This month, I have been posting holiday inspired recipes. Have you noticed?
Just a few fun recipes to enjoy during the holidays including: sweet potato soufflés, flourless chocolate cookies & Sweet and Spicy Pecans! Well, today is no different! You will go ape over this Pineapple Walnut Cheese Ball. It is so simple and so ridiculously creamy. For me, this cheese ball is true comfort food. And who doesn’t need a little comfort food during the hectic holiday season when you have to deal with the relatives?! (HA!) Just kidding, of course!
A little green scallion adds a hint of onion flavor to the sweet pineapple and cream cheese mixture. Trust me….it’s all good.
OH…did you know Green Valley offers a lactose free cream cheese? I was so excited to see this product!! Seriously, I get way too happy when I find food product that my FODMAPers can eat!! Thanks Green Valley!!
I have made this cheese ball twice already this holiday season. One day, it was my lunch! Oops. I didn’t eat the whole thing (thankfully)…but it would be easy to. It’s that good.
And the winner of the holiday tags is Stacey!! Thanks for all your wonderful comments!
Pineapple Walnut Cheese Ball
Ingredients
- Makes one cheese ball--serves 8 people
- 1/2 cup crushed pineapple: either use canned crushed pineapple drained of all the juice or pulse fresh pineapple in the food processor and drain any fluid (consistency should be like crushed pineapple--not pureed.)
- 1, 8 ounce container Green Valley lactose free cream cheese (slightly softened at room temperature)
- 2 tablespoons sliced green onions
- 1 cup chopped walnuts
Instructions
- Place a piece of parchment paper on your table.
- In medium bowl, mix together pineapple and cream cheese until blended.
- Fold in green scallions.
- Form into a ball and place on parchment paper.
- Add walnuts to parchment paper--and roll ball over walnuts evenly covering the cream cheese mixture.
- Place on plate, cover with plastic wrap and keep in refrigerator until serving.
- Serve with suitable crackers.
Liz
Thanks for the cheese ball recipe Kate. I’m thinking that regular cream cheese is low in lactose and that possibly lactose free is unnecessary – I haven’t found Green Valley products where I live in Canada (Vancouver). The Kraft Philadelphia Light cream cheese I have in my fridge at the moment has 1 gram of carbohydrates/sugars (0% daily value). I see that bacterial culture and lactic acid are ingredients. Normally I add Lactaid drops to cream cheese and sour cream so my daughter can eat them but I’m wondering if this is necessary for the cream cheese – it has the same amount of carbohydrates as the cheddar cheese we buy and she tolerates. Thanks!
katescarlata
Agree Liz–most people could probably tolerate the regular cream cheese–but lactose content varies product to product–and portion size limits need to be adhered to. With the lactose free–portion size can be a bit more liberal.
tomasz
Unfortunately I tried this recipe as I discovered the cream cheese and its delicious. But my cheeseball was way to soft to form into a ball. Only thing I could think of is rather than trying to drain/dry the pineapple use fresh pineapple only otherwise this cream cheese turns cream soup. So I ended up with a chunky pineapple walnut cream cheese.
Rebecca
It might help to mix the cream cheese, pineapple and green onions together, then put the blob in plastic wrap and place in refrigerator until firm. Then you can unwrap and roll in chopped nuts.
Cindy W
I just made this tonight and it was very good. Mine turned out to be more of a log shape but that was fine. Thanks for the recipe!