Lightened Up Green Goddess Dip

The last few weeks in our house have been wonderfully hectic... Mother's Day, my sweet mama visiting, my birthday, dear friends in town, Memorial Day... and insane work. But my dear boys love me and treated me SO well for all the celebration days, and we got a wonderful bit of time at the Oregon coast with our friends who came in from out of town. It's been a glorious few weeks!

Anyway, my sweet husband got me a Cooking Light anthology for my birthday - Antoinette and I both love CL and a lot of our recipes, and inspirations start there. One of the very first recipes in the new book is for a Green Goddess Dip - I read it through and HAD to have it. Like had to eat it right away. I took most of this batch down to the beach and our group gobbled it up!

Green Goddess Dip - from Cooking Light
Makes plenty for 6 people; even better day 2.

2 cups watercress
6 oz Greek yogurt
1/4 cup mayonaise
1/4 cup fresh basil leaves
1/4 cup fresh parsley
2 tablespoons fresh tarragon
5 green onions, chopped
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
Salt and Pepper to taste

This is barely a recipe. All you do is put all of this good stuff in a food processor and blend until smooth-ish. It's not really cooking, but it is creating, especially if you tweak the flavors to suit your preferences (or what's left in your fridge, or what's growing in your herb garden.)

The original recipe calls for a lot more basil and no tarragon. I love the lemony spice of tarragon, and definitely wanted some of that zip in this. 

The original also called for anchovy paste. I didn't have any, don't really like it, and wasn't going to buy it for one recipe. I think it overpowers with fishy flavor. It's just not for me. So out it goes.

This also called for some red pepper flakes, but we had two toddlers in our group and I wanted to make sure this would be nice for them, so I left it out and didn't miss it.

The last change I made was to swap the quantities of yogurt and mayo. Why not have more of the healthier yogurt? Done.

So that's it. Just blend it up and enjoy! It definitely improves with a little resting time. And the next day it was even better than the first. We ate this with veggies and crackers and it was a great, light snack. 

A few things about this recipe...
I think this would be just as good without the mayo, and I'd feel a lot safer having this out at a BBQ having just used yogurt. 

Also, watercress is a peppery, sturdy little green. If you want something else, baby spinach would also work, but the dip would be milder.

Things made this time last year...
Strawberry Mint Lemonade
 

Mango Guacamole and Homemade Salsa

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