I needed much more cream cheese than I had in this. Or at least used half of the strawberries. Though this was tasty, there was actually too much of a strawberry flavor and not enough of the cream cheese. I threw a bunch of strawberries into the food processor and then added the 8 ounces of cream cheese I had. It was then that I realized the over abundance of strawberries to cream cheese. It also made the cream cheese a bit runny which didn't really make it a "spread" for the bagels.
Making this again, I would start with the cream cheese in the processor first and then slowly add in the pureed strawberries until I had some pink. I also needed more than a "dash" of sugar (like several teaspoons) so you made need to just keep adding sugar to taste.
FOOD NETWORK INSTRUCTIONS
Sunday June 5, 2011
Whip up a summery spread for bagels: Beat cream cheese, pureed berries and a dash of sugar.
This worked fine on the bagels though Greg found it a bit sweet (he's more of a standard lox and bagel kinda guy). I liked the taste, the extra strawberryness didn't bother me, though it was a bit runnier than regular flavored cream cheese. It did have nice color and really made the bagel stand out on the breakfast tray.
I read up on a bunch of things I could do with strawberry cream cheese (since I had a ton leftover). Spread it on apples or celery, use it in a frosting recipe for a cake, mix with marshmallow cream for a fruit dip, layer with strawberry jello, use as a stuffing for french toast (it would probably work in the Lemon Cream Cheese French Toast I made) spread it on graham crackers (which I have leftover from day 3), use it in the middle of a Nilla Vanilla wafer sandwich, use it as the cream cheese in cream cheese brownies, use it in home made ice cream, or use it in cheese blintzes. I used it as a dip for Triscuits to snack on this afternoon.
I'm usually a plain cream cheese kinda person when it comes to bagels, but I could see making this for a special occasion.
I always end up happier with the end result if I use a regular hand mixer for this. The food processor makes it runny even before you put anything else in. I can't explain why .... demons, I'd guess.
Posted by: Lisa from Arizona that has a dumb blog about packing lunch and hates her job but loves cotton candy. | June 12, 2011 at 01:09 AM