Monday Feature: Cookin Fanatic!

Hey hey there Virginia Bloggers! My name is Stephanie, also known as CookinFanatic, and today I’m excited to share with y’all an easy & delicious recipe featuring a favorite ingredient of mine!

But before we get to cooking, here’s a little background on yours truly 🙂

I’m a 30 year old CPA living in the Richmond, Virginia area… however, number crunching isn’t exactly my passion in life. So what is? Food, recipes and all things cooking!

I have been watching cooking & foodie shows for years, reading recipe books, and over the past few years have been fortunate enough to bring many of these ideas and dishes into my kitchen and onto the table.  I love to work with healthy ingredients, and definitely like to venture out from just the standard recipe. Getting creative and exploring tastes/combos that are new and exciting is what I adore. I guess you can say I am more of a recipe reader than a recipe follower, as I am always looking for ways to personalize a dish!

I write about my various cooking and food adventures over at CookinFanatic.com and you may also recognize me from this, professing my love for my favorite Chobani Greek yogurt!

So today I thought I’d share with you one of my favorite Cho-spired recipes, one that is super easy to whip up and also a real crowd pleaser.

But if you’re anything like me, you’ll be lucky if it even makes it to the crowd 😉

Pimento Cheese: A lightened up classic

This is a great way to lighten up a traditional pimento cheese, replacing the usual mayo suspect with luscious, creamy plain Greek yogurt. Enjoy!

5 ingredients:  medium cheddar cheese, plain  Chobani Greek yogurt, diced pimentos, lemon juice, crushed red pepper flakes.

This is so so sooooo easy, just watch! 🙂

Grate the cheese and into a bowl it goes.

Add the plain Greek yogurt Chobani 0% Plain for me!

Then the diced pimentos.

You can find them in the pickle aisle at any grocery store, already diced and all!

Finish things off with a fresh squeeze of lemon juice plus some spicy red pepper flakes.

And stir to incorporate.

 

That’s it folks!  The pimento cheese is ready to be  served 😉

I served mine with some Wasa crackers, but any crackers will do the trick!

Or just straight off the spoon.

 

There’s no judging here…

 

Enjoy!

Lightened-up Pimento Cheese
Makes 6-8 servings.

• 8 oz. block mild cheddar, shredded
• 6 oz. container plain Chobani (0%)
• 4 oz. jar diced pimentos, drained
• juice from 1/4 lemon
• 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes (or more, to taste)

Shred cheese using a grater (or use preshredded if you’d like).  Combine all ingredients in a bowl and stir to incorporate.

Make sure to drain the pimentos before adding, as any extra liquid will make the pimento cheese too watery.

Serve!