Ingredients
- To that, you can add:
- 2 cups mozzarella cheese
- 1 cup parmesan (FINELY grated — the powdery kind)
- 1 cup mayonnaise
- 1 bag of rinsed-until-thawed artichoke hearts, broken up a bit with your fingers (canned works too, but the frozen ones are much fresher-tasting), as Brooke taught me originally,
- or/and
- 1 box frozen spinach, thawed and drained (I started doing this sometimes later),
- or/and
- 1 jar drained mushrooms
- or/and
- a little smoked shredded jack cheese across the top (this is a “new” alternative)
- and
- garlic seasoning, salt and pepper to taste
Preparation
Step 1
Pat dry any veggies you are using with a bunch of paper or one “real” towel. Mix well until combined, and then, in one version, you can place the dip in an oven-safe container (as in the photo above). Bake it for 45 minutes or so at about 350, and check on it. I like to put it under the broiler for a minute or two at the end, and serve it with pita bread or chips. Alternatively, you can spread it on a Boboli crust instead of the casserole dish, brushed beforehand with olive oil, and with some crushed garlic scattered about (then you can serve it as a white pizza).
As many times as I’ve made this, I’ve probably screwed it up just as many times. Benefit from my mistakes… Here are some things you should not do:
Do not add the mushrooms/spinach/artichoke hearts until they are VERY dry, drained and then toweled off.
Do not “eyeball” the measurements. Of COURSE I have attempted that, and it has always bombed, and the end result is “mayonnaise-y.” When done properly, there is no hint of the mayo at the end. This was the first dish I made my husband, ever, and there was too much mayo in it. He was reluctant to try it again. (Now he likes it, knowing what it is supposed to taste like.)
Don’t over-salt it. The parmesan is already pretty salty.
Do not forget the parmesan. Famously, I talked this dish up like crazy to my friends in college, made it, and served it to my friend Fred without adding the parmesan. The end result was too gross to even get into describing.
Do not use shredded parmesan instead of grated parmesan. I find that it throws off the proportions.