Rotting Flesh Hoagie Dip

Bring a dish to pass? They didn’t see you coming!

The packaging is the kicker in this grotesque Halloween dip. Show up toting one of these to your next Halloween bash and you’ll be the talk of the party. 

The black bottom packaging is a Styrofoam tray from the meat department of the grocery store. If you ask nicely, the butcher may just give a shiny new one. The one that I am using originally came with a rib-eye steak (which isn’t a bad way to get your tray!). I ate the steak and then washed the black tray in soapy dish water.

If something can be truly disgusting and incredibly delicious at the same time, this is it!

This is really straightforward and quite simple to make. It’s the filling you would find in a traditional hoagie sandwich, all chopped up and served with the bread on the side.

Makes enough for three extremities (I only made two)
Serves 8-10

Rotting Flesh Hoagie Dip
4oz cream cheese, room temperature
½ cup mayonnaise
2 Tbs olive oil
½ lb sliced deli ham
¼ lb sliced deli roasted turkey
¼ lb sliced deli hard salami
2oz cheddar cheese
2oz provolone cheese
1 cup chopped tomato
2 cups chopped romaine lettuce
¼ cup finely chopped sweet onion
¼ cup finely chopped pepperoncini peppers
2 tsp red wine vinegar
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp dried basil
½lb prosciutto
1lb loaf Italian bread, cut into slices

To make the dressing mixture, place the cream cheese in a microwave-safe bowl and heat for 20-30 seconds to soften (try to make sure there are no lumps) and then stir in the mayonnaise, and olive oil and then set aside.

Stack up the meat slices and chop them into roughly 1/4” pieces. I cut them into strips one way and then the opposite way to make small squares. Place the meat into a large bowl.

Next, cut the cheese into small pieces and add it to the bowl with the meat.

Chop the lettuce by cutting several times lengthwise, and then chop it into small pieces in the other direction.

Cut the tomato in half across its equator and then remove the seeds and gel and then chop the tomato into small pieces. 

Finely mince the onion and then add it to the bowl along with the lettuce and tomato.

Pour the dressing mixture over the ingredients, spread it around and gently fold to combine everything.

Very finely chop the pepperoncini and add it to the bowl along with the vinegar, oregano and basil and fold again until just combined.

Here’s where the fun starts…

We will be building the extremities directly on the trays and be using about one-third of the mixture for each one. You will smear some on the perimeter of the tray, but it’s not the end of the world, you can wipe it off with a damp paper towel. End of the world, get it? Zombie Apocalypse. Rotting flesh hoagie dip? Come on!

Look at your own hand for reference and place it on the tray to see about how it should look.

I found it easiest to grab handfuls of the dip mixture out of the bowl and place them on the tray. This will be messy. Start with the main part of the hand and wrist. Add as much of the mixture as possible without making it look too bulky; pack the mixture down.

Next, use a small amount to construct the fingers. Once you are satisfied with the shape of the hand (and it doesn’t have to be perfect, the prosciutto will cover up any flaws and add a lot of shape to the fingers).

Next, the foot! Do look at your bare foot for reference, but please don’t place it on the tray! Start by constructing the flat profile of the bottom of the foot. Add small indents for where the toes will go, and then add more of the mixture to build up the bridge of the foot and ankle.

Chill both the hand and foot for an hour to firm them up.

To cover the hand with rotting flesh… just take pieces and start to lay them on the mixture. For covering most of the hand I used pieces of prosciutto cut in half.

For each finger I used one-third pieces, draping them over the fingers and using a toothpick to tuck under the edges.

For the toes I took a whole piece of prosciutto and cut a slit about every inch. Then I laid the whole piece over where the toes would be and used a toothpick to help tuck the edges under.

I then cut strips and wrapped them around each toe to make them more defined.

To cover the main part of the foot I just draped over pieces of prosciutto, using the same technique as covering the hand. 

I recommend using one piece of plastic wrap stretched lengthwise over each of the trays.

If you use two pieces overlapping each other, it is harder to see the detail of what is underneath them.

If you will be traveling with your extremities, you may want to secure the plastic wrap on the bottom with packing tape.

You can get rotting flesh at your local deli, right?

To make the labels I was able to easily peel the price stickers from the meat I had purchased to make the dip. If yours won’t come off easily or without being ripped, cut around the sticker and just leave that part of the bag attached to it (you will need to tape it to your package if you do this).

Next I simply cut off the top part of the label that said “ham” so that I could write in my own label. I also cut the label smaller so that it wouldn’t take up the whole view of the masterpiece underneath it. With a black marker I wrote at the top, “Rotting Hand Hoagie Dip” and “Rotting Foot Hoagie Dip.”

Place the deli sticker on (not over the fingers or toes, otherwise it would be hard to tell what they were) and serve! Guests can use a knife or spoon to dig into the flesh and then spread it on the Italian bread.