White Chocolate Cheesecake Puddings with Blueberry Bourbon Jam & Basil

When I was a little girl my mother was really good at making desserts.  Two of my favorites were pudding (which I feel like we had a lot of in little pyrex cups ) and cheesecake cupcakes.  The puddings were usually chocolate and the cupcakes always had either blueberry or cherry topping right from the garden,  I mean can…I’d always pick off the berry parts and eat the cheesecake with the sauce of the berries.  Thinking back on it now it is sort of amazing she made as many desserts as she did since she is not even a dessert eater.

The other day I was craving something sweet and super easy to make.  I looked through book after book for the perfect dessert and it all felt too complicated for the moment.  You know when you get that “I have to eat it now” thought in your head? For me it is usually with cookie dough but in this case it was some sort of sweet pudding.

As I was in a bit of a “need it now” mood I did not let the cream cheese come to room temperature.  But really, you should.  By being a tad more patient I would have had a lump free pudding.  In any event…I just thought of it as texture and moved on very quickly from letting it bother me.

Ingredients:

2 eight oz. packages of cream cheese

2 tablespoons of sugar

3 cups of milk

1 box of Jell-O white chocolate pudding mix

I know someone in this house will give me a little bit of a hard time for that last ingredient…but we did not have any proper white chocolate in the house and I was a little desperate.  Use what you’ve got, right?

I mixed the cream cheese and one cup of milk together before adding the other ingredients.

I layered this dessert in little glass cups by placing a layer of the pudding mix and then some of this incredible Blueberry Bourbon Jam   from The Jam Stand in Brooklyn…repeated and then topped with a few pieces of basil.  The jam is so good.  Blueberry, bourbon and a hint of vanilla with these gorgeous little berries.  The cups are pretty tiny, so this dessert is really just perfect as it gives you that taste of sweet and then lets the craving be freed from your relentless thoughts which are screaming “I need dessert, I need dessert, I need dessert”.