Chocolate And Cream Cheese Layered Dessert

Behold The Sedimentary Rock-Like Composition Of Toasted Walnut-Crusted Sweetness!!!

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Loads of cookery experimentation tends to take place in my kitchen. Some of the results are meh, some are more than edible, and occasionally one of my culinary inspirations rises above awesome.

Yesterday we attended a dinner party at one of our dear friend's house. I would have looked forward to that event solely on the prospect of the company alone, but as it was our back to homeschool feast dinner, I felt the need to bring on the exemplary nosh.

Dishes that were in dinner attendance were some freshly constructed, yummy chicken enchiladas and pico de gallo made from homegrown tomatoes that had been lying on my counter, but it was my dessert creation that won the hearts and minds of the dinner attendees. It was a toasted walnut crust of crunchaliciousness, cream cheesecake layer of lip-smacking goodness, creamy chocolate pudding tastiness, and milk chocolate and walnut topped dish of wanna-wear-it-on your face heaven. I guess I could have just said that it was pretty good.

It is with all that fanfare that I now present you with the layered ambrosia of dessert utopia. To start, I wanted the crust to have some substance, so I threw some walnuts in a 350 degree oven for about ten minutes. You can also toast walnuts in a dry skillet on the stove, but some reason I always toast them in the oven. I've been burned by the skillet method before.

Once the walnuts were toasty and fragrant, I pulsed them a few times in Old Trusty, my garage sale, Cuisinart food processor that my grandma got me at least fifteen years ago. I love OT!

Next, I placed some flour and chunks of cold butter in Old Trusty and pulsed those two crust components until they were nice and crumbly.

That's some nice crumblage right there!

I then added my walnut pieces and gave the whole crust conglomerate a pulse to combine:

Then it was time for my favorite part of any recipe, preschooler developmental skills time! I pressed that crust into an ungreased pan like a Boss Baby!

I baked the crust until golden brown and let it cool completely, for I felt like melted cream cheese and chocolate pudding layers of goo was not the look that I was going for.

Childlike moment of crust fun diversion completed, I moved back to adult world and whipped some cream cheese and powdered sugar together. They looked lonely and deflated, so I folded in some thawed frozen whipped topping.

Using my best tactile skills,I spread the cream cheese layer onto the cooled crust.

After that bit of impressive filling application, I moved on to my favorite part of most desserts, the chocolate. Into my mixing bowl I sprinkled a couple of packs of chocolate pudding, some milk, and whipping cream. I actually thought I was going to have more whipping cream than I ended up using, but the contents of my fridge are always hit or miss thanks to the presence of more than a few adolescents.

Next, I carefully covered the chocolate layer in a whipped topping coat.

And finally I moved on to the garnish. I didn't have any chocolate chunks (EGADS!), but I did have a few pounds of milk chocolate chips. I didn't want to place them whole on top of the dessert, so I pulsed the chips a few times in OT. I then threw my reserved toasted walnuts into the food processor fray and pulsed them all a couple of times. Yum!

The end result didn't look too shabby and was completely edible. Okay, it was beyond edible, the dish lasted all of 26 seconds as soon as the plethora of kids at the dinner found out we had cut and were serving it.

I would have made this dessert again anyway, as I thought it was rather smashing, but apparently one eleven year old in attendance will expire and depart this life if he doesn't have this dessert again in a fortnight. We can't be having that sort of thing occurring, now can we?

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Layered Cream Cheese And Chocolate Dessert

1 cup flour
1/2 cup cold butter
1 cup toasted walnuts, divided
1 8 ounce package cream cheese
1 cup powdered sugar
16 ounces frozen whipped topping (or sweetened whipped cream might be nice)
3 1/2 cups milk
1/2 cup whipping cream
2 packages (3 ounces each) instant chocolate pudding
1 cup milk chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place flour and butter into a food processor and pulse til crumbly, or you can cut the butter into the flour in a small bowl. Add the walnuts and stir in. Press the walnut mixture into the bottom of an ungreased 9X13 pan. Bake until lightly browned, around 12-14 minutes. Cool completely.

Beat cream cheese and powdered sugar in a bowl until smooth, fold in 8 ounces of whipped topping. Spread cream cheese mixture over cooled crust.

Beat chocolate pudding, milk, and whipping cream together in a bowl for two minutes. Spread on top of the cream cheese layer.

Spread remaining whipped topping on top of the chocolate layer, Sprinkle the chocolate chips and reserved walnuts on top of the whipped topping. I pulsed my chocolate chips a few times in the food processor so they weren't so bulky, you could also chop them a bit on a cutting board if so inclined.

Refrigerate until cold, cut into bars, and serve to people you like.

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Notes: If you want your chocolate layer a tad more crisp looking in the layerness department, decrease the milk added to the pudding to 2 1/2 cups. I prefer a more mousse-like pudding layer, and would probably do a 3 cups milk to 1 cup whipping cream ratio, but some child used almost all of my whipping cream to make some scones, so I went with what I had.

You could also top the bars with chocolate syrup or hot fudge, but honestly, one of my friend's kids, a child whom only lives on peanut butter and mac and cheese, inhaled a huge slice of the layered dessert. He loudly proclaimed:

"You should experiment all of the time!"

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And as always, all of the images in this post were taken on the author's non-worrying about its blood sugar iPhone.

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