Sunday Dinner + Dip of the Week

image via Gourmet

This week lovely cousin Erin + boyfriend Ben hosted a special Father's Day Sunday dinner at their place. Erin whipped up an amazing meal of pork chops with a blueberry sauce, green beans and roasted potatoes. It was incredibly tasty!

Audrey, in what I would consider a major win, shunned the uncured pepperoni pizza that I brought from Whole Foods as backup, and dove into the pork chops (sans blueberry sauce, but still) + veggies with gusto. She even rubbed her tummy in appreciation... Nice.

our Sunday dinner via little e

But the pièce de résistance was the edamame arugula dip and crostini that Erin served before dinner. Erin's got some seriously magical dips up her sleeve, and given that it's insanely, un-fathomably hot in these parts of late, I could do an entire dinner of a great dip. No oven, minimal effort, light, but still incredibly tasty and satisfying.

To that end, I'll try to post a rockin good dip here each week this summer.

Herewith Erin's dip, adapted from the May 2009 Gourmet:

• 1 cup shelled shelled fresh or frozen edamame
• 1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, divided, plus additional for drizzling
• 1 1/2 cups packed baby arugula (1 1/2 ounces), divided
• 3 tablespoons grated Pecorino Toscano
• 1/4 teaspoon grated lemon zest
• 1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
• Sea salt to taste
• 1 baguette
• 1 garlic clove, halved crosswise

Preheat oven to 350°F with rack in middle.

Cook edamame in boiling water, uncovered, until tender, 3 to 4 minutes, then drain and transfer to an ice bath to stop cooking.

Pulse edamame in a food processor until very coarsely chopped, then transfer half of mixture to a large bowl. Add 1/4 cup oil, 1/2 cup arugula, cheese, lemon zest and juice, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/8 teaspoon pepper to edamame in processor and purée until smooth. Add to bowl. Coarsely chop remaining cup arugula and gently fold into edamame mixture. Salt to taste.

Cut 16 diagonal slices (1/3 inch thick) from baguette and place on a cookie sheet. Drizzle with remaining tablespoon oil. Bake until pale golden and crisp, 8 to 10 minutes. Rub with cut side of garlic.

You can either spoon edamame dip onto baguette toasts and drizzle with olive oil or serve the dip in a bowl and let folks dip the toasts in.

Either way, it’s PERFECTION.