Buffalo Chicken Cups with Celery Blue Cheese Relish

Ever have a recipe just wander around in your mind and never really work it's way out?  Well, I've had this one going on for a LONG TIME.  The other day Bobby emailed and said that we would be attending a "Hail and Farewell" (my first) in a couple of weeks.  The invite says "bring an appetizer or dessert to share", so I decided it was time to get this recipe out of my head and see if it works.  It does.  I don't know if this will be what I take to the party but I'm glad I figured out that this works and is yummy so that I can make it again and so that I could share it with you!

There are pictures with this recipe, but they are courtesy of my phone so they are not excellent quality, I think you can see what's going on though.

What you need:

Pre-baked mini phyllo cups (my box had 15 and since I was just making them to try this was enough)
2 stalks celery, cleaned, dried
1 1/2 teaspoon red wine vinegar
1/2 cup bottled blue cheese dressing (use the stuff in the refrigerated section, I used the WalMart brand)
3 Tablespoons whipped cream cheese (cold)
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
salt and pepper to taste
1 cup cooked shredded chicken
1 Tablespoon cream cheese (whipped is fine)
1 Tablespoon butter
1/4 cup of Frank's Hot Sauce (more to taste)

How to proceed:

Pre-heat oven according to directions on your phyllo cups.  Dice celery very small (almost a brunoise).  Put celery in a bowl and add in red wine vinegar, toss to coat.  In a separate bowl combine dressing, 3 tablespoons cold whipped cream cheese and garlic powder, salt and pepper to taste.  Pour dressing over celery and stir to combine.  Add chicken to the bowl you made your dressing in (no need to clean it) add in cream cheese and butter, microwave 30 seconds, stir, if needed microwave another 30 seconds and stir again, you want the chicken, cream cheese, and butter to be well combined.  Add in the hot sauce, stir, taste, add more hot sauce if desired.

Place phyllo cups on a baking sheet, fill each with chicken mixture (enough to fill, but not over fill the cup).  Bake according to package directions (mine said 5-8 minutes).  Remove from oven and top each cup with a generous helping of your celery "relish".  Serve immediately.

These were super easy and super yummy.  Even my two year old Bug liked them...of course he will kind of eat anything...My husband liked them too and he's more picky (and doesn't really like blue cheese like I do).