I am notorious for buying ingredients for recipes I intend to make and then forgetting what recipe I had in mind 3 seconds after I get my groceries home. This results in random ingredients that languish in my pantry and fridge until I notice that they are about to expire and have to put them in something.
I also tend to buy extra of things on sale with every intention of using them, but sometimes I buy too much extra and the months go by too quickly for me.
This time I had an extra package of low fat cream cheese, and a tub of Cool Whip that had to move to make room in the freezer so muffins and chicken would stop falling on me every time I opened the door. Combine that with too much yogurt, a lemon and the crumbly end of bag of frozen raspberries, and you get something surprisingly creamy and delicious!
Too-Tall Grizzly (Berenstain Bears, anyone?) has also been on a health and energy quest of late that resulted in the end of coffee drinking and late-night ice cream, and the advent of green tea, ground flax seed, avocado smoothies and chia seeds, the latter of which makes an appearance in this recipe since I figured with the raspberry seeds you’d never notice a few extra seeds and I was right. You could make this recipe without the chia, but if you research the health benefits you won’t want to…I dare say they’re worth that trip to the uniquely guilt-inducing health food store with all the oddly glowing employees.
The chia seeds serve as a thickener here that makes the dessert set – I’ve seen some recipes where they replace flour or cornstarch or even eggs with a chia and water mixture, which is what made me think I could add it to this recipe for the same reason, since I was worried about it being too runny given my random ingredients. I think it would have set just fine without them, but you really can’t taste them and it was delicious with them in there.
Light and fresh and fruity, this is totally guilt-free cheesecake. It also doesn’t taste very cream-cheesy thanks to the addition of the yogurt, which meant it was a hit with Carl who is normally not a fan of the flavour of cheesecake because of that main ingredient. My other taste tester also gave it a thumbs-up, as you can see.
Now to find something to do with those leftover dried apricots, poppy seeds and rice vinegar…perhaps not all in the same day.
- CRUST:
- 1½ cups graham cracker crumbs
- ¼ cup sugar
- ⅓ cup butter, melted
- Zest of 1 lemon
- CHEESECAKE:
- 1 (250 g) package low-fat cream cheese, softened
- ¼ cup sugar
- Juice of 1 lemon
- 1 individual serving yogurt, any berry flavour
- 2 cups thawed low-fat Cool Whip
- 1 cup frozen raspberries, smushed
- 2 Tbsp chia seeds
- For crust, combine all ingredients and press into a 8x11" baking dish. Bake at 375 degrees for 9 minutes. (If you want to avoid baking, you can just press this into the pan and skip baking it - I just prefer a crisper crust.)
- For cheesecake, beat cream cheese and sugar until smooth and creamy. Add lemon juice and yogurt and beat until well combined. Gently fold in Cool Whip, then fold in raspberries and chia seeds. Pour onto crust, spreading evenly. Refrigerate 3 hours or until set before serving; store in the fridge or freezer. This is equally good as a frozen dessert.
So good, and soooo easy! I finally bought some Chia seeds after all of your raving about them, and I love the crunch they give!
They’re a great addition to smoothies, berry crisps, and muffins too :)
Just made this one today, but I altered the recipe. I used strawberries instead of raspberries (had them on hand) and I used almost 2 pkg of Dream Whip instead of Cool Whip (again, it’s what I had on hand). I didn’t add the Chia Seeds due to not having them, so we’ll see how it turns out! Sitting in the freezer right now! Thanks for the recipe!
Love Gemma’s thumbs up :)
yummm looks delish :)
Haha. That looks tasty. Rice vinegar is good in stir-fries.
Sounds yummy! Make a salad with the apricots etc!