Well, I guess now I *have* to have a party because I’ve got a big vat of Spicy Chorizo Cheese Dip and I definitely can’t be left alone in a room with it. I can’t be trusted with this much cheesy goodness. 😳 But if you are going to have a party, like say for football, Halloween, or any other event, this Spicy Chorizo Cheese Dip is totally the way to go! You only need 5 ingredients, and there is no American cheese, Velveeta, or “cheese product” involved. 👏
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“I love this recipe. It’s become a family tradition to make it while camping and on Halloween while handing out candy to trick or treaters.”
Bobbie
Easy Recipe for Spicy Chorizo Cheese Dip
The chorizo is the magic ingredient in this cheese dip, so DON’T leave it out. Chorizo is packed with spices, which will automatically season the entire batch of cheese dip. Make sure you buy Mexican chorizo, which is a fresh ground sausage, not Spanish chorizo, which is a hard-cured sausage. I like to brown it until the edges get a little crispy because those toasty bits add even more flavor. Honestly, I could stop right there and just eat the chorizo straight from the pan…but trust me, it gets even better once the cheese hits the skillet.
P.S. It’s not intentional that half the pictures of this recipe are of me scooping it up with a tortilla chip. I literally couldn’t stop.
Spicy Chorizo Cheese Dip
Servings 6 1/2 cup eachIngredients
- 1/2 lb. Mexican chorizo ($1.37)
- 1 10oz. can diced tomatoes with green chiles (like Rotel) ($1.06)
- 1 12oz. can evaporated milk ($1.42)
- 12 oz. Monterey jack cheese*, shredded ($2.95)
- 3 green onions (garnish) ($0.25)
Instructions
- Brown the chorizo in a skillet over medium heat until it is slightly crispy on the edges. If your chorizo is very fatty, drain some of it off before the next step (leave a couple of tablespoons of fat in the skillet).
- Drain the diced tomatoes with green chiles, then add it to the skillet with the chorizo, and continue to stir and cook until most of the moisture from the canned tomatoes has evaporated away.
- Pour the evaporated milk into the skillet. Stir and cook until heated through.
- Turn the heat under the skillet down to low and let it cool slightly before adding the cheese (it should still be warm enough to melt the cheese, but not too hot that the cheese becomes gritty). Begin adding the cheese, one handful at a time, stirring until it is fully melted in before adding the next handful.
- Once all the cheese has melted into the dip, turn the heat off. Garnish with sliced green onion and serve!
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Notes
Nutrition
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How to Make Chorizo Cheese Dip Step-by-Step Photos
If you’re unfamiliar with Mexican chorizo, it’s a heavily spiced ground pork product. Super yummy. I like this Johnsonville brand chorizo because it’s a lot less greasy than some others I’ve tried. It comes in both links and loose ground meat, like this. If you get links, just cut open the casing and scoop the meat into your skillet.
Brown the chorizo: Brown 1/2 lb. of the chorizo in a skillet over medium heat until it’s a bit crispy on the edges (you can freeze the rest of the chorizo). If your chorizo is super fatty, you may want to drain some of it off before moving to the next step.
If you’re familiar with Rotel, you can use that, or use a generic version of diced tomatoes with green chiles, like I did. Drain the excess liquid from the can before adding them to the skillet.
Make the sauce: Continue to stir and cook the Rotel and chorizo until most of the moisture from the tomatoes has evaporated (another 3-5 minutes).
Add one 12oz. can of evaporated milk to the skillet and allow it to heat through.
Add the cheese: Once the liquid is hot, turn the heat under the skillet down to low. Let everything cool slightly before adding the cheese (it should still be warm enough to melt the cheese, but not too hot that the cheese becomes gritty). Begin adding the 12 oz. of shredded Monterey jack, one handful at a time, stirring until it is fully melted in before adding more. (The liquid looks really orange because the fat from the chorizo is floating on top and it’s orange from all the spices).
Once all the cheese has been melted into the sauce, it will be thick and delicious! Turn the heat off.
Garnish the Spicy Chorizo Cheese Dip with green onions, and serve! (I also reserved a tablespoon or so of the crispy chorizo and used that as garnish.)
Recipe Success Tips!
- Let it cool slightly before adding the cheese. I reduce the heat to low and also recommend letting the evaporated milk mixture cool slightly before adding the cheese. It should still be warm enough that the cheese melts nicely, but if it’s too hot, the cheese might clump and become gritty.
- Use freshly shredded cheese. I know those pre-shredded packs are convenient, but it almost always works out cheaper to shred your own cheese. Pre-shredded cheeses often contain anti-caking agents, too, which can make your dip lumpy.
- Keep it warm. You’ll probably want to keep your Spicy Chorizo Cheese Dip warm so that it stays creamy for your party guests, so I did a little testing. My slow cooker was a bit too large for this batch size, so I tested it in my 2 qt rice cooker on the “warm” setting. It kept the cheese dip creamy and warm for a whole hour, stirring only occasionally, and the dip never clumped up or broke down.
How to Reheat
I also tested reheating the Spicy Chorizo Cheese Dip and it performed well! I spooned about a half cup into a small bowl and microwaved on high for 30 seconds, then stirred, microwaved for about 15 seconds more, and then it was melty, cheesy perfection. No clumping, no separating, just creamy goodness!
I love this recipe. It’s become a family tradition to make it while camping and on Halloween while handing out candy to trick or treaters.
You should really specify in the recipe that it needs to be cooled down before adding the cheese. Followed the recipe step by step and the entire thing curdled the moment we started adding the cheese. The whole thing was ruined, all because you lacked in adding that very important piece of information.
I would like to think you had enough common sense to do this.
Tried the recipe out and it came out very gritty. Any thoughts on why?
This can happen if you use pre-shredded bagged cheese or if the temperature was too high!
Maybe include in the recipe to let the temperature drop before adding the cheese. Wasted $30 of food because of this very simple lack of instruction. How stupid.
If I wanted to use 1lb of chorizo, should I double the rest of the ingredients as well?
Yes!
Hey Beth, you got some great coverage on an NPR TV spot here in Boston last week. It came off really well. Short but great.
Great recipe! I have never made queso dip before and it hit the spot. My wife and I love your recipes, they have added so much to our meals.
Yum! I wonder if I could sub heavy cream for the evaporated milk to make this Keto friendly?
It should work, especially since cream has a higher fat content. However, we haven’t tested it. Let us know the results!
I have tried more queso recipes than I can count in the last couple months and this is by far the best!!! The only thing I did different was add a handful of queso quesadilla cheese only because I had some left from the last queso recipe I tried and I used a 4 oz can of fire roasted green chiles (NOT a fan of tomatoes at all). But this is exactly what I was looking for and I may have already eaten about half of it by myself :)
LOVE this recipe! I even made it with dairy free cheese (Moocho fiesta blend) and it came out SO good! Cut up some bell peppers to dip as well as corn chips and it’s a fiesta in my mouth. =D
Just made this and it turned out so good! Thanks for sharing :)
Thank you all for the comments and questions. All of my concerns were addressed. I cheated! I used Velveeta Mexican and Queso Blanco. It was a hit! I made it the night before and reheated it the day of the party. No problem.
Great recipe, super simple. I used soyrizo to mAke it vegetarian and it was perfect. You don’t really need to cook the soyrizo past heating it up and then just add the drained tomatoes and cook to reduce some of the water. This is a keeper. I think you could do some add-ins if you want like roasted hatch peppers. Thanks!
So easy and tasty. I added some taco sauce and used 1/2 mont jack and 1/2 Old El Paso 3 pepper blend (mont jack w/ jalapeno & habanero and cheddar with chipotle peppers). Loved it.
This recipe sounds great, where do you buy Rotel tomatoes at $0.49?
You can purchase them reasonably at a discount grocer or when you buy a larger amount the price can go down.
Very flavorful recipe, but I think I may have kept the heat too high for too long, as the cheese started to curdle onto the chorizo bits, leading to a soupy texture. I plan to remake it because it tastes so good.
Winner! And it feels so much more virtuous than the one with plastic cheese.Â