REAL Tex-Mex Dip

This post is probably too late for your Sunday football game horse-durvers, but you can remember it next time!

Most of us are familiar with the old cheese dip recipe of a block of Velveeta, a can of Rotel tomatoes all melted and stirred together to ladle over tortilla chips.



Some cooks will add a mess of already cooked and crumbled sausage to it for some extra heft, which is good, too.

For something a little different, here's a couple of Tex Mex recipes that are a terrific alternative to the orange yellow stuff above.

The basis for both of these recipes is the poblano pepper:



This first recipe is a white Tex Mex dipping sauce:

1 small white onion (chopped)

4 tbsp butter

1 and 1/2 tbsp flour
1 cup milk

1 cup whipping cream

3 roasted poblano peppers, chopped

(To roast peppers: Spray an oven safe dish/pan with Pam, place whole poblano peppers in, and roast until just brown on edges (or to the roasted level you prefer) in a 475degree oven. Let cool to the touch, then slit on one side and clean out seeds, membrane and remove tops.)

2-3 chopped pickled jalapenos (if desired for a spicier dip)

8 0z shredded Oaxaca Mexican cheese (see photo in second recipe below)

8 0z shredded Monterray jack cheese

Place butter in a large sauce pan and melt on medium low heat. Toss in chopped onion, and both chopped chiles (peppers) to saute until onion is tender-crisp. Remove vegetables with slotted spoon to paper towel covered plate for now. Add flour to remaining butter in sauce pan (adding another pat of butter if needed and stir well, making a nice roux.

Slowly add a cup of milk and whisk well into roux, then add cup of whipping cream. Mix all together well.

Add Oaxaca and jack cheeses to roux and still until all melted. Return peppers and onions to the cheese sauce. Stir well.

Serve with your choice of chips or raw veggies.



The second recipe is not technically a dipping sauce, rather makes a chewy kind of mozzarella-y filling.

Ingredients:

8 medium poblano peppers roasted (see above directions for roasting)
4 tablespoons of butter
1 med onion cut vertical into strips
1 1/2 cups sliced fresh carrots (make fairly thin)
Fresh squeezed lime juice from one lime
salt and pepper


Heat butter till sizzling and saute onions and carrots about 5 min until onion is transparent and carrots begin to soften

Slice poblanos into strips instead of chopping, this time.
Add to onion and carrots - saute 10 more min. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Place an full round (about 8 ounces) of Mexican Queso de Oaxaca (pronounced kind of like "whah-hocka") in a Pam-sprayed cast iron skillet (remove wrapper, of course!)



Spoon poblano strips, onions and carrots on top of cheese round. Pop into 350 degree oven until cheese has soften through and started to bubble and spread in the skillet.

Will look something like this, though this is not from my kitchen, but borrowed from the internet for example:




Remove from oven, sprinkle with the lime juice, and stir a bit to mix together. Spoon a big hunk of melted cheese and poblano/veggie mix into a fresh warm flour tortilla, top with some fresh pico de gallo and fold or roll the tortilla. Yum!