BBQ Bash

A friend of ours had his first annual summer BBQ this weekend. They are pretty big BBQs with more people invited than I think I even know. Since he has these BBQs often during the summer, he has it down to a science of how to entertain so many people. He provides the meat and then according to the first letter of your last name you have to bring either, drinks, condiments, or chips and dips. We fell into the chips and dip category. I wasn't feeling up to cooking on Saturday morning, so I was just going to "phone it in" and bring jarred salsa and some tortilla chips. My sister found this idea appalling, especially coming from me (since I enjoy cooking so much). Not wanting to disappoint, I did a quick dip recipe search on the internet and chose the recipe that seemed the easiest and most tasty. I was glad that I made a home made dip, as several people at the party seemed to really enjoy it!

Red Pepper - Cheese Dip
Cooking Light October 2004

Ingredients
1 large red bell pepper
1 small onion, peeled and halved
Cooking spray
1 whole garlic head
1 cup plain fat-free yogurt
1/2 cup (4 ounces) block-style fat-free cream cheese ( I used 8 ounces b/c it seemed too thin)
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper
1/4 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

Preparation

Preheat broiler.

Cut bell pepper in half lengthwise, and discard seeds and membranes. Place pepper halves, skin sides up, on a foil-lined baking sheet; flatten with hand. Broil 15 minutes or until blackened. Place in a zip-top plastic bag; seal. Let stand 10 minutes. Remove peel and discard. Set roasted pepper aside.

Reduce oven temperature to 400°.

Place onion halves, cut sides down, on a baking sheet coated with cooking spray. Remove white papery skin from garlic head (do not peel or separate the cloves). Wrap in foil. Place garlic on baking sheet with onion. Bake at 400° for 15 minutes; turn over onion halves. Bake an additional 15 minutes or until onions are soft and begin to brown. Place onion halves on a plate.

Return garlic to oven, and bake an additional 15 minutes. Cool 10 minutes. Separate the cloves; squeeze to extract garlic pulp. Discard skins.

Place roasted pepper, onion, and garlic pulp in a food processor;

process until fairly smooth. Add yogurt, cheese, cumin seed, and ground red pepper; process until smooth. Spoon dip into a bowl, and stir in parsley. Cover and chill.

Next time I would use jarred roasted red peppers to save some time. I don't think it would change the taste much and then I wouldn't have to worry about peeling the skin off of the pepper.

I think this would also be delicious as a sandwich spread.