheese in 3 batches. Once one batch is melted, add the next one.

3) Whisk the cheese regularly. It might look as if it is separating but eventually it will melt together with the stout and form a smooth dip.

4) Add nutmeg and turn heat down to medium-low.

5) Continue to simmer until fondue thickens, about 10 more minutes. Serve immediately with cubes of crusty bread. It reheats really well also.

Port Wine What?

Port wine cheese is not the most popular of cheeses and this is a huge travesty in my mind. Granted, it’s a bit on the processed side, but the ingredients aren’t all that bad.

It has things like cheddar cheese, cream, and yes… even port wine in it.

Really just two things.

Normally, you just eat it at room temperature because it’s spreadable, but I figured it would be just as good melted in a big pot.

I made a bunch of this, but you could easily half the recipe.

Just for cost comparison, 8 ounces of port wine cheese will run you about $4 while 8 ounces of Gruyere will run you about A MORTGAGE PAYMENT.

Processed.

Doing the Fondue

This can barely be called a recipe. Basically you just toss all the ingredients in a pot and whisk them until they are smooth and melted. Done.

I used a whole bottle of good stout. You’re saving some money on the cheese. Don’t use Miller Lite to make this.

Action shot!

Put this over medium heat and just start adding the port wine cheese in chunks until it’s melted.

A whisk helps to stir everything well.

As your port wine cheese melts, it will go through this phase where it looks like maybe it’s separating. Don’t fret. Just keep whisking and eventually it will combine with the stout and be smooth and delicious.

Melt and whisk and repeat.

The only other ingredient in this fondue besides cheese and beer is fresh nutmeg. It adds a nice, subtle spice flavor to the fondue.

I guess it’s optional, but if you happen to have some, grate it in.

Always good in fondue.

That’s pretty much all there is too it. Once your nutmeg is in, just keep simmering the cheese sauce until it’s the thickness that you want.

I simmered mine for probably ten minutes, whisking pretty regularly, and then called it good.

You can serve this with lots of stuff to dip, but cubes of good crusty bread were my personal favorite.

This makes a lot.

The nice thing about this fondue is that since you start with spreadable cheese, the fondue is actually useable even at room temperature.

This is not true for traditional fondue which turns into a big block of cheese if you take it off the burner for a few minutes.

Dip. Eat. Repeat.

I’m a huge fan of traditional fondue, but this was a really delicious (and cheap) alternative.

Even if you’re not a Wall Street Executive, now you too can enjoy the fun of dipping things in melted cheese!

Yes please.

I thought it was going to be a close poll last week, but a dip of some sort won by a landslide!

I’m big believer in the general philosophy that almost any appetizer can be made into a dip of some sort. It’s really just simple physics. If it tastes good on it’s own, it’ll probably taste good processed down, baked, and put on a piece of bread or chip.

Sometimes, the dip is even easier to make then the original appetizer which is an added bonus.

That’s definitely true for this recipe.

There are two ways to make jalapeno poppers that I know of, both of which are delicious but a bit of work. This recipe pushes both of those methods aside and just mashes a metric ton of jalapenos with cheese.

How could it not be delicious?!

Jalapeno Popper Dip

Yield: Serves 6-8.

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound cream cheese
1 cup mayonnaise
1 cup cheddar cheese, grated
5-6 jalapeno peppers, minced
1 poblano pepper, minced (opt.)
1 Tablespoon olive oil
1 cup Panko bread crumbs
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 cup butter, melted
Tortilla chips, for serving

Directions:

1) Mince jalapenos and poblano. Leave the seeds in.

2) Add olive oil to a skillet and saute peppers over medium heat for about 4 minutes until they soften.

3) In a large bowl, mix together sauteed peppers with cream cheese, grated cheddar, and mayo. Stir well to combine.

4) In a small bowl, mix together Panko, butter, and parmesan cheese.

5) In a 1 1/2-2 quart buttered baking dish, scoop in the dip and spread it evenly in the dish. Top with panko topping.

6) Bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees until cheese is melted and topping is browned.

7) Serve immediately with tortilla cheese or toasted bread.

Adapted from a Tablespoon recipe.

Pepper Overload

I know. This recipe has a lot of jalapenos in it. In fact, I’d bet that the only recipe you would ever make that has more jalapenos is if you were to make actual jalapeno poppers.

The truth though is that there is so much creamy stuff in this dip that the heat of the jalapenos is really reduced. If you only did one or two, you wouldn’t get any heat at all from them.

And don’t worry about seeding the things. Just wash them and dice them up. I like to quarter mine into segments and then dice them.

Leave the seeds.

I threw in a poblano in my batch just for fun, but I’m not really sure it gave the final dip much flavor. You can leave it out without too much worry I think.

Once you have all your peppers diced, saute them in a skillet with a drizzle of olive oil over medium heat for a few minutes. You just want them to soften a bit and cook off some of the liquid.

Just a few minutes will do the trick.

Trust me on this.

Mixing the Dip

There’s a lot of creamy stuff in this dip. No doubt about that.

I just did the full fat version because, hey… this is for the Super Bowl!

If you wanted to make this somewhat healthier though you could:

1) Cut the mayo amount in half.
2) Substitute the mayo entirely for Greek yogurt.
3) Sub out a quarter to half of the cream cheese for whipped silken tofu.

The third one might change the texture slightly, but I doubt it would be very noticeable. It’s a substitution that I frequently use in dips like this.

The creamy business.

But like I said… this is for the Super Bowl so why not just do it all the way?!

Once your peppers are done cooking, just stir everything together. Pretty straightforward!

This will even smell spicy.

The Topping

Probably the most common type of jalapeno popper is the fried ones with a golden crust. To get the same effect in dip form, just mix together some Panko bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese, and melted butter in a bowl.

If you don’t have Panko, you can definitely use normal bread crumbs.

Butter is important.

Baking the Dish

In a medium-sized casserole dish, scoop in your dip mixture and top it with your bread crumb topping.

I’d recommend buttering the dish before adding the dip just to make sure it doesn’t stick badly. It would be horrible to lose some dip!

Don't forget to butter the dish!

Bake this whole thing for about 25-30 minutes at 350 degrees.

It’s done with the cheese is all melted and the topping is nice and browned.

Really nicely browned.

Serve this sucker as soon as possible with lots of tortilla chips or toasted bread.

The chip to dip.

This is about as easy as a dip gets. It’s definitely way easier than making actual jalapeno poppers, but the flavor is really very similar.

If you happen to have leftovers, let me tell you a little secret. Put a few spoonfuls of it in a rice and bean burrito. Amazingness.

That's a good lookin' dip!

One nice thing about working from home is that I have the luxury to go the store pretty much whenever I want. As you might imagine, I try to go when there aren’t a lot of people there.

The downside of this flexible schedule is that it has made me a pretty lazy meal planner. Because I can go to the store every day, I do go to the store every day. Sometimes multiple stores…

The people all know me now at the local spot as the weird 20-something guy who shops only when retired people shop.

I think they like me though because I bring them lots of strange ingredients. I have a knack for finding weird stuff they didn’t even know they had in their own store.

On this day, that ingredient was fennel thanks to the poll last week when an appetizer won. There was a pristine row of fennel bulbs in my local store. Untouched.

The check-out person didn’t even know what they were, let alone the look up code. When he asked me what they tasted like I blurted out, “It’s like licorice celery.”

He replied, “That sounds horrible.”

I almost brought him some of this dip just to redeem fennel in his mind after my apparently gross description!

Baked Fennel Dip

Yield: Serves 6.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

3 bulbs fennel, quartered and roasted
2 cloves garlic
3 Tablespoons honey
1/4 cup half and half or cream
1/3 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
3 Tablespoons olive oil
Pinch of salt and pepper
Butter, for baking dish
Crackers or crusty bread

Helpful Equipment:
Food Processor

Directions:

1) Chop stems and roots off of fennel, leaving just the bulbs.

2) Wash bulbs well and quarter them.

3) Heat oil in an oven safe skillet over medium-high heat. Once hot, add the fennel quarters and sear on each side for 3 minutes per side.

4) Add garlic cloves (whole, but peeled) to the pan. Sprinkle on some salt and cover the pan with foil. If you don't have an oven-safe skillet, you can transfer all of this to a baking dish.

5) Bake the fennel and garlic at 400 degrees for 20-25 minutes, until the fennel is very tender.

6) Transfer fennel and garlic to a food processor and pulse until smooth. Add other ingredients (reserve 2 tablespoons of cheese for topping) and continue to pulse until everything is combined.

7) Butter a 3 cup baking dish and transfer the dip to the dish. Sprinkle on remaining cheese and salt and pepper.

8) Bake dish again for 20 minutes at 400 degrees.

9) Serve dip with thick crackers or crusty bread.

Adapted from a Martha recipe.

Roasting Fennel

Fennel is kind of a strange vegetable. It’s looks like what would happen if you stuck celery and dill in some sort of nuclear chamber and fused the two together.

It’s delicious stuff though and I love cooking with it every chance I get.

Strange Root!

What I love about fennel is its light flavor. It smells pretty strongly of anise, but once you roast it down, it completely mellows out. It still has a subtle licorice flavor, but it’s very light.

Mixed with a few other ingredients, I think it makes a really solid dip.

Prepping fennel can be a pain if you’re doing something fancy with it. For this recipe though, just chop off the stalks and the root tips and give them a good rinse.

Ready to quarter and cook.

Quarter the fennel next and toss the fennel quarters into a pan with a good drizzle of olive oil. If you have an oven-safe pan, that would work best since we are going to transfer these to the oven after a quick sear.

Just heat the skillet over medium-high heat until the fennel lightly caramelizes, about 5 minutes.

All ready to roast!

After that, go ahead and add a few whole garlic cloves to the dish along with a good pinch of salt.

Cover this entire thing with foil and roast it at 400 degrees for about 25 minutes. The fennel will get super-tender.

This will also make your house smell like a licorice factory and a garlic farm had a baby.

This will make your house smell awesome.

The Dip

Besides the fennel and garlic, there’s only a few other ingredients that you need.

The half and half (or cream if you want to get crazy) is important as it gives the dip a really smooth texture. The honey gives the dip some sweetness which is nice and the Parmesan cheese gives it some saltiness and, well, cheesiness which is always good for a dip.

Good flavors here!

Basically, just throw all of this stuff in a blender or food processor and pulse it until it’s a smooth consistency. I recommend tasting it at this point and adjusting for salt and pepper. It might need a bit more cream or honey. Just use your best taste bud judgement.

NOTE: If you don’t have a food processor, I still think you can make this dip. The fennel bulbs are so tender after roasting that I think you could just mash them with a fork and the stir everything together. It might be a bit more rustic, but I think it would work fine.

When you think it’s ready, pour it into a lightly buttered baking dish and sprinkle on a bit more Parmesan cheese.

Ready for the oven.

Bake this bad boy at 400 degrees for another 20 minutes and you’ll be left with this thing of beauty.

The crispy edges are the best.

Those almost burned bits around the edges are my favorite part. They are crunchy and delicious.

Serve this warm with crackers or nice crusty bread.

Chomp!

Why did I pick this as a Thanksgiving Appetizer?

Well, for one, you can make it in advance. Two, although it does have a bit of cream in it, it’s actually a really light dip. The flavors are completely refreshing and palate cleansing so I thought it would work well as a snack before the big meal.

It’s definitely a unique dip and one that I bet most of your guests haven’t had.

Quick and delicious!

As I mentioned on Friday, I spent my weekend cooking for a wedding (about 100 people) and I’m completely exhausted. I’ll write more about the wedding, the menu, and the whole experience later. I still need to process it!

But I thought I would share a fantastic dip with you all that, in hindsight, I would have definitely included on the wedding menu.

It’s a really simple baked dip from Anne Burrell’s latest cookbook, Cook Like a Rock Star.

So check out this rock star dip and also enter to win a copy of the book!

Baked Ricotta

Yield: Serves 4-6 as an appetizer.

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 45 minutes

Ingredients:

2 Cups ricotta cheese
1 clove garlic
1 sprig rosemary, finely chopped
1 lemon, zest only
3 Tablespoons olive oil (plus a bit for finishing)
1 pinch red pepper flakes
1 pinch salt and pepper
1 baguette, sliced and toasted
Butter, for baking dish

Directions:

1) Combine ingredients in a bowl and mix together well.

2) Scoop dip into a buttered, small baking dish.

3) Bake at 375 degrees for 15-20 minutes until lightly browned and hot.

4) Drizzle dip with some good olive oil and sprinkle with fresh rosemary.

5) Serve dip with sliced, toasted baguette.

Adapted from Cook Like a Rock Star

Mixing the dip

There’s nothing hard about this dip. It has only a few ingredients, but each of them pack some great flavors.

The basics!

Just add your ricotta to a large bowl and stir in the minced herbs, crushed red pepper, and lemon zest.

In my opinion, the lemon zest is the most important thing here. It’s a great addition to this dip.

The zest is so crucial.

Stir this all together really well and scoop it into a small baking dish.

I recommend buttering the baking dish so that the dip doesn’t get really stuck to it. Not essential, but definitely worth the 5 seconds it takes in my opinion.

All set to bake.

Bake this dip at 375 degrees for 15-20 minutes. The dip should be lightly browned on top and very hot.

Finishing the Dip

I guess you could use crackers or pita chips for this dip, but I recommend slicing up a sturdy baguette and lightly toasting the bread. The dip is pretty sturdy and thick so it helps to have a similarly sturdy vehicle to get it into your mouth!

No wussy crackers for this dip.

When the dip comes out of the oven, sprinkle it with some extra rosemary and drizzle on a bit of olive oil.

I housed almost half of this by myself, but it’s definitely meant to serve multiple people!

Yummy stuff.

Cook Like a Rock Star

The publisher for Anne’s latest book was nice enough to send me a copy of the book and also give me three copies to giveaway to you all.

After hanging out with the book for a week or so, I think it’s a solid book.

If I had to give one critique of the book, I would say that some of the recipes are a little too extravagant. I’m not sure how accessible some of the recipes are for most at-home cooks. I picked one of the easier recipes in the book to try out.

But, at the same time, they all look really freakin’ good and she does a good job of walking you through some of the more difficult steps. I guess, at the end of the day, if you want to cook like a rock star, you probably need to learn how to go a bit above and beyond.

So the title is fitting I think. It’s not a book that I would recommend for someone who is just learning to cook, but it’s awesome if you want to take your game to the next level.

Anyway. I’m giving away THREE COPIES of the book! So just leave a comment and you’re entered to win!

I’ll pick the winners at 7PM Eastern Time tonight.

Oh. And make this dip. It really is rock star.

There's good stuff under those crumbs.

So, I have a kind of crazy week next week and this dip will play a part in it.

Betsy and I have a few friends that are getting married in Boulder next weekend and through an interesting turn of events, I’m going to be catering their wedding!

Yes. You read that correctly. I will be feeding 100ish people with delicious Macheesmo food.

I’m mildly nervous about it because A) I’m not a caterer and B) I’m not a caterer, but I think it’s going to be fantastic.

We decided on a menu that’s going to be very doable for me to make (think upscale BBQ) and I’m going to have a few helping hands.

What’s the worst thing that happens? I ruin two people’s special day? Probably not the first time!

I plan on writing more about the wedding and the menu that I came up with after the event, but I was very excited that you guys voted for a butternut squash dish in last week’s poll because it gave me the chance to test a dip that will be on the menu next week!

Butternut Squash Dip

Yield: 1.5 quart dish

Prep Time: 1 hour 15 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour 45 minutes

Ingredients:

3 cups butternut squash flesh
1 cup heavy cream
8 ounces Gruyere (or swiss) cheese, grated
1 Teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 Tablespoon hot sauce (opt.)
Salt and pepper
Panko breadcrumbs
Butter (for the dish)
Pita chips (for serving)

Directions:

1) Slice butternut squash in half and bake at 350 degrees for an hour. let cool slightly before handling.

2) Scoop out seeds from squash and measure out flesh. Add to other ingredients and mix well.

3) Add dip to a buttered casserole dish and top with Panko.

4) Bake at 400 degrees for 30-40 minutes.

5) For pita chips, cut pita into sixths and split each sixth in half. Toss with a drizzle of olive oil and kosher salt. Bake at 400 degrees for 10-12 minutes and stir once halfway through.

6) Serve dip with the chips!

Chopping Goards

A whole butternut squash is kind of a daunting thing. It seems kind of impenetrable.

I’ve found that the best way to get into it is just to attack it from the top. Take your largest knife and carefully stab it right in the center. Push the knife down as far as you can.

Scary.

Then just kind of push the knife down and it should easily slice open half of the gourd. This is a safe and fast way to slice this guy open rather than sawing away at it for hours.

The safest way...

Repeat the process on the other side and the squash should pop open and reveal some delicious orange flesh.

Pretty thing.

Add these two halves to a baking sheet and bake them at 350 degrees for about an hour. They should soften up a lot, but you don’t want them to get completely soggy.

These were mine after an hour of baking. You’ll want to let them cool for a few minutes before trying to handle them!

After a long bake.

Mixing the Dip

It’s important that you actually measure your squash when you mix it in with your other ingredients. Butternut squash can vary hugely in size so don’t just toss in the whole thing and call it good. It’ll mess up the ratio.

But the flesh is pretty easy to scoop out so just measure it along with all your other ingredients. Stir this together and you’ll be in business.

All the other tasty stuff.

Once you get the dip mixed together well, add it to a baking dish that has been buttered. If you don’t butter your dish, the dip will stick pretty badly to the edges.

I love the color on this stuff.

Don't forget the butter!

While you could just bake it like this, I decided to add a crispy topping to the dip.

I did make a small mistake though (which I swear I will not make during the actual wedding). I accidentally used Italian Panko instead of just regular Panko.

Don’t make this mistake. Just use the normal stuff.

Try to avoid Italian breadcrumbs...

Bake this at 400 degrees for about 30-40 minutes. The Panko should brown a bit and the dip should be hot and delicious.

Pita Pita Pita

You can definitely buy pita chips, but I’m a big fan of making them. I find that they are sturdier and more flavorful. Just chop up a few pitas into sixth and then separate the two layers.

Add them to a baking sheet and drizzle on some olive oil and kosher salt.

Easy to make at home.

Mix them all together and bake them for about 10-12 minutes at 400 degrees. Check them halfway through and stir the chips to make sure they are being cooked evenly.

You’re finished chips should be lightly browned and crispy.

So good!

It’s not rocket science at this point.

The chip goes in the dip.

A first dip...

I feel great about this dip. The flavor is really nice and it goes well with crispy chips. Plus it’s pretty low maintenance and easy to make in bulk which makes it a winner for my wedding day menu.

This time next week I’ll be prepping this dip for a hundred hungry wedding guests.

Interesting color...

Betsy and I hosted a Cinco de Mayo happy hour last week and I wanted to make a few different dips to go along with the ‘ritas and ‘ronas. Guacamole and pico de gallo were requested, but I wanted a third dip that was a bit experimental.

The only thing I new for sure about this dip is that I wanted it to have black beans in it.

My plan was to just mix stuff in until I had something that was tasty on a chip.

Luckily it didn’t take me too long to get there even though the ending dip ended up being kind of a strange orange color.

Black Bean Chili Dip

Yield: 5 cups

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 10 minutes + cooking time if using dry beans

Ingredients:

4 Cups black beans, cooked
1/4 red onion, diced
2 red jalapenos, minced
Small handful cilantro, minced
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1/2 Cup sour cream
1-2 Tablespoons chili powder
1 Teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
Salt and pepper
Tortilla chips for dipping

Directions:

1) Cook beans if using dry beans.

2) Mix beans with veggies and stir in olive oil and sour cream.

3) Add spices to taste and serve with chips.

Cooking the Beans

If you’re in a rush, you can 100% use canned beans for this dip.

I find that dried beans have a slightly firmer texture which I liked in this dip. If you want a softer dip though, then you should just use canned.

If you’re using dried, soak them in cold water overnight to make them easier to cook. I never really noticed it before but soaked black beans are actually purple!

Purple beans!

Of course, after you boil them in salted water for an hour or so they soften up and turn a more familiar color. Mine still weren’t exactly black, but whatever. They tasted good already.

Still not black!

The Dip Process

I kind of just tossed stuff into the bowl for this guy. I started with some red onion and cilantro. I had these leftover from the guacamole and pico so I figured it should work in this dip also.

Some flavorful veggies.

I also added in a few diced red jalapenos to give it some heat.

The dip was pretty dry at this point. In fact, it was more like a black bean salad then a dip. So I found some good stuff to add to it that would hopefully make it more dip-like.

Fixing the dry issue.

I added a good drizzle of olive oil and some sour cream and I liked where it took me. It made them kind of a strange black/white color, but the consistency was good. You could add more sour cream or greek yogurt if you wanted it even creamier.

White black beans.

Now it was just a seasoning game for me. For some reason I grabbed chili powder. It was a good grab.

Actually homemade...

Mix in a Tablespoon or two of that along with some cayenne if you want it spicier. Then season it with salt and pepper and you’re all set!

As with most dips, this gets better if you let it chill in fridge for an hour or so before serving.

Not as spicy as I was thinking...

The requisite dip-on-a-chip shot:

Pile it high!

This was a pretty unique dish. Most people couldn’t quite put their finger on what the flavors were, but they had no problem eating two big bowls of it. It’s a lot heartier than other Tex-Mex dips so it’s great for a dip-based happy hour.

As with most the recipes I make, I encourage you to customize this guy as you go. There’s all kinds of veggies or spices you could add to this to make it your own.

The pita just dove right in.

This is one of those special dips (you know the kind) that takes practically no time to prepare but gives the impression that you were slaving away for hours peeling artichokes and chopping olives. It also won the poll last week!

OK. Actually, if you can convince someone that you peeled like 20 artichokes then you are partying with the most gullible person on the planet. But still, people will be impressed because it’s a delicious thing and the flavors are fairly complicated considering it’s really only a few ingredients tossed together and baked up.

Artichoke and Olive Dip

Yield: 8x8 dish

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

1 (15 ounce) can artichoke hearts, chopped
1 (8-10 ounce) jar olive tapenade, no specific brand needed
1 Cup grated Asiago or Parmesan cheese
1 1/2 Cups grated Monterey Jack cheese
1/2 Cup fresh basil, chopped (plus some for garnish)
1 Serrano pepper, diced (optional)
Salt and pepper
6 pita breads
Olive oil

Directions:

1) Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Cut pita chips into sixths and peel apart each side. Each pita should make 12 chips. Lay out chips on two baking sheets and drizzle with oil and a pinch of salt.

2) Cook pita chips for 10-15 minutes, stirring once until they are a light golden brown. They will continue to crisp up out of the oven as they cool.

3) Drain and chop artichokes and chop basil and pepper if using it.

4) Add veggies in a medium bowl with olive tapenade and grated cheese. Stir to combine and pour into a 9x9 baking dish or a 2 1/2 quart round or oval dish.

5) Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes until bubbling and browned around edges.

6) Let cool for a few minutes then serve immediately with pita chips.

Making the Pita Chips

This dip is so simple to make that the least you can do is make some nice, homemade pita chips for your guests. Of course, if you’re in a crunch, you can buy some or also just serve the dip with crusty bread.

But homemade pita chips are so easy and delicious that it makes sense to me to make them any time I get the chance.

Just chop up 5 or 6 pitas into sixths and then peel apart the two sides of each sixth. So each pita should make 12 chips. They won’t all be perfect and that’s okay.

Then lay them out on a baking sheet (probably need two) and drizzle the pita slices with olive oil and a pinch of Kosher salt. Bake at 400 degrees for 10-15 minutes, stirring once halfway through.

It's the little things...

Just be sure not to burn the chips though. They’re done when they are slightly golden brown. They will continue to crisp up as they cool out of the oven also.

Literally, that’s about the hardest part of this dip. Good thing we got it out of the way.

Making the dip

This could be an incredibly hard dip to make if you peels all the artichokes from scratch and made the olive tapenade from scratch, but we’re going to do neither of those things.

Oh. And if you don’t love olives, you can cut back on the tapenade or replace it with sun-dried tomatoes. The original recipe just called for like 1/2-3/4 of a cup of tapenade, but I wasn’t going to keep a tiny jar of tapenade which would quickly get lost in my fridge so I just used the whole jar.

It's okay to cheat here.

Chop up your pepper and basil and grate your cheeses. If you’re using the Serrano pepper, dice it pretty tiny so someone doesn’t get a big bite of heat.

For the artichokes, just drain them and roughly chop them up. Easy enough.

Again, canned or jarred is what you want here.

Combine everything in a big bowl and stir it together! There should be plenty of salt and oil from the tapenade but give it a quick taste anyway and adjust.

I used two kinds of cheese (Asiago and Monterey Jack) for this dip. I figured the Asiago would give it some nice flavor and nothing melts like Monterey Jack so it’s always good to throw into a dip.

Just stir everything together!

Already smells good!

There’s enough oil in this dip that you don’t need to worry about greasing your baking dish at all. Just fill it up!

Bake it up!

Bake this guy at 400 degrees for about 30 minutes until bubbling and browned around the edges.

If you want to get fancy you can sprinkle some more chopped basil on top just to make it pretty.

A sprinkle of basil to make it pretty.

You’ll want to let this cool for a few minutes before diving in, but man is it good.

Dip on a chip.

This is a really nice fall dish. It uses mostly canned/jarred stuff and is completely warming.

If you make this though, I highly recommend the homemade pita chips. They’re maybe the perfect chip for this dip.

Like roasted peppers? I have a treat for you!

When I was a kid, I remember we had a small garden out back behind our house. Ok. Actually it wasn’t that small. It was probably like 1/2 an acre. And we grew a huge amount of peppers – mostly green chiles.

We would pick them all off the plants and my dad would set them up on some wire mesh grates and then pull out an enormous butane torch. He would roast the crap out of all of them.

This of course led me to have a serious love for two things during my childhood: Fire. And roasted peppers.

Turns out that it’s not really realistic to set up a butane torch in a DC apartment, but you can get pretty close with a gas stove or really hot oven.

And if you like roasted peppers, well, this dip is for you my friend.

Roasted Pepper Dip

Yield: Makes 4 Cups

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Ingredients:

4-5 assorted roasted peppers. If I did this again, I think I would skip normal bell peppers. They don't add much flavor when roasted. Go with red peppers, banana peppers, green chiles, etc.
2 Jalapenos, roasted
1/2 onion, roasted (optional)
2 Cups yogurt (Greek yogurt would work also)
1/2 Cup sour cream
Salt and pepper

Directions:

1) Roast peppers in a 450 degree oven for 30 minutes, turning occasionally, until peppers are charred all around.

2) Add peppers to a bowl and cover with plastic wrap to steam for a few minutes.

3) Don't wash the peppers, but rub them with your hands to remove as much skin as possible. No need to be completely thorough here.

4) Slice peppers and remove most of the seeds.

5) Dice peppers (dice the jalapenos very small) and add to a bowl. Let cool to room temperature before mixing in other ingredients.

6) Mix in sour cream, yogurt, and any other spices you are using. Taste for salt and pepper.

7) Serve with tortilla chips, pita chips, or anything that you can dip!

The Peppers

I kind of just grabbed some peppers for this dip but if I were to make it again I’d be a bit more thoughtful about it I think. For starters, roasted bell peppers don’t add much in the flavor department. I’d skip those entirely and maybe substitute some green chiles or something.

Also, you could also roast up half an onion. The caramelized onion would go great with all the other flavors.

An assortment of peppers...

Roasting the Peppers

Unless you happen to have a huge butane torch laying around, you’re gonna have to get creative about roasting these guys.

I’ve used my gas burners for roasting before, but I was roasting so many peppers this time around I decided to just do it in the oven. Lay out all the peppers (including the jalapenos) on a baking sheet and roast at 450 degrees for about 30 minutes. Turn the peppers every few minutes.

Charred skin is what you’re looking for. When most of the skins are charred and shriveled, remove the peppers and add them to a big bowl.

All roasted up!

Cover this bowl tightly with plastic wrap so the peppers can steam for a few minutes. This will make the skins really easy to peel off.

Peeling and chopping

Since this is all going in a dip, there’s really no need to be completely thorough about the peeling process here. I wouldn’t recommend rinsing the peppers either because that washes off a lot of the flavorful juices.

Instead just use your fingers to rub or peel off as much of the charred skin as you can. Then slice the peppers in half and discard the seeds. Again, it doesn’t have to be a perfect job.

A bit messy...

Dice up all your peppers and add them to a bowl!

One tip: If you’re using the jalapenos, dice them very small. I made the mistake of dicing them the same size as all the other peppers and when you got a jalapeno, it was a bit over-powering because of the size of the pieces.

This smells pretty solid.

Once you have your peppers chopped, let them cool to room temperature and then stir in all your other ingredients!

Taste it as you go and adjust the seasonings to your liking. You can obviously add salt and pepper, but feel free to experiment with other spices as well like maybe oregano, basil, chives, or parsley.

Also, you might need a bit more yogurt or sour cream based on how many peppers you end up using. Just eyeball it here people.

Great colors!

Add this to a bowl and serve it with tortilla chips, pita, or really anything that allows you to scoop a maximum amount of dip and put it in your mouth.

From above!

So while this may not be as fun as playing with a butane torch on a nice Fall day, the flavors are great and it’s pretty versatile. You can also make it spicy or just savory.

This would be awesome for a football game and as you might imagine, if you let it sit for a day or so in the fridge, the flavors get even better as the meld together.

Can't go wrong with beans and cheese!

Quick Administrative Note: A bunch of people have emailed me about past comments not showing up on posts. When I installed the new commenting software, I had to import all of the old comments into that system. Turns out it takes a little longer than I thought to do this. The good news is that they are almost all done and most of them should be showing now. This is also causing Macheesmo to be a bit slow. It should be back up to normal speed soon!

Also, I know that there’s some issues with the new site showing in Chrome… working on it!

OK. On to more important things. Things like beans and cheese and dips.

Let me tell you what I don’t always love about bean dips. Sometimes I think they are too beany. And I say that as a man that loves beans. So for this dip I ramped up the veggies in the dip and added a good amount of cheese to make it more of a dip and less like just refried beans in a bowl.

Bean and Cheese Dip

Yield: Serves 6-8.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

2 cans pinto beans
1 can black beans
1 red pepper, minced
2 poblano peppers, minced
1 jalapeno, minced
1/2 onion, minced
8 ounces cheddar cheese, shredded
1/2 - 1 Cup water
1/2 Teaspoon ground cumin
6 Tablespoons butter
Salt and pepper
Cilantro (for garnish)
Tortilla chips (for eatin')

Helpful Equipment:
Food Processor (like I say... helpful, but far from essential)

Directions:

1) Mince up veggies into very small pieces. If you have a processor, just give them a quick whirl in the food processor until they are minced, but definitely not a paste.

2) Melt butter in a medium pot over medium heat and when hot, add all the veggies.

3) Cook for about 5 minutes until veggies are soft.

4) Drain beans in a colander and then rinse quickly under cold water. Add beans to veggie mixture.

5) Cook for a few minutes until beans are really soft.

6) Either use the processor to blend up the entire mixture until smooth (you can also use a blender at this point), or add the water to the pot and mash up the beans with a fork or masher until they are pretty smooth. If you're blending or processing, add water until smooth. If you don't have a processor the dip may not end up quite as smooth, but just call it rustic and eat it anyway.

7) Add dip back to the pot if you processed it and heat over low heat. Add the cheese to the pot and stir until melted. Add spices and taste for salt and pepper.

8) Serve immediately with cilantro and chips. The dip is great warm or cold.

Starting the dip

The cool thing about this dip is that it’s actually good at any temperature. And it’s a lot more flavorful then that stuff in a can that you find in the chip aisles.

You’ll need these guys to get started.

Feel free to customize this!

Since this is a dip, you really need to mince your veggies. You can 100% use a knife for this obviously, but I was in a hurry so I just roughly chopped everything and took out most of the seeds and gave it a whirl in my food processor.

I was lazy on this day

Of course, if you use a processor you also run the risk of over-processing the veggies. If you make a soup, you’ve gone too far!

But getting them pretty finely chopped is great. Literally this is like 3 seconds in the processor so don’t just turn it on and walk away or anything. If you do happen to over process it a bit, it isn’t the end of the world since we’ll be blending it all together later anyway.

Be careful if you use a processor...

Cooking this down

These veggies have a lot of flavor as is, but we can cook them a bit to pull out even more flavor.

In a medium pot or pan, add your butter until it’s melted. 6 Tablespoons sounds like a lot maybe but it’s really not considering how much dip we’re making. We’re basically going to make re-fried beans in this pan as part of the dip so the butter helps with that. If you wanted to be totally traditional you could use lard as well.

Once the butter is hot, add all your veggies and cook until they are soft, probably 5 minutes over medium heat. Stir pretty regularly.

Water's got to go...

While your veggies cook, open your beans, drain them in a colander, and give them a quick rinse under cold water. Then add your beans and spices (besides cumin, you could add some paprika, cayenne, or maybe a pinch of chili powder) to the pot and cook them until they are hot.

A little watery is okay at this point.

Finishing the dip

You have a few options at this point. In my opinion, the best thing to do is to add this whole mixture back to the food processor (or blender) and blend it until smooth. Add some water to the mixture until it’s smooth. The amount of water you’ll need to add will depend on a lot of variables so I can’t give a firm amount, but just add it 1/4 Cup at a time until the mixture is really smooth and blending easily.

I probably added about 3/4 cups of water.

Then add this all back into the pot to heat up again so we can melt the cheese!

But Nick. What if I don’t have a blender or food processor? I think you could still make this. As you cook the beans in the pot, just mush them up really well using a fork or masher. Mix in the water and continue to mash. Eventually I think it will mash up just fine. It might be a little more rustic than with the food processor, but it’ll still be delicious.

Smooth and cheesy!

Put this slightly ugly brown mixture over low heat and once it’s hot again, add all the shredded cheese and stir until melted.

Then taste for salt and pepper. Mine definitely needed a good pinch of both. Then serve it up with chips and cilantro on top if that’s your thing.

Dip on a chip!

This is really delicious. The dip has some heat and loads of flavor from the veggies, beans and cheese. As I said, it also stays a pretty smooth consistency when it’s cold so it’s fine to serve at any temperature.

I think it’s best warm though because then the cheese is really melted and awesome.

This might seem like a bit of work for some bean dip, but trust me, your guests will love it. Or if you don’t have guests you can just house the whole thing by yourself. Either option is fine.

This is how it goes: Show up at a party with your dish. Don’t let people know it’s your dish (skews the results). It’s sometimes unavoidable that the host will know that you brought it, but normally you can disguise it from most guests. Then sit back and watch. Do people prod at it curiously? Do people devour it? Does word spread about the crazy orange dip on the table? Does someone fake vomit after trying it? (Didn’t actually happen.)

You see, it’s pretty easy to sell a dip. But it’s an entirely different thing if the dip can sell itself. I took this acorn squash dip to a holiday party a few weeks ago and I would give it a solid (and honest) B on The Party Test.

Pretty things.

This dip is packed full of squash flavor which I consider to be a very good thing, but not everyone likes squash. Also, while I was tasting it, I could tell that it needed something. The flavor was just not quite there. I asked a very trustworthy friend what he thought (revealing the dip’s creator): “Needs hot sauce.”

He was half-joking because he puts hot sauce on everything, but he was also right. It needed some spice to it. I’ve adjusted the recipe below to have a bit more heat which I think would improve this dish.

Acorn Squash Dip

Yield: 8x8 baking dish.

Prep Time: 1 hour 15 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour 45 minutes

Ingredients:

2 acorn squash, roasted and mashed
1 Cup cream (or milk)
1.5-2 (about 8 ounces) Cups Gruyere cheese, grated
Salt and Pepper
1 Teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 Tablespoon Tabasco or other hot sauce (optional)

Homemade Pita Chips (for serving)
12 wheat pitas, cut into sixths
Olive oil
Kosher salt

Directions:

1) Slice squash in half, scoop out seeds, pierce skins with fork or knife and bake at 350 degrees for an hour. let cool slightly before handling.

2) Scoop out squash and measure out flesh. Add to other ingredients and mix well.

3) Add dip to a buttered casserole dish.

4) Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes.

5) For pita chips, cut pita into sixths and split each sixth in half. Toss with a drizzle of olive oil and kosher salt. Bake at 400 degrees for 10-12 minutes and stir once halfway through.

6) Serve dip with the chips!

Adapted from a Kitchn recipe.

Preparing the Squash

Literally the hardest part of this recipe is cutting the squash open. These suckers are hard. Get a good, large knife and work slowly and carefully so you don’t lose a finger! Start by piercing the squash in the middle and push your knife all the way through vertically until it hits the cutting board, then slide the knife down, slicing the squash open.

If that doesn’t make sense, check out this video which shows the technique I used. Once you get your squash halved, scoop out all the seeds.

After some scooping.

Then flip them onto a baking sheet and pierce the skins all over with a fork or knife. Bake these at 350 degrees for 60 minutes or until they are very tender. Yours might take a bit longer depending on the size of your squash, but mine took 60 minutes.

A good long roast.

These will be very hot when they come out of the oven, so let them cool for a few minutes before even bothering trying to handle them.

Then you can scoop out all the delicious roasted squash interior! If you wanted to be all fancy, you could even fill the shells with the dip and use that as a serving vessel. I just decided to use a baking dish though and so I threw out the pretty shells.

Stackable things are awesome.

Making the dip

Once the squash is roasted, the dip is pretty straightforward! Just toss in all your other dip ingredients and you’re all set!

Lotsa cheese.

Be sure to taste the dip and adjust for salt and pepper and also hot sauce if you want your version to be spicier or not. Then scoop it into your baking dish. You could obviously do this a day or so ahead and then just bake it before the party!

Ready for the oven.

The Pita Chips

I think pita chips are the perfect vessel for this dip. Actually, I think they are the perfect vessel for almost any dip.

And while the store variety is good if you’re in a crunch, they are super easy to make at home and are vastly superior on the taste scale. I like to make whole wheat pita chips but you can use the white variety if that’s your thing.

Just stack up 6 pitas and cut them into sixths like a pizza.

Pita chips!

Then take each sixth and open it up, splitting it into two sides. That means that each pita should yield 12 chips. Some will rip and that’s just fine. Lay them all out on a baking sheet and drizzle them with olive oil and a good sprinkle of Kosher salt.

Couldn't be easier...

Toss the pita chips a bit to make sure the oil is even and then bake them at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes. Stir them every 10 minutes or so to make sure they are cooking evenly. The ones on the bottom of the tray may get a bit soggy while cooking, but if you stir them around, they should all cook evenly.

They should be dry and crispy after 30 minutes, but you might need to bake them for another 5-10 minutes or so depending on your oven, the kind of pita you are using, and other variables. They should be mostly crisp and slightly browned, but not a deep brown. They will continue to turn crispy as they cool also!

One 10X13 baking sheet can hold 6 pitas worth of chips. Don’t over fill the baking sheets more than that though or they won’t cook evenly.

TIP: While you can make these days in advance, I don’t recommend it. Why? Because they won’t last until the party. You will eat all of them. Trust me on this one.

Baking the Dip

Once you are ready to party, just pop the dip in a 350 degree, preheated oven for about 30 minutes until it is hot and bubbly in the center. Then serve next to the pita chips and maybe additional hot sauce in case my hot sauce loving friend happens to be at your party.

Put the two together!

The only thing I will add about this dip is that it’s best right out of the oven. I actually cooked mine, then let it cool, then reheated it and it lost a good amount of moisture with the double warming.

Other than that, I thought it was awesome. If you give it a shot, let me know if it passes The Party Test!