The Life of a Domestique Goddess: Chocolate Chip Cream Cheese Ball Tutorial

Welcome to my first cooking tutorial! Since our awesome Superbowl party food was such a hit, I thought I'd share my not-so-secret recipe for my chocolate chip cream cheese ball. I originally used a recipe from Taste of Home, but I've modified it so much, I regret giving people the original recipe (because that's a sneaky thing my grandmother would do--give you the recipe, but not have it quite right, and you're forever wondering why your dip, although delicious, isn't exactly like mine!)

First, assemble your ingredients:
1 package (8 oz) cream cheese, softened (I use fat free)
1/2 cup butter, softened (that's one stick)
1 teaspoon of vanilla
3/4 to 1 cup powdered sugar (add to taste, some folks think 1 full cup is too sweet, but I think 3/4 is too bitter still)
2 tablespoons light brown sugar (dark can look like spots, but will taste the same)
1 cup mini chocolate chips (consider using mini M&Ms or any small bits of chocolate candy--don't add big chunks!)
Lots of chocolate animal crackers

Next in a bowl put together your very soft butter (I always nuke mine for a few seconds, not to melted, but just to be super soft), soft cream cheese, and vanilla. I use a hand mixer, but I'm sure a regular stand mixer would work fine (just bigger cleaning and usually I use my stand mixer for the "bigger" jobs).

Beat this until fluffy and blended. If your butter is too cold, it'll chunk up. Not a good thing.

This is fluffy... if you've got chunks you can nuke it for a few seconds or let it sit and get to room temp

Next gradually add your sugars. I typically put in all the brown sugar and measure out my powdered sugar in 1/4 cups--and ONE 1/4 cup, and if you're being clean, drape a kitchen towel over your mixer and mix on slow. Then I add in the rest of the powdered sugar in another 1/4 cup. That way when you hit 3/4 powdered sugar, you can taste it to see if it's sweet enough (sneaky!!) Mine wasn't on this, so I added the full cup.

Throwing a kitchen towel over the mixer keeps your kitchen powder sugar free! I do this with my stand mixer, too. Flour, powdered sugar, light mixes--also mix on SLOW. A towel can only do so much!

Nice and creamy... if your powdered sugar is chunky, you may want to sift it first, but mine was fine, so I didn't bother.

Then, put your mixer away. I always blend in chocolate chips with a spoon or a spatula. Otherwise it'll build up in your blades AND might smush your chips... which although tasty, doesn't make it pretty.

mini chips are the best size for this... big chips make for hard to dip dips.

So now you've got your dip! Usually I stop here and don't bother to make a ball. People can dip out of the bowl just fine. However, if you're trying to impress (and oh, I was) you can take it to the next level by making a ball.

First refrigerate the dip for 2+hours, covered. Scoop chilled dip out onto saran wrap, careful to have lots of it ready. Form the dip into a ball, using the saran wrap to form it (it won't stay in a firm ball, but that's okay). Refrigerate for another hour (and/or throw it in the freezer for about 15 minutes, but only if you know you won't forget it!)

In the meantime, crush up a few handfulls of chocolate animal crackers.

For extra fun on this step, imagine the animal crackers screaming for mercy

When the dip is ready, unroll it gently from the saran wrap and roll it in the crumbs. Now it is a full on cookie cheese ball! You don't have to use chocolate, but I think it's the best. Also you don't have to dip with chocolate animal crackers--you can use graham crackers, Teddy Grams, whatever you think is fun. (If you change the dipping medium, you can crush that up as coating just as easily).