Ritz Box Red Onion and Black Pepper Spread

A few weeks ago while while visiting my Dad's house I saw a recipe on the back of a Ritz Cracker Box for Red Onion and Black Pepper Spread. It looked easy and good so I took a picture of the back of the box and last week I finally got around to making it. Besides me making a mess of chopping everything it turned out really good! I was requested to make it again for an Orioles game get together this evening, so I thought I'd share.

Here's my great recipe saving/sharing skills (the iPhone picture).

A few notes:

- You know I used reduced fat cream cheese, no one needs all the fat in the regular kind, and it honestly doesn't taste any different. :) 

- It's a pain in the butt to chop all that onion. My eyes were watering like crazy. However, I actually added a little more onion than the recipe called for, probably a little under 1/2 a cup. 

- What the heck is pan toasted garlic? My friend who is a chef told me its the same thing as roasted garlic. So you could do it in the oven, but since its only 1 clove it was really easy for me just to dump the clove in a non-stick saute pan with a teeny tiny bit of olive oil and heat it for a few minutes on very low heat (I burnt the first one).

- I added a little bit of garlic powder to the mixture. Not much, maybe 1/2 a tsp, but it really had a great taste to it. 

- It never really hardened up in the fridge, its really messy to roll, just expect your hands to be covered in gooey cream cheese when you wrap and unwrap it. (PS. Make sure you add the parsley after you plate it).

Here's everything in the mixing bowl.

And of course I forgot to take a photo of the finished product but it did look exactly like it said it would. I served it with Ritz crackers and of course some veggies. I thought it was really good spread on a cucumber slice or on a piece of celery. 

So this back of the box recipe is definitely recommended by me. Happy snacking! :)