White Chili

Please forgive the photograph. It was a late night and I had very shaky hands. That being said, this dip is amazing. As in my family will throw elbows over who gets to stand next to the pot and eat it amazing. It is a recipe from an old family friend that has become one of our family favorites. While we call it a "chili," there is nothing terribly chili-like about it. The trick is to serve it warm with tortilla chips, and I find that a fondue pot set on low works very well in terms of keeping it warm.

I made this most recent batch for an office open house, and I made it the night before, stored it in glass bowls in the fridge, and then reheated it in the fondue pot for serving the evening of. It tastes better if you serve it immediately, but it still tastes pretty amazing reheated. The proportions below should yield approximately 2 quarts, based on the size of the glass bowls I used to store it. You could easily halve the recipe (but why would you want to?).

White Chili

2 large sweet onions
4 Tbsp. butter
3 cans chopped green chiles (7 oz. cans) (Mexican aisle)
2 cans petite diced tomatoes
2 packages cream cheese (8 oz. bars) (Neufchâtel to lighten if desired)
1 1/2 c. heavy cream

Chop the onions in a food processor until they are finely diced but not liquid. Melt the butter in a dutch oven or medium stock pot, and saute the onions in butter over medium heat until they are translucent. I drain the chiles and tomatoes before adding. If you have only diced tomatoes (I can't find the no-salt-added in petite diced), use the food processor to do a quick chop so that you have smaller pieces. Once the onion is soft, add the tomatoes and chiles and cook until the tomatoes soften. Add the cream cheese and cook, stirring, until melted. Pour in the heavy cream and cook until heated through. Serve warm with tortilla chips.