Seriously Good Pimento Cheese (without cream cheese!)

This classic Southern, slightly spicy pimento cheese recipe is absolutely perfect! I love to have pimento cheese homemade with lots of storebought ingredients (crackers, cheese, pickles, etc) for an easy cheese board at a party or for a snack plate dinner! This is extra delicious paired with some homemade focaccia for dunking.

OK SO. 

Let us discuss the glory that is pimento cheese, since even if it's not Master's Weekend, we live in the South and love this dip for any and all snacking occasions. Since I started this blog I've made a LOT of pimento cheese, and have tweaked the recipe over the years to a combination that I absolutely adore.

Other people adore it too, and that's not something I say about a lot of the food I make, because I'm insecure. Pimento cheese homemade, though, is something that people of all walks of life really enjoy when it is good. Back when we used to cater large parties this was one of our most-ordered recipes, hands down.

Ingredients

Here's what you need for this recipe: cheese, mayo, sour cream, jarred pimentos, hot sauce, and some spices. That's it!

Recipe Notes and Ingredient Notes

• I have a few parameters slash requirements for pimento cheese, a few winning must-haves that make this version so delicious. First, cheese is freshly grated. By hand, with a food processor, box grater, or whatever, but from a brick that you break down into shredded cheese. 
• Next, I use a combination of mayo and sour cream, but not too much of each. I like my pimento cheese to be thick, not gloopy at all, and err on the side of an almost-dry mixture. You can always add more white stuff, but it's awfully hard to take it out once it's in the mixture. 
• Next, seasonings. I use several spices in homemade pimento cheese, including seasoned salt (sub kosher salt if you don't keep seasoned salt around), which adds something that is hard to describe to the dip, but a certain saltiness and flavor that tastes like a snack, I realize that makes no sense at all.
• Also, Hot Sauce: I love cayenne hot sauce in pimento cheese – think Frank’s, Tabasco, etc. But, other hot sauces such as sriracha add a really nice depth of flavor. Play around with hot sauce, and use ½ tablespoons of two different types if you’d like. For additional spice, add a sprinkle of cayenne pepper to the mixture.
• I listed measurements below but I always taste and add a little more of whatever I want to taste more of based on the cheese, my mood, the crowd (extra spice if there are no kids around!), etc. 

Step By Step Instructions

Making pimento cheese is seriously easy ... drain peppers, grate cheese, throw everything in a bowl.

I stir super gently to keep the cheese intact, then I taste and add more seasonings, then it's done! Serve this right away or let it hang in the fridge for dipping, sandwiches, topping BURGERS, you name it.

Feel free to add more hot sauce and/or cayenne pepper to make this an extra spicy pimento cheese! I do that often depending on who I'm serving.

Pro Tip: Right after the pimento cheese is made it will look a little creamy, like in the image above. As it sits, the mayo and sour cream will absorb a bit and the flavor will intensify as the dip thickens.

Serving and Storage

• This is PARTICULARLY good on crackers with green tomato jam. The combo of sweet + savory is one of my absolute favorites.
• I also love this on a cheese plate with crackers, veggies, cheese, etc.
• To make a very excellent pimento cheese sandwich, toast some grainy bread on one side with butter, then spread the soft side with pimento cheese. Lettuce and tomatoes are delicious on pimento cheese sandwiches, or you can eat it plain.
• Pimento cheese can be made in advance and stored in the fridge for about a week - it gets better as it sits.

Simple and delicious, I can't tell you enough to make this soon for football, keep it in your arsenal for holiday parties, summer potlucks, just everything fun needs some spicy pimento cheese.

Enjoy this!

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