I participated in a campaign on behalf of Mom Central Consulting for Hood. I received product samples to facilitate my review and a promotional item as a thank you for participating.

It’s been really cold here on the East Coast and I’m counting the days until Summer.  We all need to get out of the house more and moving!  During the winter months we all tend to snack more on the food we shouldn’t be eating and by this time of the year we all start feeling it.   The first thing my kids do when they walk in the door after school is ask for a snack!  If the weather was nicer outside, then they’d be playing out there instead of snacking.

So when Hood asked me to use Hood Sour Cream in a comfort food for my family I felt a bit challenged.  Because this time of the year I try to serve more healthy foods since we aren’t outdoors and moving more.  But on the same hand, I’ve been eating better for the past year so my normal comfort foods have changed to healthier versions.

For example, I love chips and dip and so do my kids!  I could sit and eat an entire bag of chips along with a bowl of onion dip in one sitting.  Seriously!   Is that good for me or my family?  No!  So over the past year I’ve shifted my bag of chips and bowl of onion dip to a bowl of raw veggies and ranch dip.  And believe it or not, it’s become a favorite comfort food for me and my kids.

Even thought I try my best to get the most bang for out buck each week at the grocery store, I’m also guilty of spending the extra money to purchase a try of pre-cut veggies for a lot more than it would cost to buy them and cut them myself.   I do this because it’s a huge time saver in the kitchen and my kids LOVE dipping into these for a snack.  However, I still like to make my own ranch dip because we like to embellish ours a bit for more flavor!

So I decided to do a twist on a comfort food and share with you our favorite dip recipe using Hood Sour Cream, of course and also turn it into a ‘green’ dip for the upcoming St. Patrick’s Day.  I mean snacks are always more fun with a little food coloring, aren’t they?

Here is what I purchased:

Why the cream cheese?  Because I like to add a little to my dip to make it even creamier and also more yummy!  (OK that so doesn’t sound correct but that’s what it does to it!).   And then I like to cut up some peppers for crunch and color and since this was a GREEN Theme, I went with a green pepper.  Even the Ranch mix had green specks in it!

I chopped the green pepper up in small pieces and added about 4 ounces of cream cheese, the entire tub of Hood Sour Cream ( you can use low fat or fat free versions as well), along with one packet of ranch dip mix.

I mix that really well sort of mashing the cream cheese so it mixes in.  I then added about 4-6 drops of green food coloring to the mix for a nice light green color.  You can use any color food coloring to make this a fun dip as it doesn’t add any flavor to the mix, just color.  Then I let that sit in the refrigerator for at least an hour if not more so the flavors all mix together well!

Again, because this was a green theme, I only cut up green veggies that my girls enjoy to dip – peppers, celery and cucumbers.  We leave the skin on the cucumbers when we dip them!

This may not be your typical ‘comfort food’ but for us right now it is!  And the girls loved adding the food coloring to make it more festive.  They asked if next time I could turn it orange and then dip some orange peppers and carrots.  We may have fun with this!

We tend to keep Hood Sour Cream in our house a lot.  The girls like to add it to their tacos and top off their baked or roasted potatoes with it.  I enjoy added it to salad too!  And of course for making dip for our raw veggies.   But Hood Sour Cream is a great addition to a lot of recipes to make them richer and more flavorful.  Try adding it to your favorite comfort food next time you cook!

Here is the recipe that you can print out:

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Green Ranch Dip for St. Patrick’s Day Dipping

Prep Time: 15 mins + 1 hour refrigerated
Serving Size: one party!

Ingredients:

16 ounces Hood Sour Cream
4 ounces Cream Cheese
1/2 Green Bell Pepper
1 Packet Hidden Valley Ranch Dip Mix
4-6 drops of green food coloring
Dipping Veggies of your choice

Directions:

1. Wash and Chop bell pepper.
2. Mix sour cream, cream cheese, bell pepper, ranch dip mix together in small bowl.
3. Add 4-6 drops of green food coloring and mix well until you get the shade you are looking for.
4. Refrigerate at least 1 hour before serving.
5. Chop veggies of your choice for dipping.
6. Arrange on platter and serve!

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Disclosure: I received a Free product for review. My opinions are 100% mine.