Garden Cream Cheese Sandwich Spread
This is a quick and easy recipe for a creamy, garden cream cheese spread that will rival anything you can find in the supermarket. We used this on our Grilled Vegetable Pita sandwiches mainly because we could, but it would also be great on bagels or in a chicken wrap. Use it as a fancy dip for a party! Or thin it out with some stock or milk and make a veggie, creamy pasta sauce.
Use whatever kind of solid, block cream cheese you'd like; the whipped kind won't work here. Stir everything together and let it mellow in the fridge for an hour before you go to eat it, because you need to let the vegetables rehydrate in the cheese. And while most of our measurements are solidly determined, we suggest that you add Ground Celery Seed incrementally. It's got a pungent flavor that could overwhelm the other ingredients. Add a little bit right as the final ingredient, stir well, taste, and adjust as necessary.
If you don't have the time to let the cream cheese sit, you can rehydrate the vegetables in a bath of hot water; pour in just enough to get them damp and drain them well after 5 minutes. Then mix as usual and eat.
- 4 oz (1/2 packet) cream cheese
- 1/2 teaspoon olive oil (maybe even less - just need a little bit to get a smooth, spreadable consistency
- 1/4 teaspoon Tomato Flakes
- 1/4 teaspoon California Roasted Minced Garlic
- 1/4 teaspoon Dried Shallots or minced onion
- 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon Ground Celery Seed
- In a small bowl mix cream cheese and just enough olive oil to get a smooth consistency. It should still be thick, just a little easier to spread than cream cheese alone.
- Add the tomato flakes, dried shallots, and minced garlic; mix until they have combined with the cream cheese.
- Add ground celery seed in small increments; mix, taste, and add more as necessary.
- Refrigerate for about an hour to allow the flakes to soften into the cream cheese.