For a straightforward brunch improve, skip the store-bought flavored cream cheese and make your individual with a block of endlessly customizable plain cream cheese. Its easy and gentle base permits for a variety of taste enhancements, making it straightforward to create specialty spreads and dips that match your preferences.

Flavored cream cheese spreads are incredible served on bagels — toasted or not. However in addition they make an excellent addition to snack boards, the place they function a tangy, cooling complement to pretzels, crackers, or recent greens like cucumbers and celery. In order for you a looser consistency, you possibly can stir in heavy cream, yogurt, or bitter cream to create a dip for chips and softer breads.

When doctoring up cream cheese, it’s greatest to begin small. You’ll be able to all the time add extra seasoning or components, however as soon as blended, the one approach to tone down overly intense flavors is so as to add extra plain cream cheese. Begin by mixing in a number of tablespoons of finely chopped dill, mint, or basil. Or lean right into a candy taste profile by stirring in brown sugar and the seeds of a scraped vanilla bean. Keep away from including components which might be overly juicy (comparable to oranges or tomatoes), and if doable, give the flavors time to develop and meld after mixing by chilling the unfold within the fridge for an hour or extra earlier than serving.

Right here’s easy methods to make your individual flavored cream cheese — and a few scrumptious concepts for what to combine in. 

Find out how to make flavored cream cheese

Begin with a base of 4 ounces softened cream cheese and three tablespoons bitter cream, then stir within the under mix-ins to pair along with your subsequent bagel sandwich. With slight changes, you too can rework any of them right into a dip to serve with chips or crackers.

1. The whole lot pickle

You don’t have to decide on between your love for dill pickles or the toasty, nutty, and savory notes that all the pieces seasoning brings to bagels. As a substitute, stir them collectively for a diffusion or dip that’s tangy and crunchy. Stir dill pickle relish, chopped recent dill, and some dashes of all the pieces seasoning into your base for a zesty cream cheese. To make it a dip, skinny the combination with heavy cream.

2. Caviar and onion

Substitute crème fraîche for the bitter cream, after which combine in finely chopped crimson onion, lemon zest, and caviar (these are our favorites) for a vivid and briny cream cheese. For a dipping consistency, use a 2:1 ratio of crème fraîche to cream cheese. (Should you desire, American paddlefish roe is a much less dear various to caviar.)

3. Chili crisp

This fashionable condiment is full of fried chile peppers and aromatics that may carry spicy warmth to your cream cheese base. Chinese language variations of chili crisp typically characteristic components like preserved black beans and tingly Sichuan pepper, whereas Mexican variations (additionally known as salsa macha) may get their warmth from jalapeño or serrano chiles. Stir chili crisp, cilantro, and a splash of soy sauce into your base for an umami-rich cream cheese with a kick. To make it a dip, skinny the combination with extra bitter cream.

4. Muffuletta 

Finely chop your favourite store-bought olive salad and stir into your cream cheese base. Recognized for its key function in a muffuletta sandwich, this mixture of pickled and brined veggies, peppers, and inexperienced olives performs off the wealthy cream cheese and provides salty and tangy accents. To make this a dip, skinny the combination with heavy cream — and for a little bit extra warmth sprinkle with chopped sizzling pickled peppers.

5. Suya-spiced

Suya is a West African seasoning mix made with floor roasted peanuts and a mixture of spices that brings heat and spicy warmth to dishes like Rooster Suya. Attempt the spice mix in our hen recipe, or buy from an African grocery retailer or on-line. Add suya spice mix into your cream cheese base, a couple of half teaspoon at a time, till you attain what fits your tastes. To make it a dip, skinny the combination with plain yogurt.

6. Candy and sizzling

Dissipate that jar of pepper jelly on the door of your fridge by swirling it into softened cream cheese. Quite than utterly mixing within the jelly, add it in dollops so that you just get shock bursts of candy, vinegary jelly with spicy warmth, and extra cooling moments of simply cream cheese. To make a dip, first skinny the cream cheese with heavy cream earlier than swirling within the dollops of jelly.