Pimento Cheese Cracker Spread
Cheese powder, dried peppers, and cold water. Southern tea-party food that survives a pack.
- calories
- 520
- weight
- 3.5 oz
- cal / oz
- 149
- protein
- 14 g
- serves
- 2, scales
- prep
- 5 min
- cook
- 0 min
- total time
- 5 min
- water
- 60 ml cold
- cost
- $
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Snack
- Lunch
- No cook
- Backpacking
- Car camping
- Day hike
- Canoe / raft
- Vegetarian
- Nut free
- Eat in the bag
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Dump and stir
Ingredients
| Sharp cheddar cheese powder | 1/2 cup | the kind sold for popcorn, not a boxed mac packet |
|---|---|---|
| Powdered cream cheese | 3 tbsp | sold with baking or emergency-food supplies |
| Powdered butter or ghee powder | 1 tbsp | |
| Dried diced red bell pepper | 2 tbsp | stands in for jarred pimentos |
| Garlic powder | 1/4 tsp | |
| Onion powder | 1/4 tsp | |
| Paprika | 1/2 tsp | |
| Old Bay | 1/4 tsp | |
| Cayenne | a pinch | |
| Lemon juice powder | 1/2 tsp | citric acid works if that is what you have |
| Salt and cracked pepper | to taste | |
| Sturdy crackers or flatbread | 1 sleeve | rye crisps and pilot bread do not shatter |
Method
- Put the dried peppers in the bag with 2 tbsp of cold water and leave them ten minutes. They need the head start.
- Add the rest of the powders to the same bag.
- Work in cold water a tablespoon at a time, kneading the bag, until it turns into a thick paste. Stop before it goes runny.
- Let it sit five minutes. The cream cheese powder keeps drinking water and it will firm up.
- Spread on crackers with the back of a spoon.
This started as a tea-party spread built on refrigerated block cheese, jarred pimentos, and cream cheese. None of that travels. Cheese powder and powdered cream cheese carry the same fat and salt at a fraction of the weight, and dried bell pepper rehydrates into something close enough to pimento that the difference stops mattering after a few miles.
The order matters more than the ratios. Peppers first, because they take the longest and will stay leathery if you dump everything in at once. Then water in small increments — powdered dairy absorbs slowly, so a mix that looks right immediately will be soup in five minutes.
Packing
All the powders and spices premixed in one small bag at home. Dried peppers can ride in the same bag. Crackers in a rigid container or you carry crumbs.
Variations
- Stir in a foil packet of chicken and it becomes lunch instead of a snack.
- Boil water for black tea if you have a stove going. That is the whole point of the original.
- A spoonful of olive oil makes it richer and adds calories you are probably short on.
https://www.pinchmeimeating.com/mothers-day-afternoon-tea-menu