Three Cheese Macaroni

Comfort Food: Lasagna

BBQ Grilled Cheese

Pork Sandwiches

I may or may not have just finished two, giant cream cheese wantons. Not a big deal.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Anyone out there have callused finger-tips? Are you available for hire? Seriously, my fingers are pink and salty. My nails are all torn up. The things I do for food... that should have been my blog post title. The Daring Cooks challenge for this month was to make some sort of nut butter. We had the option of what type of nut we wanted to use. Once the butter is made, we were to use it in a savory dish. I must admit, this might not necessarily be 'savory', but more sweet. I have a sweet tooth, I can't help it.

Since few people used pistachios, I decided to give it a try. My husband is also obsessed with them, so I figured he'd be a good guinea pig regardless.  I used about 3/4 cup of shelled and skinned pistachios (well, I skinned them as best as I could). I threw them in a food processor, added about 1/4 cup of sugar and a few tablespoons of water. After pulsing for a while, I realized that the processor wasn't going to hack it. So I transferred everything to a blender. That helped, but the butter didn't quite get to the consistency I was hoping for. The color was very pretty though.

I had a hard time trying to decide what to make with the butter. What do you put pistachios on? Maybe it would have been good with some salmon or other fish or meat with some sweetness to it, but I had already eaten dinner and really craved some dessert.

I decided to make some cream cheese wantons to devour with the pistachio butter. When I was plating it, I remembered that I was supposed to add honey to the pistachio butter while processing it - oops. That would have helped with the texture a bit. Instead, I drizzled the honey over the wanton. It was awesome. The combination of the sweet honey, nutty pistachios, creaminess of the cream cheese and the crunch of the deep fried wrap - so good. This could be a really quick appetizer when you find out someone's coming over in 15 minutes. I bet it would go great with a Veltliner or other sweet wine.


12 comments:

Margie said...

Great blog post title! Your pistachio butter looks so good and pairing it with the cream cheese wanton was inspired. I think there may be two giant fried cream cheese wontons over a bed of pistachio butter in my future. If I can get my kids to shell the nuts!

July 14, 2010 at 1:00 AM
Audax said...

Those photos are stunning and the wontons sound so delicious - pistachio nut butter yum yum. Marvellous work on this challenge. I should of done a 'sweet' version seeing your wonderful creation. Cheers from Audax in Sydney Australia.

July 14, 2010 at 4:06 AM
Unknown said...

Love love love pistachios! I bet with these wontons they were fabulous!

July 14, 2010 at 11:00 AM
Anonymous said...

Yum! This looks delicious - I love that you used pistachios!

July 14, 2010 at 11:44 AM
Ruth H. said...

Beautiful presentation of an amazing sounding dish! Can I come over next time you are making them? Your pistachia butter is a beautiful color, and I hope your fingers get a rest from those shells and husks!!

July 14, 2010 at 3:33 PM
TaGa_Luto said...

I like the combination. Your photos are beautiful too!

July 14, 2010 at 9:00 PM
chef_d said...

Yummy, the colors look beautiful! It must have tasted great :)

July 16, 2010 at 7:13 AM
Marisa said...

Great idea - I love this!

July 16, 2010 at 7:48 AM
Allison said...

The wontons look so beautiful! These look great!

July 16, 2010 at 2:29 PM
Monkeyshines in the Kitchen said...

Nice idea! (We made pistachio butter too, but cheated and bought the nuts pre-shelled...)

July 16, 2010 at 5:04 PM
Lana said...

Yum! Please make these next time I come visit!

July 16, 2010 at 5:41 PM
David and Stacy said...

Can you really stop at one giant cream cheese wanton?

The dish looks wonderful. Well done!

Stay JOLLY!
D&S

July 22, 2010 at 7:11 AM

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