Cheese grits w/green chiles (ala ashley)

8 Servings

Ingredients

Quantity Ingredient
6 cups Water
2 cups Quick-cooking grits; uncooked
2 teaspoons Salt
1 teaspoon Paprika
1 teaspoon Ground red Cayenne pepper
3 larges Eggs
4 cups Shredded Munster cheese
1 cup Mumex green chiles; roasted, peeled and seeded; chopped

Directions

I confess I have not tried the above recipe as listed (see "Cheese Grits with Green Chiles"). My feeling on reading it was that I would prefer a firmer finished product. Also I like the taste of NM green chiles and felt that sharp Cheddar cheese would overpower the chiles. I don't use canned chiles, keeping only frozen NM green chiles on hand. With all this in mind, I changed the recipe as follows: Prepare as in the first recipe, except place the grit mixture directly into greased custard cups instead of a baking dish. Bake the grits as above and let to cool. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

When ready to serve, reheat the cups of grits in a mircowave and inverted onto dinner plates. Serve as the starch accompaniment to a meal. Garnish with slivers of roasted red bell pepper or a good salsa. Probably best with grilled meats.

I served the grits with another recipe in the article: Roasted Serrano Salsa. I'm very partial to roasted (grilled) vegetables, especially, root vegetables and thought this salsa was an excellent accompaniment.

Made with either set of ingredients, the dish is rather tame, although tasty. But then, we all know how to improve on the tame part.

My SO proclaimed, that "This is company food". An ultimate complement for grits from a Vermonter. I thought it was very good and would serve it as an entree accompaniment in a meal served to southern guests (UK and AU subscribers read: "guest from the southern USA". Grits are a southern cultural thing, unique to the south.). However, I feel that grits' course texture keeps it from being an extraordinary dish (Please! ... don't shoot). I'd also increase the amount of green chiles.

Notes: A friend recently gave me a copy of an article from Southern Living, August 1995, page 73-75 entitled "A Taste of Red Hot Success". It was a brief article on Jean Andrews' new book _Red Hot Peppers_ (no bibliography or even ISBN was listed). Three recipes were included. The one which caught my southern friend's eye was "Cheese Grits with Green Chiles".

For UK, AU and some northern North American List subscribers: grits, plural noun (used with a sing. or pl. verb) (1) A ground, usually white meal of dried and hulled corn kernels that is boiled and served as a breakfast food or side dish. (2) Coarsely ground grain, especially corn. May your food be wonderfully pungent, Lynn. Lynn Ashley <73744.3234@...> CHILE-HEADS ARCHIVES

From the Chile-Heads recipe list. Downloaded from Glen's MM Recipe Archive, .

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