STRAWBERRY CREAM CHEESE
This is a dessert thing. But I'll admit to eating it for breakfast a few times. When you're living away from home, you'll eat almost anything for breakfast. I used to wake up at 10:00 for an 11:30 call time at the theatre and eat two cheese dawgs with barbecue sauce, no bun.
Buns cost too much. On days I was out of cheese dawgs, I'd eat Saltines with whatever I could squoosh together in between commercials. I had a lot of trouble with one particular roommate stealing my food, so Saltines I was able to keep in my closet, locked in my suitcase.
A big tip on roommates: Don't buy food that you're not willing to share and lock up anything that you don't have to keep in the refrigerator. I swear my closet looked like an aisle from Kroger's. As far as the cream cheese stuff, I just never told anyone what it was, so they didn't have the courage to try it. Wimps. How I got on this subject, I'll never know...but makes for great reading, I think. Yeah, I'm sure of it. Highly educational stuff. Actually I'm a very generous person, but this particular slimeball also stuck me with a four hundred dollar phone bill...so you can understand why I would be inclined to hide stuff like food and cash.
Hopefully, the dog will read this and feel so guilty that he'll send me my money, after all...I'm not a wealthy person. But, as usual, I digress.
Strawberry cream cheese. I remember.
one block of cream cheese (Oooo...what an original thought.)
a can of strawberries or about a pint of fresh strawberries (I personally am writing this in the middle of the winter, so fresh strawberries seem quite far away)
two teaspoons of sugar (or you can steal a couple of those little packets from the Waffle House or wherever it was you ended up last night for breakfast at 3:30 am.)
** Soften the cream cheese (another original thought).
Squoosh in the sugar, this slightly sweetens the cheese, to make the fruit go better with it. Just trust me on this one. Add the well-drained strawberries. And I do mean well drained. Otherwise there's too much water and the whole stuff gets to be a bit slimy. Not a particularly good word for a recipe, huh? Mix the stuff together well, but without totally destroying the fruit. Oh, by the way, if you're using fresh strawberries, it would be a real good idea to slice them first, otherwise, you just have cream cheese coated strawberry blobs. Which is just nifty, if that's the result you're looking for, but was it?
And if the canned ones are particularly large, slice them too. I personally never kept a sharp knife in the kitchen when I had that one demented roommate. I was always a little concerned that he was going to knife me for drug money.
Perhaps I was a little paranoid, but you weren't living with him, were you? He was about half a bubble off level, if you know what I mean. Don't ask why I was living with him, not that we were "living together", perish the thought...I'd rather sleep with a copperhead. And I HATE snakes. But I'm sure I'll get into that somewhere in the book, keep looking for it. Back to the original subject, whatever the heck it was. Oh yeah, strawberry cream cheese. Basically, you've got it together now. All you need to know is how best to eat it. The ideal is NOT on Saltines watching Designing Women reruns waiting for the psycho to get out of the shower. The ideal is on fresh baked french bread, with nice crusty edges, lightly buttered and then heavily coated with strawberry cream cheese. I also like to include a glass of light white wine. But, to avoid offending any readers who may take a strong view against the spirits, drink a Sprite and don't worry about my soul. Going to hell can only be a continuation of living with the deadbeat. And at least there will be good bourbon there.
While I still have your attention, try this one with a variety of fruits. I suppose I could create six or seven different recipes with the same message, but as I've said before, I'm not getting paid by the word. So far, I've used mandarin oranges, blueberries, blackberries, cherries (ick), apples (double ick), and pineapple.
Most, except for the two noted, were nifty. The mandarin oranges were exceptional and obviously I thought the strawberry was the best. You decide for yourself. Did you think I was going to have all the answers?
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