Cheesy Olive Bites Food

CHEESE-WRAPPED OLIVES (BOLLITAS)

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
• In bowl of food processor, combine cheese, butter, paprika/cayenne, and flour.
• Process until smooth.
• Take about 1 Tablespoon of crumbly dough and place in the palm of your hand.
• Place one of the olives in middle of dough.
• Cup your hand to begin fixing dough around olive.
• Roll between palms of hands until dough is smoothly wrapped around olive.
• Sometimes the dough gets a little crumbly, rolling faster helps a bit, and you can stick dough onto any'naked' areas and roll until smooth.
• Repeat until all olives have been wrapped.
• Place onto oiled baking sheet and bake for 15 minutes.
• Due to the amount of cheese in the batter, these will be rather greasy when they emerge from the oven.
• Remove from baking sheet and place between paper towels to remove grease.
• Serve with dipping sauce of choice (I used a mango salsa).
• Note: Upon making these recently, I discovered that the preferred method should be to freeze these on a baking tray for about 3-4 hours before baking. This allows the texture of the 'dough' to remain firm around the balls when baking. Of course if you don't have the time, they are still just as tasty the first way... the balls just don't hold up quite as well in the oven.

OLIVE-CHEESE BREAD BITES

Steps:

• Heat oven to 350°F.
• Drain olives and finely chop them. In a medium bowl, mix olives, cream cheese and 3/4 cup of the Monterey Jack cheese. Place on a baking sheet.
• Spread about 1 Tbsp. olive mixture onto each bread slice. Top with a sprinkle of the remaining Monterey Jack cheese.
• Bake for 10 min.

OLIVE CHEESE BALLS

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees. In a medium bowl, combine cheese, butter, flour and cayenne with a fork until a dough-like form forms. Scoop up a tablespoon of the dough and enclose one olive with dough. Roll into a ball and place on baking sheet. Repeat process using up remaining dough. Sprinkle with paprika. Bake for 15 minutes or until golden. Serve warm.

CHEESE BITES (TOTALLY ADDICTIVE)

Steps:

• Combine cheese, butter, flour, salt, and cayenne in a large bowl: knead into a dough.
• Roll dough into 1 inch balls and place on an un-greased baking sheet.
• If using olives, form each ball around 1 olive.
• If using pecans, press 1 pecan half onto each ball.
• Can bake them right now (see instructions below) or freeze for later.
• Place in trays in freezer for 30 minutes.
• Remove from freezer and place in freezer bags or container.
• Seal and freeze.
• Can bake them straight from freezer.
• Preheat oven to 425°F.
• Place cheese balls 3 inches apart on an un-greased baking sheet.
• Bake 15-17 minutes if frozen, 13-15 minutes if thawed.