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Side Dish

Appetizer/ Side Dish

Hot Bleu Cheese Dip With Sweet Corn

This hot dip makes a great fall appetizer. Chunks of bleu cheese and kernels of fresh corn are stirred into a mixture of cream cheese and light mayonnaise, then accented with chopped chives and shallots, and pieces of chopped jalapenos, if you so desire. The whole mixture is then baked in the oven to produce a piping hot savory dip that melts in your mouth, with pleasant bursts of sweet corn flavor. This is the perfect appetizer to serve at a cocktail party or before dinner. This tastes wonderful on blue corn chips or toast points, and a glass of oaky chardonnay is the perfect complement. Serves 4 to 6.

Ingredients:

  • 1 8 oz package cream cheese, softened
  • 1/3 cup mayonnaise
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 shallot, chopped
  • Kernels scraped from 2 ears fresh sweet corn
  • 4 oz blue cheese or gorgonzola crumbles
  • 2 Tbsp chopped fresh chives

Directions:

  1. Preheat oven to 350. 
  2. Place corn kernels and chopped shallot in a microwave safe bowl, and microwave on High for one minute to give them a head start on cooking. 
  3. Remove from microwave, let sit for one minute, then pour out onto a paper towel and pat dry with another paper towel to remove excess moisture. 
  4. Beat softened cream cheese and mayonnaise with a hand mixture until smooth and homogenous, about one minute. 
  5. Add salt and half of blue cheese crumbles and mix to until incorporated, about 30 seconds. 
  6. Remove beaters and, using a fork, stir in remaining blue cheese crumbles, corn mixture, and chives. 
  7. Transfer to medium, shallow oven-proof dish, scraping bowl with a spatula. 
  8. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until dip is slightly browned on top. 
  9. Remove from oven and allow to cool for about 10 minutes. 
  10. Serve in baking dish with blue corn chips.  Carrot and celery sticks are good if you would like additional dipping choices. 

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Side Dish

Oven-Toasted Hawaiian Rolls with Ginger

I absolutely adore King’s Hawaiian Rolls. They are soft, just a tiny bit sweet, and honestly, I think about Hawaii for just a millisecond every time I eat one. I wanted to find something special to do with them besides…well, just eat them. Even though they are wonderful on their own, I was convinced there must be something more imaginative I could do with them. While making a quick oven-toasted garlic bread one day, I realized that it must be possible to make a similar bread side dish using ginger instead of garlic… and that King’s Hawaiian rolls, with their slight tropical sweetness, would be the perfect bread base for this idea!

These oven-toasted rolls are slightly sweet, but not sweet enough to be a dessert. The ginger, broiled onto the top, is slightly spicy, but most of the bite is cooked out. I recommend serving them alongside a stir-fry or a salad as a warm side dish. This recipe serves 4, but they are tasty enough that people may want to keep eating them, so a double batch may be a good idea.

Ingredients:

  • 4 King’s Hawaiian rolls, cut in half-cross-wise
  • 2 Tbsp salted butter, softened (but not melted)
  • 1 tsp light brown sugar
  • 1 Tbsp peeled, minced fresh ginger

Directions:

  1. Preheat the broiler on high.
  2. In a small microwave-safe bowl, microwave the minced ginger on High for 30 seconds to give it a head start on cooking.
  3. Remove bowl from microwave and stir in butter and sugar.
  4. Place Hawaiian roll halves cut-side up in a metal baking pan lined with foil.
  5. Spread butter mixture evenly over the tops of the rolls.
  6. Place pan under the broiler and broil for 1 to 2 minutes, or until the rolls are toasted to the desired level of doneness (watch carefully as edges of rolls can blacken quickly).
  7. Remove from oven and serve warm.
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