As I have already mentioned in previous recipes, I am blessed to have my mother-in-law visit fortnightly to run a baking class with my kids.
My three eldest children have been doing distance education for the past few months, and this year their workload (and social life!) has picked up. This means that the only child available to do the baking class is my 4 year old daughter, Sienna. We decided not to enrol her in kindy this year, so opportunities like this to have one-on-one attention and be taught explicitly are appreciated! Sienna isn’t able to do the more complex cooking and chopping skills that my older children are, so bringing to life some of the simple baking recipes from Grandma’s recipe book are perfect for her little hands.
I have been super busy myself, running the home, helping with our business and overseeing the distance ed. that I have been neglectful of adding recipes to Country Recipebook…. Sorry! So I thought this new year was the perfect opportunity for a fresh start and a simple way to ‘kill two birds with one stone’. Here we are! Hoping you enjoy the beginning of some new additions. Old school recipes, inexpensive and high on the comfort radar…. Like this Light Cheese Cake Slice.
This Light Cheese Cake Slice is decadent, yet easy to make…. With a catch! Unfortunately Arnott’s has discontinued their line of Lattice biscuits. I wasn’t sure what would be a suitable alternative until I discovered you can use Sao biscuits and brush on a sugar syrup. You don’t need to use as many Sao biscuits, as they are around 10mm bigger than the Lattice variety. Sao still provide the crispy, salty base and the sugar syrup adds the sweetness.
Sienna’s cousin, George, came over and helped out with the bake this week. He and Sienna seemed to especially enjoy taste-testing the sugar syrup and were full of beans afterwards! Even with this extra layer of work, the Light Cheese Cake Slice was simple to make and a crowd pleaser. I accidentally bought too much cream cheese and unsalted butter, so I decided to double the recipe. There ended up being plenty for us to enjoy, as well as plenty to share with our neighbours. *Please note, the recipe below is for a single batch only.
We hope you enjoy it as much as we did!
- 1 dessertspoon gelatine
- ½ cup boiling water
- ½ lb (225g) cream cheese
- ½ lb (225g) unsalted butter
- ½ cup castor sugar
- Vanilla
- Approx. 1.5 packets Lattice biscuits (or, a few less Sao biscuits with a sugar syrup brushed on)
- Have cheese and butter at room temperature.
- Dissolve the gelatine in water. Add to the remaining ingredients already in a bowl.
- Beat together until creamy.
- Spread on top of about twelve biscuits in a tray and allow to set in the fridge.
- Cut into fingers to serve.
- Keep refrigerated in an airtight container.
